Well it’s getting to be later July and we’re in the heat of summer. We had a very good tarpon season overall and again I don’t update this website as much during prime tarpon months as that’s what we’re doing 95% of the time. Though now that we’re into July there are definitely some other things we start doing as tarpon fishing can be a little less consistent and we start exploring in the backcountry more. Many of the tarpon that are here during season have moved on so we’re left with the residents. The numbers you see any given day aren’t near what they are in April or May, but sometimes you can still have pretty good fishing and combine that with much less fishing pressure and it’s not bad. And some years in the backcountry we get some pretty good size groups of resident tarpon that can rival the big days of the early migratory season. However so far this summer it’s not been tons of fish though that can change and I’m sure it will at some point so if you are looking to tarpon fish, we’ll give you the rundown on what to expect and often times we recommend being open to other opportunities in addition to tarpon.
I did fish a little bit a couple weeks ago. I just got back from the Bahamas but earlier in July I have some reports. I did tarpon fish one day locally around the bridges and we had a tough day the first week of July. We actually saw a decent number of fish but whatever was going on they were just not biting. We fished the bridges and then around some local channels and basins. Everywhere we saw fish and we worked them hard but no love for us. So that kind of put the nail in the coffin for me to call the ‘end’ of prime tarpon season lol! A few days later we fished the backcountry and that was very good we had a big day with snook, redfish, and some small goliath groupers. I would say a 30+ fish day so that was pretty good. A few days later we had requests for tarpon but we decided to spend part of the day doing the snook thing and then try for tarpon later. Snook fishing was OK that day we had to work at it but caught maybe 8 or 10 or so. Then the last half of the day we looked for tarpon and low and behold we found a pretty good group of them offshore kind of about as far as we normally see them away off the backcountry beaches. We worked them for a couple hours and we jumped two fish after putting ample time in, then finally right before the buzzer we hooked a nice 60# fish we landed and got good pictures of. So we made it happen but it did take some work and a bit of luck.
Capt. Steve has been out since I’ve been away the last 10 days or so. They have had OK tarpon fishing locally still getting a few bites around the bridges and channels. Typically not where you are hooking a bunch of fish but if you put time in you can get a shot or two. He’s had some good permit fishing around the slack tide at the bridges too with permit landed on multiple trips. They also had some bonefish on some days and completed 2 backcountry slams on one of the days! Bravo! And they also have been in the backcountry doing the snook/redfish thing which was fair too. So all in all a little bit of everything and it’s best to be open to suggestion as to what to try. Steve will be gone the month of August but I will be taking a few trips and Capt. Trent is also available as well. So give us a shout if you want to get out there and we hope to see you down here in the Florida Keys!
Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
