Backcountry Fishing Reports

Great day with Mike, Michael, and Don! The boys wanted to get into the backcountry creeks and such, but with it being calm with the light south wind, I told them we might be better off fishing open water. We tried it early on and bugs chased us away. But we went to plan B and got into an insane mackerel bite. Had to take the chum out of the water and we were throwing bare hooks catching them as fast as we could. But lots of cut offs, thats what we call it when it’s too good. We ran back inshore and found a good load of tarpon moving through the gulf. We set up and within 20 minutes, Michael hooked a big one! We had something else on the other rod too. But stayed with the tarpon and landed him, though the other fish had run out all our line and snapped us off! I think it was just a big Ray or something. Anyways we were happy you have landed the tarpon. Got some pics and let it go. After that the tarpon didn’t seem to respond much, but we had plenty of big shark action. We ran over a monster tripletail running back inshore and landed it, probably a 14 lber. We tried a snook spot without any luck but got a bunch of nice trout. Then we had a few more minutes and stopped in a redfish hole, catching about 20 of them in 15 minutes before heading home. Back at it tomorrow!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Fun fishing with pops again, and his lucky streak continues! We were hoping it’d be flat clam and we might find those permit again. Though we started to run back there and it seemed to be rough and just didn’t feel right, so we bailed on that. Tried a few other spots out there and did get into a mess of spanish mackerel and jacks with some big sharks mixed in. We ran back inshore and checked a few other areas too, way up the coast but the tide was high too high for the spots I wanted to hit, and too low to get up in the other areas. But we decided to work another area I don’t often fish just to try something new. We didn’t have much luck at first, blind casting on the trolling motor. But after a little while and some patience, I hooked a big snook that made a blistering run! Unfortunately the hook pulled, and I was using a smaller hook as I wasn’t expecting such a monster. I thought that might be our shot at the fish of the day, but my dad made a cast right in the same area and then he hooked a monster too that made the same type of run. He landed a gorgeous fish probably a 15 lber! We ended up getting a double header a little later after that which was cool, and then walking the shore my dad got another one. He had been wanting to get a nice picture with a snook on the shoreline which we had the perfect opportunity. After that we had to run in, but what a way to end our day.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Day 2 with Howard and company along with Capt. Bill Bassett. Winds laid down nicely 12 mph out of the north or so and getting very calm by the afternoon. We fished some shorelines and had good action with nice size trout, with a few redfish, a black drum, and a good size snook too! After that we hit the creeks, getting into a mess of smaller redfish. We then ran out and caught some tripletails on the buoys. Saw quite a few but nothing real large. We hit a couple wrecks quickly that held mostly Jacks but Howard did have a big Goliath grouper eat his light rod, but we couldn’t do much with him. He seemed hesistant to eat any larger bait we tried to put down. After that we tried a few spots we had luck at yesterday, not a whole lot there but did get another snook and redfish. Called it a day after that, lots of fun and great action. A couple days off now though should be warming right back up with some calm weather!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Fantastic day with Howard and Amit. There buddies came down and also fished with Capt. Bill Bassett on his boat. We had a cold front come in yesterday. Didn’t get crazy cold but the winds cranked hard and definitely cooled off a bit. Super low tides early with the wind blowing it out. We were barely able to get where we wanted but squeaked in there. Howard got s snook right off the bat, then a red a little later. We had to jump around, but got on a better redfish bite after that. Took a little bit to get them going, but when they did it was strong fishing with lots of double headers! After the tide quit and wind laid off slightly, we decided to try some other things. We got on a pretty good snook bite, water looked great with a nice easy tide. Howard and Amit both caught a good handful of snook, with four being nice size ones and several smaller ones too. Amit also jumped a small tarpon. We also picked a few more redfish and a sheepshead. We tried one last spot in hopes of something real big, but not much luck there. A bunch of catfish but on another nearby spot we tried and did find some Jacks and nice size trout. Day 2 tomorrow let’s see what it brings!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Got out with Rick and Greg today for what was to be a full day trip.  The weather had other ideas though it looked pretty nasty with some incoming rain before a minor cold front that was hitting us.  But it looked fishable at least for a while.  We blasted out and it wasn’t too bad until we hit the line of weather.  We battoned down and had to run through about 4 miles of torrential downpour, but once we got through to the other side it was kinda nice.  We caught a ton of redfish for about an hour.  It started to drizzle lightly after that and the tide quit.  We looked for some tarpon and found quite a few.  But they weren’t interested in our offerings, though we caught several blacktip sharks including a couple size large ones!  After that we could see some tarpon free jumping and kept moving out towards them, it looked like it would be good fishing.  But the rain intensified and we decided to run back towards home.  Caught our limit of snappers on the way in and then called it a day.  Made the best of it and beats sitting in a hotel room for sure.  It’ll be cooling down more tonight and north wind and chilly tomorrow, probably good for snook/reds in the everglades.  But then getting nice and calm friday through the weekend… could mean big things!  Sounds like the tarpon bite around town is better then in the backcountry right now.  Though sometimes it’s hard to sit around town all day, so unless people really really want a tarpon you have a lot more options running into the backcountry, which is what most of my clients have preferred as of late.  As we get closer to March though, I think it’ll turn on back there for them.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing