Backcountry Fishing Reports

Got out with my dad and his good buddy Pete who often fishes with us.  Pete hadn’t been down in a while so he was glad to get out on the water.  We had a fair bit of wind though it was relatively calm early in the backcountry with the colder air and picked up as the day went on.  Strong incoming tide though the mid-day falling tide was very weak, on one of those cycles.  This often isn’t necessarily a bad thing for hunting the big trophy fish we like to do as it makes many of those areas much more fishable without heavy current.  Water temperatures were still a little chilly in the high 60s but the water for the most part looked pretty good not too muddy in many areas.  We found a couple spots that we hadn’t really been catching much at that both had some nice black drums.  Not monsters but good 10-12 lb fish, we caught 2 or 3 off each one.  The first one too my dad got a monstrous snook that was super fat.  Not over 40 inches but the belly was just big.  Seems a lot of these big near gulf/everglades fish are like that they rarely push over 40 inches but some of the bellies are just huge so they must weigh more than an average fish that size.  Anyways good to see some big beauties out there.  Doesn’t look like much cold weather in the future so that might be it for the year.  Tarpon should be just around the corner I think a nice calm day or two and they’ll be loading up offshore in the backcountry.  That early season fishing can be good through the next couple months and one of my favorite times to be back there.  You may not get the amount of bites you do when the bridge fishing is red hot, but not having to deal with the bridge and the boat traffic is definitely a plus.  I have open days through the rest of February and some in March too.  Let’s go fishing!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina

Got out for some fun fishing with my dad and one of our great marina employees Lainey!  Went after the big dawgs not much happening early we hit quite a few areas without much luck though we did catch a couple of juvenile goliaths.  We were really hoping for a big snook or cobia.  Finally after a few hours of jumping around we hooked what we believe was a nice snook though we pulled the hook on her!  Had a few jacks give us some action.  Then the last few stops things started to come alive Lainey hooked a beautiful bull red that she fought for several minutes but unfortunately the hook opened up slightly and pulled!  Quite a heart breaker.  Then we ran to an area we hadn’t fished much lately just because it’d been dead the last few months but today it was lively!  My dad got a nice jumbo snook on the first stop.  A few big jacks at the next stop.  Then the final spot of the day was loaded with some monster tripletail!  We caught two nice keepers 20+ inches and a couple that were near legal that we through back.  And we saw one jumbo slowly swim away slightly spooked.  Great way to end the day and great to see some of them around!  You never know what you’ll find these days.  Also a few days ago got a couple of nice large tarpon with return customer Howard and a few other bites plus a cobia one day, and the day before that plenty of mackerel, snapper, sharks, and a big sawfish!

I’ve just opened my calendar through May and am doing my 2022 rates through February ($1235.00/day for 1 or 2 people , $1335.00 for 3 people).  Then in March through May I’m only going to be fishing three days a week and new pricing schedule so please check with me but that is prime tarpon season and a very busy time.  So I’d recommend getting something on the calendar soon!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina

Always nice to get a text back from a customer saying how great of a time they had with one of my Captains!  Mike reached out to me a few days ago looking to get on a half day inshore fishing trip.  Mike wanted to try to catch a tarpon however knew it was not the greatest time of year.  After discussing options with him I told him Capt. Trent would be a good fit.  He’s fairly dialed in with the patch reef fishing as he worked on an offshore boat for the last several years doing a lot of that.  So conditions being favorable for that (calm) I said give it a go, and if you whack the fish out there then maybe spend the last part of the day trying for tarpon – that way you aren’t putting all your eggs in one basket.  He agreed and so that’s just what they did.  Patch fishing was excellent Mike caught a bunch of variety including this lunker school master snapper, very large for that species of fish.  They gave tarpon a go for the last bit and fished hard, Trent was able to get them plenty of nice big pilchards for bait, but alas no bites.  I myself spent part of the day tarpon fishing on my full day trip as well and we didn’t have any luck either.  There were some tarpon in the backcountry but it was still a tad on the chilly side in the 70-71 degree range, and they really like it up there closer to 75.  But still worth a shot and you don’t know if you don’t try.  The big blacktip sharks kept us busy though as well as plenty of mackerel and a few tripletail and snook which rounded out a productive day as well.  Anyways if you wanna get out and fish, lemme know.  I’ll shoot you straight and if my guys aren’t the ones for the job I want to make sure you are happy.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina

Capt. Trentin got out with some clients the other day for a short half day trip.  Snook and small tarpon were the desired species which sometimes can be tough on a half day especially if you have to run back in the park.  But they  gave it a go he said bait was fairly easy we’ve still been fishing with pilchards fairly often as overall its been a warm winter side from a couple times where it’s gotten cold.  When its cold everything wants shrimp but when its warm the pilchards are a plus.  They fished some islands in the middle bay and found some decent snook schools and caught a good handful along with some mangrove snappers.  They saw some tarpon but were not able to get any bites out of them but had plenty of fun with the snooks and other rod benders.  We’ll still be doing a fair bit of backcountry fishing for the next month but as soon as it warms up some big tarpon should start to show themselves.  The crew here is ready to go after them and the phone is definitely staring to ring for the spring time so make sure to get your dates locked in.  Capt. Trentin is available for evening tarpon trips whenever anyones wants to go if conditions look feasible too so that is always a good short notice possibility.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
Instagram: @richardstanczyk
Facebook: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
YouTube: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina

Well the last day I was out a few larger size snook seemed to finally show up in some of spots.  This was good to see as I often take my dad out to target these larger behemoths and they just had not really been around in recent months as they were in previous years.  I will admit we did get kind of spoiled a few years back landing these very large monster fish and maybe it’s just back to reality now… but anyways it’s good to see a few roaming about.  The ones we caught the other day weren’t absolute monsters but they were good 30+ inch fish none the less in the areas.  So today I went out with Drew and Sam and knowing we had decent calm conditions for that we gave it a whirl.  It was also fairly calm and the bugs had been fairly horrendous in the creeks where I often fish plus the fishing in there just hasn’t been super red hot.  So we focused on the big boys and it was good enough for us.  First stop we landed a nice 18 lb black drum which was cool on a nice large shrimp.  Next stop a medium size snook which wasn’t a monster but good to see him none the less.  Next stop a much bigger one that was in the 34 inch range – whew we were on a roll and 3 good fish off 3 different spots.  After that we struck out a couple times but then we got the fish of the day about a 25 lb redfish!  Awesome to see as the big reds had really been absent this last year and we often see a few of them showing up in October.  Though everything as I mentioned previously seems to be a little late this year and it may only be Fall on the calendar right now with the way the weather/bait patterns are.  Anyways awesome fish and what I call a Jurassic park slam with a large red, drum, and snook!  After that things cooled down with the big boys we tried a couple other spots to no avail.  We went inside the creeks and had to jump around a bit we hit a few spots and had a bite or two on some of them but kept pulling the hook on our fish.  Finally we got to one last stop and we had a short rally catching 8 or so snook, decent size fish for in the creeks in the 3-6 lb range which was fun.  We had a little time left and hit a couple more spot for big boys on the way home and were rewarded with a couple more pretty large snook in the 33-34 inch range!  What a way to end the day!  So absolutely awesome fishing and I was glad as I had a trip a few days before that just a 3/4 day and we struggled a bit.  With the timeframe we had in that day I decided to stick around town to try and catch some local snook as it was a full moon/falling tide in the backcountry which can leave you with some tough fishing windows.  Unfortunately it wasn’t too productive no snook for us we did catch some jacks and small cudas, and we did eventually run to some islands a little closer in the bay and caught a handful of snook at least.  But today was much better and goes to show sometimes a longer time frame is just going to give you more flexibility which what you try and do and can pay off.  I have a few more days open between now and Xmas and I’ll be gone Xmas week.  January is more or less booked up for me I have a few dates left but I’ll likely be closing it off this week.  February I’ll open some days when we get back from our ski trip probably in mid January… that’s usually when we start tarpon fishing some but who knows what’ll happen next year if we don’t get any cold weather it may start in January?

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

: @richardstanczyk
: Islamorada Tarpon Fishing
: Bud n’ Mary’s Marina
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