Backcountry Fishing Reports

Jim and Gwen were with me again today, it was a little breezy out of the southwest with an impending cold front coming tomorrow night.  We had some leftover bait from yesterday and Gwen didn’t want too bumpy of a ride so we stayed in the backcountry bays and channels.  We caught some sharks, a big ‘mud marlin’ sawfish, and one tarpon!  We also lost another tarpon unfortunately.   With the wind and conditions it was fairly good fishing to be honest so we were happy.  We decided to hit the mangrove islands for some snapper on the way home.  That was a little tougher we had to work around but eventually we found some nice snappers in one of the cuts leading into the island – the island itself seemed to be filled with undersized ones.  Anyhow, back at it tomorrow.  Gonna get cold so tarpon may slow down for a few days here until water temps get back up near 80.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Got out with Jim and Gwen, two of my favorite long time customers.  We hit the mackerel grounds early and caught a ton of spanish macks it was hot and heavy action.  Also a few bluefish and blue runners in the mix.  After that Jim wanted to try for a goliath grouper so we ran out further to one of the wrecks that hold them.  Unfortunately there were so many big bull sharks at the wreck it was tough to get through them.  We got one big 300 lb bull shark up to the boat, and proceeded to hook 4 more that we chased around and eventually just popped most of them off trying to get back to the grouper.  Jim wasn’t feeling well though and eventually he had enough and we decided to head in a little early.  On the way home I spotted a couple triple tail, and one looked like a keeper so I talked him into just spinning around to catch that – as triple tail was on his species target list too.  We got him for dinner, and headed home happy.  I have tomorrow off to do some service work on my motor, then back at it Wednesday with these two again.  Suppose to blow but it’s warm enough again for tarpon so may give that a shot, we’ll see…

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Today the winds swung back to the east/southeast, it wasn’t blowing too hard either but still 10-15 mph.  We caught the mackerels well in the morning it was action just about every cast.  I had 3 anglers and this was a good option for them.  We kept a few for bait and some for the table as well.  After that we tried to see if their were some big critters in the channels where they were a few days ago before the last front.  We sat for about 40 minutes with our cut bait out, but alas never even had a sniff on them.  I didn’t see any tarpon roll or anything either, so we went to another area further back.  Here the fishing was much better and I noticed the water temperature was also 73 degrees instead of 70 like the previous spot.  We ended up catching a couple goliath groupers, a couple big sawfish (only saw the bill of 1 before he cut us off), and a big lemon shark.  It was good action and some big fish!  After that we caught some snappers for dinner on our shrimp leftovers, couldn’t find any monster snappers to eat our cut bait, but we did get a few keepers for the table.  Tomorrow I have the day off so far, will be nice!  Next week it’s getting busy again.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Got out with my same guys from yesterday Howard and Mike.  Today was a different day it was blowing 20-25mph out of the north as a minor cold front hit us last night.  The temperatures didn’t really drop much at all though it was a little chilly but not cold.  I will say though the tides were the lowest I’d ever seen in the backcountry!  With the north wind blowing hard it blows the water out of the bay, but we also had a full moon, and winter time tides in general are often lower than usual.. so it was a trifecta of low water conditions!  I almost got stuck getting into the canal where you normally rarely have to even pay attention to getting in.  We made it though thankfully but did see a couple other boats that had some trouble.  Fishing wasn’t too bad we actually did OK considering the conditions – extra muddy water due to the wind, and that mid range water temperature that is in between normal winter time and normal summer time.  We had some nice live pilchards we caught around town before we left, and caught about a half dozen snook.  We probably lost another half dozen unfortunately but that is fishing, but it was good to have some action anyways.  We left there with about an hour of fishing time to spare to hit a few mangrove snapper spots on the way home for dinner.  We were able to catch some real nice mangrove snappers on the pilchards, several in the 2 to 3 lb range, and even got a snook doing that too!  Anyways it was a fun day and nice for my anglers to do something entirely different from yesterday as only the Keys can offer.  Hopefully the boys will be back to fish again soon.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk

Did a pretty similar routine as yesterday we had some prefrontal conditions with a light southwesterly breeze.  The mackerels bit well much better than yesterday.  We caught a bunch in about an hour.  After that we caught the start of the incoming tide in the channels where the tarpon were yesterday.  They were still there and we caught a few big blacktip sharks, a couple big mud marlin (sawfish), and then got hooked up with two large tarpon (120 + 150 lb)!  Both tarpons stayed on though only one cooperated for the boat side picture.  It was good fishing to say the least!  After that we tried some snook areas again like yesterday, but with the onshore wind the shore was pretty muddy and we didn’t have any luck with that.  Though we did catch a couple big jacks at least on the pilchards!  Tonight it’ll get a little chilly so probably will slow the tarpon down for a few days at least and tomorrow is gonna be blowing 20 mph, so may mix it up.

Capt. Rick Stanczyk