6/21/15 June Tarpon Fishing in Islamorada continues!

More tarpon fishing today we got out at 6 AM nice early start.  Caught some bait on the way out.  Tried some local channels with the last trickle of incoming tide followed by a quick turnaround of falling tide.  Saw some fish but they really didn’t respond, tried a couple places where we saw fish roll and even free jump.  After that we ran out off the beaches and found some fish near shore free jumping.  We set up and caught some sharks and eventually a nice 35 lb tarpon.  After that we moved a few hundred yards down where we saw some fish rolling.  Soon we hooked a massive 150 lber that was a battle like none before!  The fish dragged us about 4 miles up the beach and then out into the gulf.  A school of permit even came up and followed him briefly (we weren’t able to catch any unfortunately).  The fish only jumped one when hooked and then just would not give up as we kept heavy drag on him.  Eventually we got him to roll over on the leader for pictures and then it was about time to go home.  But what a fish and a 2.5 hour battle!  We also caught a couple hammerheads and blacktip sharks.  2 for 2

Capt. Rick Stanczyk