Capt. Rick Stanczyk's Islamorada Tarpon Fishing

Well we’re near the end of September and the tarpon bite has still been fairly consistent!  I had Greg out earlier this week and we had banner fishing.  He booked a trip a little while ago after reading my September newsletter talking about how good tarpon fishing had been lately.  I think we hooked over 10 fish and it was just easy livin’.  Some days are like that.  We had a good incoming tide early on which as I’ve mentioned lately just seems to be the better fishing right now.  We didn’t really have to move too much the fish just kept coming by us, sometimes in packs of 6 or 8!  We caught a double header at one point which was fun especially with just one angler!  Had another big moose fish we hooked at the end that we fought for over an hour but unfortunately couldn’t roll her over.  But great day none the less!  Today on Thursday I had return customer Mike.  Weather was very questionable early at 5 AM, didn’t think we were going to get out.  But by 6:30 it started to dry up so we left soon after that.  Today the tarpon were not super thick like they were a few days ago.  We had slack tide first thing, so I was hoping once it picked up going in they would start to respond a little more.  We made a couple moves early on and after about 30 minutes put one in the air!  Then the tide started in and it never got into a red hot bite, nor did I see a ton of fish.  But the few good looks we got when we were scanning with sonar for tarpon, we were able to get those fish to bite and hooked 3 more. The first one was another 100 lber that we fought for a good 45 minutes that again we couldn’t quite get to roll over.  Then we got a couple of 40-50 lbers to the hand after that for good pictures.  Never got rained on really either so that was a plus too!

So fishing is still pretty good for tarpon.  Baits been around too I did catch bait for my Thursday trip the day before.  Some real nice mullet muds with lots of mullet so that is nice to have around.  I have plenty of days open next week and Capt. Stephen is returning too, so we can definitely still get you out in October if you are looking to catch the silver king here in the off season.

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

Got out with a group trip the last two days my good customer Gerald from Las Vegas and his crew of builders had 5 boats booked for two days. They come a couple times of year often in the late spring for big tarpon and then in the offseason around now. Fishing honestly was a little tough yesterday we focused more on snook and fishing with our light rods with pilchards. Falling tides all day long mostly. I had Jack on the boat and we picked away at snook early on. But it was about a fish or maybe not in every ‘good’ spot you hit. No big rallies and lots of moving around and time to invest for a handful of bites. We switched to tarpon a little after that and we jumped two fish back to back! Couldn’t keep ’em buttoned which was frustrating. We caught a tripletail and big redfish after that and a few more snook, but finished the day with a nice juvenile tarpon so all in all not bad just really had to work for it. But the whole group of boats had tough fishing just one of those days nothing seemed to be super happy. Today we focused more in larger tarpon and we found a school first thing. Same school I’ve fished a couple times in the last few weeks it’s not a lot of fish, but they are biting and there aren’t a lot of ‘pickers’ messing with the baits which makes it nice. We jumped a tarpon and then next stop we hooked two back to back. Landed them both and got pictures which was great! After that we caught a handful of snook and a goliath grouper, then saw a few more tarpon free jumping and busting in another area. Again not a huge school of fish but we got lined up and put our baits out and boom we were hooked up in about 2 minutes with a nice 80 lb fish! Awesome fight for Jack and good opportunity for pictures again. So all in all a great day.

I’m hoping next week the big school of tarpon may show back up. Who knows possibly with the incoming tidal scenario things will be much different. But I think we’ll still get a good fall push once the bait runs start it’s almost October and that is the time usually. Have some days open in October so give me a shout if you want to get set up!

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

Got out with Cody and Shelby today for a full day trip.  They were recommended from a client Chris who fished with me a couple years ago and caught some nice tarpon.  The wind had swung a little south and we had a lot of weather offshore in the morning but we ventured out back.  Unfortunately the big massive school of tarpon that was around last week seemed to have disappeared.  But I was out with my dad yesterday snook fishing and we did see a smaller group of tarpon that we didn’t mess with so we ended up finding those guys again.  First thing we got into a little group and Shelby hooked a nice 40 lber that we landed great fish and she did a good job fighting it for not much fishing experience!  After that we jumped around and kept trying to line up on fish but they were spread out and definitely not as easy as they were last week.  Finally after 3 or 4 moves, we sat for a good 20 minutes and sure enough got a bite finally!  Big 100 lber goes airborne!  Cody gets this one and this fish really put on a show with at least a half dozen big jumps, almost jumping in the boat at one point and going under the boat and trolling motor, but Cody did an excellent job backing off the drag and getting the rod tip down in the water to clear the boat, while we picked up the trolling motor so he could get around to the other side.  He knew just what to do as I explained it to him but that is the type of move that a big tarpon can pull on your and break you off sometimess real quick!  After that we tried a bit more but things kinda petered out so we tried some snook fishing, which was a little slow but we did manage a handful and a few small goliath groupers.  Though we did finish up the day with an XL snook to put a nice cherry on top and a couple of medium size goliath groupers and jacks.  The weather built up pretty big from flamingo all the way to key largo after that so we headed in.  But a fantastic day for these two enjoying there honeymoon in the Florida Keys!  We are getting the tarpon or snook mounted through Grays Taxidermy, maybe both of them as they are fish he wants to remember!

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

Got out again yesterday with one of my regulars.  We focused strictly on tarpon.  We had enough bait leftover from the previous day but did spend a little time looking for bait early on which proved difficult but luckily we had what we needed.  We ran far in the backcountry where we had found the tarpon the previous day but alas didn’t see too much there.  We spent some time looking and scanning around with sonar but to no avail.  I was sure they had to be somewhere in the area so we started backtracking a bit.  After about 4 or 5 miles we notice a few splashes on the surface and I pull the boat out of gear.  “Keep your eyes peeled, watch for any signs of activity” I say to my customers.  Sure enough we see a few tarpon tails slapping the surface and another one breach the surface.  I watch the sonar and sure enough it lights up like a christmas tree soon – we’re in ’em!  A massive school with thousands of fish and we’re seeing them from where we are to nearly a mile away.  We set up and sure enough they’re happy we ended up boating six tarpon and jumping off another 4 or so.  Just incredible fishing and no sharks really to deal with which was great.  After a couple hours though things kind of start to fizzle out.  We’re not seeing as much and I’m sure we could still catch one if we worked really hard but being we had such a banner morning it just kind of feels like it’s time to be done so we call it a day!  So it’s great to see such good fishing right now I’m hoping it will hold through the rest of September and October.  I’ve been saying I feel things had been building up to have a great fall season of fishing just with the cleaner water we’ve had in areas of the backcountry and all the bait that showed up a few months ago.  I’ve also been running the boat a little more now since Capt. Stephen is on vacation and I’ll take a few more trips this month if anyone is interested drop me a line.  Steve will be back in October though I may still run a few trips then as well.  Come take advantage of good fishing and light crowds in Islamorada!

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

Got out today with long time customer Jeff G along with Capt. Trent who is running my other boat now.  We tried to mix it up and started off snook fishing with some pilchards we caught.  Had dead low tide and kind of a funky tidal current with not much moving water early on.  Didn’t do much and we fished around in 4 or 5 different areas.  Late morning though we happened to see a tarpon bust and had some mullet we had caught while snook fishing.  So we looked around and found it was quite a good school of tarpon!  We set up and soon we had tarpon in the air!  They weren’t sticking on the hook too well for us we put 3 or 4 in the air before we landed 1.  Then we proceeded to catch 3 more it was a really good bite, and then jumped a few more larger ones off after that!  I think we had a dozen bites just good tarpon fishing….  We stopped on the way home on a spot and caught a couple nice big redfish and even had one more shot at a tarpon that at a pilchard on a jig but he came off unfortunately.  Still though banner day landing 4 nice tarpon and hooking a dozen or more.  The September tarpon bite has been really good I’ve not been out a ton but we did get out last Wednesday and caught 6 tarpon that day as well and hooked 10 i think.  I may fish a few more days this month so give me a shout and if I can’t go, Capt. Trent is standing by.

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