5/9/13 May Backcountry Fishing Report in Islamorada

Well the backcountry islamorada fishing in may has been pretty productive with shots at all kinds of different fish.  Capt. Jim Willcox had some good fishing in the gulf several days ago with a variety of fish.  They got into cobia, permit, and tripletail, among other things.  The tripletail fishing should be good until the stone crab traps are pulled soon, then they won't have much to hang on for structure.  Calm days this time of year with the falling tide can yield good fishing for permit on the wrecks.  May inshore fishing islamorada has still been yielding a good catch of tarpon.  Capt. Rick Stanczyk had 4 out of 6 big tarpon in the backcountry yesterday, plus some nice redfish, a snook, a permit, sharks, and a few other things.  Capt. Bill Bassett caught 3 tarpon yesterday plus several hammerhead sharks.  Capt. Ben Ekblom caught multiple tarpon as well, plus this fish that was estimated over 200 lbs!  Today fishing was a little tougher with a breezy north chilly wind in the morning.  That didn't stop Capt. Skip Nielsen who ran deeper into the glades and got 4 tarpon and 4 nice snook.  This evening I saw Capt. Bill Bassett fighting a tarpon on our way home from catching bait too.  Earlier in the day he reported catching a nice permit sight fishing the local flats of islamorada.  The tarpon in islamorada will start feeding more and more on crabs as the mullet start to thin out in the next few weeks, early mornings and later evenings can be a very productive time drifting with crabs for tarpon!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk