2/15/13 Pre february cold front backcountry fishing report

Well looks like we have (hopefully) our last cold front of the year coming over the weekend.  Today on 2/15/13 there was lots of moisture in the air and some scattered rain, you could also feel the cooler air pushing down with the north/northeast winds in the backcountry fishing islamorada february.  We fished a bit west of flamingo and out around the cape this morning.  Picked a handful of nice 22-24 inch redfish off a few spots.  Also got a nice juvenile tarpon which was cool as my anglers wanted to catch one.  We also lost a snook at the boat and caught plenty of snappers and jacks.  Later bugs got bad in the next spot, so we went in the gulf to check it out.  Hooked one cobia on the wreck which we pulled the hook on, and caught a big sting ray fishing the gulf in islamorada.  On the way back found the tripletails floating and caught probably 8 or those, only one nice keeper though but they were lots of fun!  We ended the day with a handful of trout in some runoffs again, not a bad way to spend the day fishing islamorada in february.  Capt. Dave Sisung fished closer to Islamorada, they had a mixed bag and got a couple nice sharks too, as well as this nice redfish to end the day.  Capt. Bill Bassett found caught a few redfish polingand said they saw many more, plus caught fish for dinner including trout and mangrove snappers.  Capt. Mike Bassett reported some redfish, black drum, trout, and a snook back around mainland florida as well.  Great news on this islamorada fishing report.  This cold front should only last a couple days and hopefully a few days after that things will warm right back up.  Tarpon have been around we saw several again on the way home near Bud n' Mary's, and Capt. Vic Gaspeny did report catching some in the early morning hours before daylight.  The islamorada fishing forecast will be calling for tarpon, tarpon, tarpon as we enter the spring!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
305-747-6903
rick@seethefloridakeys.net 

1/29/13 Great florida keys backcountry fishing despite high winds!

Well the wind was howling today on 1/29/13 inshore fishing islamorada.  The southeasterly winds were warm though and not too bad riding into the backcountry anyways.  We decided to run around the corner of cape sable as that area is fairly protected on this wind.  My assumption proved right and the water was much more 'fishy looking' than around other areas we ran by.  had falling tide most of the morning, tried to jump in a creek where we had done well several days ago, but the bugs almost carried us away so we had to leave right away.  This proved to be a good thing though, as we moved out to more open water on the outside shoreline to try some islamorada backcountry snook fishing.  The islamorada backcountry fishing for snook has been off and on as of late, but we found some nice ones this morning.  Simply casting shrimp on heavy jigs and slowly bumping them along the shoreline sandbars and such worked for us, we caught 3 nice fish of 9-13 lbs in 45 minutes.  After this we tried to get back in the creeks again as the sun was up and wind had swung around a bit to give us a breeze in there, and luckily the bugs were gone.  We caught plenty of juvenile redfish and black drum florida keys flats fishing.  We continued working our way in the creek further, next stop some more redfish, sheepshead, and a whopper ~20 lb black drum!  This one dragged us down the creek and almost around a corner, but we gave chase and got him!  We hit one last spot and same thing, redfish and black drum, though we caught several nice big trout there as well.  The tide was about dead now, so we made our way back towards home.  Stopped in a channel for the last 45 minutes, and caught several trout, ladyfish, and jacks.  Capt. John Johnansen and Capt. Perry Scuderi stuck in the channel areas and reported good action fishing for trout, ladyfish, jacks, and such.  They also caught several black tip sharks.  Capt. John also caught a goliath grouper.  Lots of fun today florida keys flats fishing!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk
305-747-6903
rick@seethefloridakeys.net 

8/1/12 Islamorada bonefish report

Hays King caught a bunch of trout lady fish and a nice blacktip shark. Then he and his friend Cam decided to go bone fishing for the last hour of the morning and managed to hook two bones and got one to the boat. Nice job for his first bone fish trip.