7/28/12 Fishing the gulf of mexico

Capt. Rick Stanczyk had Bob Davidson and crew out for a day of fishing the gulf of mexico on 7/28/12.  We started off some of the banks that line the edge of everglades national park and the gulf.  The bite was hot with a mix of big ladyfish, sea trout, mangrove snappers, and jack crevelle.  We loaded up on fish for dinner, as well as more for bait for larger specimen.  We then headed to try to find some goliaths we had some action with the prior day, however another boat was fishing it, so we headed back west into the open gulf.  We had one of wrecks to our selves and the fish were there!  We had the last of the incoming tide.  Big schools of permit in every direction, great permit fishing in islamorada.  We caught about 8 total on shrimp and even bare jigs!  We tried pitching the one crab we had to some of the larger ones, though they did not appear interested.  After the tide started to fall we anchored up, and chunked up some ladyfish and caught 6 big goliath groupers up to 200 lbs!  Bob also got a nice 75 lb bull shark.  We also managed one cobia to the boat, and had one other small 4 pack follow a goliath up and disappear.  Great action and love to see it this time of year!

Capt. Bill Bassett also fished in the backcountry today and reported good action.  They caught plenty of trout and ladyfish in the bays.  They found lots of tarpon around some islands and had a couple in the air!  They also poled around a bit later and caught several redfish, after that they headed in a little earlier to beat the heat!

7/27/12 Islamorada tarpon fishing in July and backcountry fishing!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk had Brad, Shane, and Richard for several trips the past week.  Day 1 we fished a full day in the everglades backcountry fishing, catching plenty of trout, snappers, ladyfish, jacks - lots of rod bending action.  We put Richard on a big 200+ lb sawfish.  The sawfish had a cobia on him as well, about 15 lbs, which we got a hook in but spit the bait and disappeared!  We later caught a nice redfish and pulled on a couple sharks.  We then had some tarpon fishing to do, which coincided with the lobster mini season.  We went very early one morning at 4 am.  The tarpon in islamorada were not happy and it was slick calm with bully netters lighting things up everywhere!  No bites unfortunately...  But we made up for it later that evening, and caught 3 out of 4 tarpon.  2 on frozen mullets, and 2 other bites drifting crabs!  We also caught a couple big jacks and a sting ray.  The guys had so much fun they wanted to do it again the next night, and we got 2 more nice tarpon, and a big nurse shark.  They also fished offshore with the Redfish, Capt. Merv Finch, and caught some nice schoolie dolphin and a couple bigger slammers!  Today we had Erik Munchnick and family out for some fishing in the florida keys flats.  We caught some nice big trout and mangrove snappers on the edge of the gulf.  Drift some baits for some tarpon but no luck.  We hit a hole off east cape sable and the big goliaths were there - unfortunately no heavy duty tackle since I hadn't been catching these fish in there as of late, we broke 3 off in the rocks but did manage to get a 175 lber up to the boat!  Lots of little blacktips swarming the area as well.  We then ran back towards flamingo fishing and caught several nice big redfish up to 12 lbs on the edge of some banks to end the day!  They were eating GULPs and shrimps.

7/14/12 Bonefish, snook, sea monsters, backcountry!

Captain Vinnie Biondoletti reported the last couple days for this islamorada fishing report...

Bob Casey senior caught this nice bonefish on fly. He was fishing with his son Bob Jr. He also hooked another bonefish this morning. Fishing was quite good we saw a dozen groups of fish on a half day. 

More bone fishing this morning with Bob Casey senior and Jr. Saw lots of tailing fish back in the bay. Bob Jr. Managed to hook up on fly. He brought a nice 8 pound fish boat side. No pictures of this fish it fell off while we were trying to get it in the boat. We also had several groups of permit turn down our fly presentations. All in all another great day on the flats. 

Sara Michael caught her first snook today with  Capt. Bob Reineman.  They fished the backcountry around Flamingo.  Snook fishing in the everglades!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk had Jason and crew down for some fishing in the backcountry today.  We caught plenty of trout, mangrove snappers, and some ladyfish in the bays early.  We fished some out off of east cape later for bigger stuff, and caught 3 big sea monsters, a couple smaller sharks, and jumped a 30 lb tarpon and had one other flash a pinfish.  Great day of fishing in the florida keys!

7/9/12 Florida Keys Fishing in July

Had Morgan and Julie out for a full day on 7/9/12 fishing in islamorada.  We went back into the gulf to try and catch some goliaths.  Action fishing was good early on, first two baits in the water we hooked double header permit on the light rods.  Very fun on the smaller tackle!  We then started to catch some nice size jacks and a mix of mangrove snappers, plus a couple of larger look-downs.  Lightning and thunder storms were around so we started to chunk some jacks and put the baits on the bottom.  We caught 2 out of 3 goliaths, up to about 80-90 lbs or so.  Morgan also caught a large bull shark.  Storms never made it to us, but the action slowed down and the weeds got very bad.  We saw some schooling tarpon rolling around us, and jumped one on a light rod.  Islamorada tarpon fishing has been picking up a little here late in the summer, with some fish showing up off the cape area in the day time, but you have to hit them early!  We ran back inside off the cape and tried fishing some markers, caught a handful of trout and snappers, and a blacktip shark.  Called it a day after that and headed home!  Still some good florida keys fishing to be had here in July!

7/28/11 Baby hammerhead, tarpon, big trout and snaps!

Well it's not all about lobster mini season this week!  Capt. Rick Stanczyk fished a full day in the backcountry today on 7/28/11 and had a wonderful time.  The wind was howling almost 20 knots most the day - very unusual for July!  Though it kept the heat & sweat down for the most part which was a welcome change.  With thousands of people in the water snorkeling and diving looking for those caribbean crawlers, we ran way in the backcountry and only saw one other boat the whole day back there!  Fishing was fantastic early, we caught several large trout on shrimp and artificials.  We also caught some jumbo mangrove snappers!  The ladyfish were chomping too and we saved several of those for bait.  We set up in one of the channels for some bigger stuff, and the bite was slow to come but produced nicely.  We caught a 75 lb tarpon after our first hour.  Then a 60 lb lemon shark, followed by a 40 lb hammerhead, and finally a small 30 lb blacktip!  Not too shabby for the conditions and time of year.  We tried around one of the islands at the end of the day for a few reds but we didn't find any. However a few days ago, Capt. Vinnie Biondeletti took his son Ryan out and did manage to wrangle up a few sight fishing in the everglades!