10/5/11 Islamorada Inshore Fishing Action!

Well the wind was howling for most of the day today on 10/5/11 and it was fairly choppy in the bay.  Capt. Rick Stanczyk fished a half day this morning with Lori and we were after some edible fish and some rod bending action!  We ran the edges of the banks to avoid the chop, staying within 30 minutes from home, and the ride wasn't too bad with the strong 15mph east-northeast breeze.  We got into the mangrove snappers pretty good in one of the cuts in the backcountry, cutting some fresh pinfish in half was the trick to catching some of the nicer 11-12 inch keepers.  Lots of smaller jacks and stuff came up in the chum as well during our islamorada fishing.  After catching enough for dinner we moved on and found a big area of mud that was loaded with trout and ladyfish.  With the wind blowing as hard as it was, it was tough to tell where the fish were since all the water was fairly muddy, but we hit them right the first drift and repeated that a few times, drifting through the fish for 5 minutes or so before we would be out of them.  Live shrimp on jigs did the trick here, not any keeper trout but we did save some ladyfish for baits.  After that we headed back towards home and put the big rods out.  The blacktips were swarming we had 2 bite us off right away, so we switched to wire leader and ended up catching 3, no tarpon bites or any other large critter.  After that we headed home, have a few more days booked of florida keys fishing charters this week so stay tuned for more october florida keys fishing report!

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

9/7/11 Great half day backcountry fishing action!

Capt. Vinnie Biondoletti had a couple half days the last few days fishing the florida keys backcountry.  Muds close by had plenty of trout, ladyfish, and snappers to bend the rod. Andy and Evan from Germany also caught blacktip sharks, a bonnet shark, and this nurse shark.  Keith and Chris Rowland from Texas caught their limit of snapper and trout to eat. Capt. Rick Stanczyk reported similar fishing with plenty of action from blacktip sharks as well.

8/24/11 Florida Keys Backcountry Fishing Action!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk has still been picking up a handful of half day trips short notice and getting some good action in on his islamorada backcountry fishing trips!  We headed out this A.M. in search of some table fare and the mangrove snapper bite in the bay has been pretty good!  We headed out to the west and anchored in an area where there has been plenty.  We chummed up a few small ballyhoos and netted a few of those.  Cutting them in half made perfect baits for the hungry mangs, also a few small ladyfish worked almost as well cut in small chunks. After we had enough of that we headed back towards Islamorada to try to bend the big rods.  We ended up jumping a small tarpon.  Then after putting the last couple pieces we hooked a double header.  One was a nice 30 lb cuda that skyrocketted all around the boat.  The other was some kind of monster hugged on the bottm!  We got the cuda in and released him and then proceeded to fight the other.  After a 15 minute battle we pulled up this huge sea monster!

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

7/13/11 Night tarpon fishing and florida keys backcountry fishing!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk fished with Graeme and his father over from Scotland last night and today. They wanted to catch some big stuff for their florida keys fishing charter trip.  We went out late yesterday afternoon in search of tarpon.  With the in tide and most of the migrating fish gone from the local areas we usually night fish at it looked like it may be tough.  We caught some stuff for bait and brouht some crabs and gave it our best shot.  We had two tarpon bites early and caught one fish that was roughly 60 lbs and had another jump and spit the bait!  We also caught some nice lemon sharks and had a couple others bite us off.  When it started getting closer to dark we began drifting with our crabs.  Jumped another tarpon on our 2nd drift close to dark.  It was a pretty night almost full moon, and on our last drift Grame hooked one about 90 lbs that gave him a good 30 minute battle before we went in!  Very pretty to see a tarpon jumping in the bright moon light!  We fished a full day in the everglades today, it was brutally hot but fishing was decent.  We caught our limit of trout, some snappers and a few ladyfish.  We caught one tarpon in one of the channels way in the back plus a few blacktip sharks.  We moved to another area and caught a few more sharks, including a big 200 lb lemon shark!  We also caught a triple tail on a GULP shrimp, after casting to him several times with no response we finally hit him on the head with it and he GULPED it!

6/17/11 Florida Keys backcountry fishing in June!

Well today was a warm one down here for our florida keys fishing charters!  Capt. Rick Stanczyk had a full day back in the everglades.  We started off hitting a few spots to try and catch some ladyfish for bait, plus of course trout, snapper, etc...  They were a little tough to find, after our 3rd or 4th spot though we bagged enough of them, plus picked away at some trout and keeper snappers.  We put the big rods out in hopes of tarpon, though no luck with them but did catch some nice lemon sharks!  We fished around flamingo area and then moved out off the cape to a good area for some florida tarpon fishing!  Capt. Skip Nielsen was flyfishing and said he had caught a couple on fly, so we anchored up and put baits out.  Saw some fish rolling but as soon as the tide started pouring in good, the water got real nasty and weedy and the fish quit showing.  We did catch another nice shark, and hooked a couple others we pulled off.  But we did catch this nice snook to make the end of our day!