Tarpon Fishing in Key West
The tarpon is one of the world’s favourite sporting fish. Stunningly beautiful and known as the Silver King, their aerobatic leaps make them a favourite of fishermen worldwide. From March to July thousands of tarpon pass through the harbour in Key West en route to the spawning grounds and fishermen are drawn into town in order to do battle with them.
There are many different methods for catching tarpon, the style varying depending on the type of water that is being fished. Tarpon can be found on sand or mangrove flats and also in shallow river inlets. In this case the preferred method is either fishing a fly coupled to a very strong rod and line or using an artificial lure. At some venues such as Islamorada the preferred style is livebaiting with small fish such as pilchards or herring. The favourite method in Key West is chumming with shrimp boat trash. Let me explain what is meant by shrimp boat trash. Many shrimp fishing boats ply the waters in the Gulf of Mexico and apart from netting shrimp they also catch a lot of small fish called menhaden. These are sacked up and sold as bait to the light tackle fishing boats in Key West.
The method sees the Captain cutting these small fish into chunks and continually dropping them behind the anchored boat to attract the tarpon. The fishermen use a whole menhaden on the hook, and it is drifted back in the tide towards the feeding tarpon.
The tackle suggested for Key West tarpon fishing is extremely straight forward. Our favourite tarpon fishing rod is the ABU Conolon Boat, 7’9” 12-20lb test curve. It sells here in the UK for £74.99. There is also a 3 piece version of the rod (the Conolon Boat Traveller) which probably better suits the travelling angler. That one retails at £79.99 in the UK. Incidentally, I use that very same rod to fish for sturgeon on the Fraser River near Vancouver and last year landed my biggest ever fish with a length of 9ft 1inch and weighing…who knows, with only two of us fishing there’s no way you can lift such a beast but I’d put it at around 400 lbs. Anyhow, back to tarpon fishing. The most widely used reels whilst fishing for tarpon are the TLD15 and TLD20 lever drag multipliers from Shimano. The TLD 15 retails at around £80 in the UK, whilst the TLD 20 is about £15 more expensive. Whatever reel you decide on, it has to be super free running, because you’re attempting to make your bait run down in the current at a similar speed to the pieces being thrown in by the skipper. My own preference is for the larger TLD 20 because the larger spool revolves slower when you are drifting your bait down in the tide plus it needs less turns to reel in when your bait has drifted as far you want. You will need the reel completely loaded with line, I prefer the Ande grey in either 15lb or 20lb breaking strain. At the end of the line is securely knotted a 10 foot leader of 50 lb fluorocarbon and a large circle hook. Of course all of the fishing boats have top class tackle available free of charge if you don’t have your own.
Let’s now take a look at the actual fishing method used in Key West. Your skipper will have motored out to one of the top tarpon spots, perhaps the entrance to Key West Harbour, the yacht basin, the North West Channel or maybe Bokacheeka. The boat is anchored at the bow and if there are other boats fishing they’ll probably be moored only a few feet to one side or the other. The plan is that if everybody is chumming then there will be a good supply of bait drifting down to the tarpon, keeping them in one substantial shoal rather than splitting them up. The captain will start throwing in the pieces of menhaden and you’ll put a whole fish onto your hook. There’s a definite way to put these baits on the hook but don’t fret, the captain will demonstrate how it’s done. You now let your little fish drift down the current, paying particular attention to your line as it leaves the reel spool. A bite can be quite gentle and will often be just a speeding up of the line leaving the spool. As soon as you see a bite you need to reel like hell….don’t strike !!. The magic of a circle hook is that it kind of hooks the fish itself if you simply tighten the line by reeling in as fast as possible.
When a tarpon is hooked all hell will be let loose, the tarpon will likely jump clear of the water and it will definitely start running towards Cuba !!. Don’t forget that when playing a tarpon that if he jumps he’ll get rid of the hook unless you immediately lower the rod to lessen the tension on the line. This lowering of the rod is known as “bowing to the King”, and you’ll get plenty of stick from anybody else on the boat if you lose a fish because he jumped and you didn’t bow. If the hooked tarpon is of reasonable size the skipper will let the anchor go and set off to follow the fish. I’ve released fish that were hooked a mile or more away from where they are finally released. It can be a tiring and long fight but with a bit of luck you will eventually have the fish beside the boat ready for a swift photo before it is safely released to continue its journey to the spawning grounds. I remember a ‘first-timer’ fishing with us one year. He hooked his first tarpon and as it jumped he excitedly asked “how big is that” to which one wag replied “about forty minutes” !!.
Link to the original site
)
Fishing Doesn’t Get Any Better Than October Offshore at Orange Beach with Captain Johnny Greene
October is the best month to catch a variety of fish along Alabama’s Gulf Coast because as the weather cools off, the baitfish move in, with the sportfish following not far behind. According to Captain Johnny Greene of the “Intimidator,” docked at Orange Beach Marina in Orange Beach, Alabama, anglers don’t have to travel nearly as far to catch fish in October as they do in the summer.
)
Cabo San Lucas marlin fishing is truly spectacular
Marlin fishing does not get better, anywhere in the world, than it has been these past few weeks along the Baja California peninsula north of Cabo San Lucas.
Pisces Sportfishing this morning reported a weekly tally of 620 marlin, of which 615 were released. The density at the Golden Gate area left "even seasoned Cabo veterans amazed at the sheer numbers of stripers," said Tracy Ehrenberg, owner of Pisces.
The numbers are ridiculous: Clint Brooks and Ross Loveland from Oregon released 14 marlin aboard La Brisa; Gary and McKenzie Smith from Destin, Fla., released 15 marlin; Joseph and Martha Angel from Chesapeake, Md., released 16 marlin and one sailfish.
Most ridiculous of all was the one-day tally of 20 marlin and 10 dorado by a group aboard Bill Collector, which had another 20-marlin day, and a 19-marlin day.
So if you’d like to try catching a marlin, you should book a flight soon because this cannot last forever.
–Pete Thomas
Photo: A striped marlin goes ballistic on the hook at the Golden Gate north of Cabo San Lucas. Credit: Chic McSherry
)
