Florida Keys Fishing Reports

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02/22/2012 2/22/12 Islamorada backcountry shark and tarpon fishing!

Gerald Cohen holds up a Blacktip Shark for his 9 year old daughter Liat. She released 13 sharks and caught and released her first ever Tarpon an estimated 85 pounder.  She was using Foxsportfishing tackle.   Also on the trip was Hannah,Ben and mom Liz. Everybody got in on the shark action. Earlier in the day Spanish Mackerel and Mangrove Snapper were caught. The Cohen's have been Bud and Marys fishing customers since 1971 and fished with Captain Skip Nielsen.  Great to see the islamorada tarpon fishing starting to pick up!

02/20/2012 2-19/20-2012 Islamorada Reef Fishing Report!

Islamorada Fishing Trips have been great the last 2 days! Yesterday the Reel McCoy had a limit of king mackerel, with a handful of smokers over 25lbs including a couple over 35 lbs! The BNM also had a limit of kingfish with 2 smokers up to 33 lbs as well as a 300 lb bull shark! The big shark took 90 minutes to bring boatside before releasing it to fight another day. The Kalex had king mackerels, yellowtail snapper, and a limit of cobia up to 50 lbs! The Fearless went back into the gulf of mexico 2 days ago and got on some monster goliath groupers up to 300 lbs too! The Gon fishin V had a beautiful 33 lb african pompano as well. Today bait was tough with the weather change, but most the boats still put together good catches. The BNM released a sailfish, kept a 15 lb blackfin tuna, a limit of king mackerel including 4 over 30 lbs up to 37 lbs, and a 45 lb amberjack. The Kalex caught yellowtail snapper for dinner and some snake king mackerel, and own his way home caught a few cobias including a 51 and a 55 lber! The Finnster also released a sailfish. Get on down here for your fishing trip soon and do some Florida Keys Fishing!

02/19/2012 2/19/12 Backcountry fishing florida keys february.

Well the wind kicked up out of the southwest this morning and by the end of the day was howling for islamorada fishing in february.  This really churned up the water in a lot of the backcountry.  We weren't able to do anything on the edge of the gulf or back at the cape, so stuck around flamingo.  Caught plenty of ladyfish and trout in several spots.  Shark fished for a while and caught a nice 80 lb blacktip.  Saw a few tarpon rolling but they were not biting.  As the tide died we moved, lots more trout and ladyfish and a few pompano and jacks.  Water was incoming now and we decided to try some redfish spots.  Hit the right spot first and spent our last hour catching about a dozen reds, several slot size fish 20+ inches.  Also caught a big black drum and a smaller one, and a sting ray.  Good finish to the day.  Capt. Bob Reineman reported catching several redfish poling and casting.  Capt. Jim Willcox reported some good action with snappers, trout, and ladyfish, and lots of small blacktips and a big 100 lber further out west for his day of february florida keys fishing.  -- Capt. Rick Stanczyk

02/18/2012 2-18-12 Daytime Swordfish Report and Reef Fishing Report

On the BNM today we took Jim Jr and his Father Jim Sr out for a daytime swordfish charter. They were from Boston and came down for an Islamorada Fishing Trip at Bud N Mary's Marina. The day started out slow with no bites the first 3 drops. At about Noon we finally had our first bite and an hour later Jim Jr. caught his first ever broadbill swordfish. It wasn't a monster but a good one to start with and weighed in at 60 lbs. We made one more drop and after 30 minutes we had a cheap bite, but the swordfish didn't want to play and left us alone. We called it an early day and were back to the dock by 3:15 p.m. , a rather short trip for swordfishing. We also hooked a big squid on our medium size squid we were using for sword bait, but only came back with a tentacle. When we cleaned the swordfish it also had a cool creature from the deep inside his stomach, the remains of a lancet fish est. to be at least 4 feet long. It had huge teeth! The reef fishing was fair today. The sails have been tough, but the Reel McCoy released 2 sails and the Relentless 1. There was a few mahi hanging up as well as some king mackerel. The Kalex had a pair or 40 lb kings and 30 yellowtail snapper! The Relentless had a great day on sailfish yesterday and released 6 sails, while the most of the other boats had their limit of king mackerel, but no sails.

02/15/2012 2/14/12 + 2/15/12 Post cold front Islamorada backcountry fishing report!

Capt. Rick Stanczyk fished the last few days after our recent cold front in the Florida Keys backcountry, from west of flamingo out around the cape area and further northwest.  It's quite a run for an islamorada fishing charter taking over an hour to get to.  The recent front we had chilled the water down considerably, but pushed many fish out from the gulf and further up north into some of the creeks and canals in search of deeper warmer water.  On 2/14/12 I fished Nilson and his wife from Sweden.  We caught 10 snook and lost a couple nicer ones.  Lots of redfish too about 2 dozen, and even caught a baby goliath grouper which I have not seen any of those since the cold snap of 2010 that killed them off along with many of the snook.  We ended the day catching trout on artificial GULPs.  Today I fished the Levor's who have fished out of Bud n' Mary's for many years, mostly with Capt. Paul Ross on the Relentless.  We did the same thing, but today the snook were much bigger!  We caught 5, some nice fish 10 lbs and a little over, lots of fun on light spin.  Had almost 2 hours of incoming tide today, whereas yesterday we didn't have any, arriving at roughly the same time.  We last about 5 others that we pulled hooks on, cut lines on, and lost in the trees.  But that's snook fishing!  The bait of choice was a large horn hooked shrimp, though the big ones are scarce.  We also caught a couple off of pinfish on the bottom.  We caught several redfish as well, and a small lemon shark.  Had a big 200 lb lemon inside one creek eat one of our reds, and pulled another one away from him before he got it.  Got some decent slot size fish today and saved a couple for dinner.  Caught a flounder as well, plus several mangrove snappers and jacks in another creek, and again ended the day with some trout.  Great news for our Islamorada flats fishing. 

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

Capt. Paul Ross had several nice mutton snappers up to 15 lbs today as well on the offshore side!