The weather has changed and the nights are finally staying warm enough to make the tarpon happy. Chris Dankan fished with me on Friday hunting sleepers all day with fly rods. The fish were in and we had numerous chances at giants, green giants, new arrivals in almost every spot we fished. At the end of the day Chris had jumped three, one baby about fifty pounds, another sleeper about 120 pounds that took the fly just ten feet from the bow, and an epic battle with a giant that might have been close to 150 pounds. We had this last fish on for maybe ten minutes, twice recovering almost three hundred yards of backing and finally losing it on a magnificent leap almost two hundred yards from the boat.
Everyone has to let their hair down once in a while and we’ve done a couple of jigging trips over the past few days. The fishing has been excellent, if you catch the tide right, and if you’ve got the spot, you can catch fish on every cast. We’ve probably caught over a hundred of various species including, spotted sea trout, jack crevalle, spanish mackeral, ladyfish, bluefish, pompano, whiting, redfish, snook, and permit. Here’s one in the photo that Bob Lunsford caught jiggin’ in the Milky Way Swash.