Tarpon Tune Up Tampa Bay
April will mark the beginning of our tarpon season. Consistent reports of poon sightings and hookups start to spread quickly, and everyone starts to feel symptoms of tarpon fever. You know tarpon fever is spreading when tackle shops start to run out of heavier Fluorocarbon leader, bigger circle hooks are disappearing of the racks, and guys are flooding in one after another with big dusty spinning reels to get them reloaded with heavier braid. Read More
Flounder Fishing Charter Tampa Bay
Tampa Bay’s flounder fishery has been dramatically improving over the past few years. Fortunately for those of us that like to catch and eat these tasty flat fish, flounder populations are strong enough to exclusively target them during the cooler months of the year.
Two species of flounder call Tampa Bay home. The Gulf flounder is the most common and can be identified by three distinct dark spots on its back. The southern flounder is less common and usually covered in spots. Read More
Spring is in the air!
Our recent fishing charters on Tampa Bay have been fair to excellent over the last month and things are really about to heat up. We have been fishing from the Skyway Bridge and Fort DeSoto all the way up in the bay to the Gandy Bridge. The redfish and trout fishing have been good, but it’s the snook action that has really stolen the stage lately. We have caught many snook over 30 inches lately, and lost some even bigger ones to the bushes and docks.
Fabulous Fall Fishing!
The Fall weather is here and with it brings some of the best fishing of the year. Almost every part of the bay is holding good numbers of gamefish and the near shore and offshore fishing is red hot as well. Inshore fishing for Snook, Redfish, and Trout has been excellent and a Florida Inshore Grand Slam which consists of one of each of the above mentioned species is almost a guarantee, even on a half day of fishing.
The Snook have started to move into the rivers, estuaries, and small bays, and are feeding almost 24/7 to fatten up for Winter. Read More
Cold Front Fishing!
Fishing around the cold fronts is the key to making a great day! The fishing out of the Gandy area has been on fire! Trout in the 17-24 inch class and multiple slot redfish being released as well as those over 27 inches. The smaller redfish are also easy pickings with a 1/8th oz jig and a piece of shrimp slowly moved along the channel edges and drop offs!
The Snook bite has been on fire with whitebait readily available to the hard working individual! Read More
Life for the Land Locked Angler
Shallow water redfish might be my passion, but largemouth bass fishing during the spawn and pre-spawn months has been a tradition for me since i was a kid. I loaded up the Hewes Redfisher with a different type of tackle this day. Topwater frogs, weedless worms, and texas rigs filled the tackle storage and off to a local lake we went.
Today we were focusing on bass starting to stage up in their pre-spawn homes. Read More
Winter Power Plant Fishing!
Between Bradenton and Tampa on the southeastern shore of the Bay, lies a magical winter wonderland. TECO power plant located in Apollo Beach is one the best winter fisheries in the world. When the bay and gulf waters cool down, TECO power plant heats up! Anglers, captains, and spectators flock to TECO power plant by land, sea, and air.
Many private planes and helicopters circle to get a birds eye view of this amazing natural winter aquarium. Read More
Cold Weather Means Hot Fishing
Well, like it or not winter is near. I personally love fishing in the winter time, negative low tides and gin clear water. Usually finding a few fish can mean a full days worth of action is close by. Redfish and Trout (although Trout is out of season for the remainder of year in our region) are the main targets however Snook, Flounder, Sheepshead, and juvenile Tarpon can be caught.
Recent trips have resulted in over 30 Redfish being caught on a single half-day charter. Read More
Upper Bay Redfish!
Right now we have a lot of Redfish in Tampa Bay, the only problem is that they are still in transition moving into their fall/pre-winter time homes. For the most part I am focusing on areas with oyster beds or Mullet activity on the higher tides, and looking for tailing fish on the open flats on the lower tides. It is important for me to stay fishing even on my days off, to ensure I stay in tune with the Redfish habits and patterns. Read More
Chicago Boys Tangle with Tarpon!
Last weekend I had the Chicago crew down again for their annual guys fishing trip. This year the group added another “Mike” to make 3 and 2 days to their trip. They showed up ready to fish, unfortunately Mother Nature threw a wrench in our plan blowing winds 20-30 Knots on the first two days. So instead of trying to get on some Tarpon from the start, we spent the first two days ducking in and out of rivers and estuaries catching everything from Trout, Ladyfish and Jack Crevalle to Snook and Redfish. Read More