TARPON

A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of taking Tom Wilbanks and his son-in law out on their first search for panhandle tarpon. The fishing gods were certainly smiling on us that day as hoards of fish swam by out boat throughout the morning and afternoon. We experienced several pushes of big pods of tarpon all day long. They were just pouring by the boat, usually in groups of at least 6 fish. We were able to feed two fish, one of which never came tight. Tommy did come tight on his fish though, then he proceeded to bring the fish to the boat after a couple jumps and about 30 minutes of pulling. Big congrats on his first tarpon. Here are some photos Capt. Christian Yergens got of us as he idled past during the fight.

Variety day 7/14

Woke up today to thundering clouds and gloomy skies, but as soon as the sun burned the cloud cover off the horizon, we had some pretty good weather. Light winds, good sunlight, and a pretty high tide on the bay.  We first found a group of about 30 redfish, but they were pretty spooky. So we moved on to an area that I knew the fish would be feeding in. Sure enough, the fish were there but they were chasing minnows rather than tailing up on crabs - making it harder to target individual fish. We finally found a fish so shallow his eyeball was above the surface, and I waded over to it and caught it on a little small shrimp fly I have been using a lot lately. Nice little fish with unique spots.

Just when I thought the day was over, I got an invite to fish some local bass ponds with my good friend Jason Stacy. I quickly obliged and loaded up the 6wt and a topwater deer hair diver. We proceeded to catch as many 2-3 lb bass as we could handle - and my bonus fish was a decent size catfish that also ate my topwater fly.

Never before have I caught a redfish, a largemouth bass, and a catfish in the same day.

Skinny water tailers - 7/6

Had some great weather over the holiday weekend, low winds and good sunlight. The tides were high this week and the fish were taking advantage of the increased water flow. I fished Sunday with a friend from Birmingham for a much needed day off. Travis and I found a bunch of fish tailing very shallow, mostly in groups of 2-3 fish at a time. Though they weren't the biggest reds in the world, we had a great time picking them off with the fly rod as we inched our way along the grass flat and took turns with poling duties. 

Travis with a healthy 24" red

Me with another victim of the little shrimp pattern we were throwing