Hells Bay Video!

As a follow up to my last post I put together a video of my latest fishing trip into Hell's Bay. You'll notice some overlap in the photos, but I wanted to put together a clip which better showed the intricacy of the mangrove creeks that we navigated through. It is pretty awesome check it out. You will also be able to access it from our videos tab on the top of the page!

The music is "Limelight" by Rush, because it's awesome.

1 Day in Hells Bay

Everglades Fishing Report: Backcountry Grand Slam!

I'll admit heading to the everglades and fly fishing the back country with 20-25mph winds didn't exactly excite me like it should have going into this trip. But, with wonderful advice: "you can sleep when you are dead," I set off for Flamingo at 6am. Surprisingly enough it seemed calm, excitement growing. 

When we arrived in at the boat launch it was like a scene from the Alfred Hitchcock movie "Birds." There were vultures and seagulls everywhere and they were seemingly hovering right above our heads waiting for the right moment to peck out our eyes... (Apparently they are a problem there?) That thought quickly left my mind as we raced across whitewater bay and into some intricate interconnected mangrove channels. This place is a maze of epic proportions. When I was in Alaska I though the lakes and rivers were complicated but at least we could use elevation as a place marker or a guide that you are in the right place. Out here if you don't have a GPS you are screwed. Oh hey, that clump of mangroves looks like that patch we passed an our ago but it also looks exactly the same as... yes... every other patch of mangroves in this area! 

When we finally popped out somewhere in Hells Bay we were immediately on fish but it was sporadic. We would get a flurry of 5 or 6 snook and then nothing. For just about long enough to lull you to sleep and then another one would try to rip the rod out of your hand. This went on for most of the day until we hit this stretch where there must have been hundreds of snook just lining this cut, because it was all I could do to release one and get my fly back in the water. It was literally two straight hours of catching 14-24 inch snook, all on the same fly, all in the same 300 yards of water. It was insane, it was BY FAR the most action I've seen on a fly rod since I've moved down here. To top that off in the midst of the chaos I landed my biggest red fish to date on a fly rod. As well as two mangrove snapper, and a lady fish. All in all I'm sure I landed 25 snook and that is a modest estimate... 

On our way back to the ramp to end our day my luck found a way to have another positive twist! Tarpon started boiling everywhere on glass minnows. Holy shit! Several casts later I had the silver king doing a tail walk across the water right in front of me. Granted it was only a 4 pounder instead of a 104 pounder, but I'll take it! A couple more tarpon in the boat made me one happy fella. After all it's not every day I get to go out and land the backcountry grand slam... Tarpon, Snook, and a Red Fish. 

First Tarpon on the Fly!

The smallest tarpon I landed... haha awesome. 

The only fly I used ALL day. It caught everyone of my fish. It's a little worse off then it started but boy was it productive.

Big snook of the day!

The Red Fish that completed my Grand Slam!

Tarpon Photo Submission

Captain Chris White sent me this photo holding up a 30 pound tarpon that he caught near Flamingo this past weekend. He sent me this as a way to make me jealous as I still haven't caught a tarpon on the fly... Well it worked Chris I'm jealous.. When are we fishing?

Baby Tarpon in Flamingo

There are a couple of things in life I will rarely pass up on.. One of those is an opportunity to chase big fish with a fly rod. So when Captain Chris White asked me if I wanted to head to Flamingo to try to catch some baby tarpon I was more than willing.

Flamingo is a small little "town" inside the Everglades National Park. The town consists of a couple boat ramps, a little boat rental place, and a food trailer that is only open sometimes... So town may be a large over statement.

Regardless, the fishing there is pretty unreal. It's the opposite of the Atlantic side. The water is murky, sometimes muddy. There are huge, expansive channels bordered by thin, widespread flats. Here you can find snook, redfish, lady fish, sea trout, tarpon, and tons of other cool fish. I was specifically here this day in hopes of feeling a tarpon on the end of my life for the first time, but I would, as always, settle for anything eating my fly. 

The day started off slowly and I found myself switching flies pretty regularly until I settled on this bright orange, krystal flash looking fella I tied up myself shortly after arriving in Florida. (I'll show you all what it looks like sometime...) I don't know if it was the fly (I think it was) or if it was the tide (Chris thinks it was) but all of a sudden we started seeing a little more activity and before I knew it I had a split second hook up with a 10 pounder. He exploded out of nowhere crushed the fly and I trout set him out of sheer surprise... Chalk 1 up for the tarpon. Several more flashes later I was still blanked on these little guys. My next and final hookup was on a pretty solid tarpon that just inhaled the fly I strip set the hell out of him and he bolted straight at me! I caught up to him just in time for a little bit of tail walking, but that was all I got. He smiled, gave me the middle fin, and swam away. Now I took some pictures of this trip but I no longer have that piece of technology... But that's another story for another day. 

http://fishingtheworldover.com/

Destination: Ascension Bay, Mexico

The Mexican Yucatan Peninsula has been a destination for fisherman for a long time, but until recently fly fisherman have been relatively unaware of just how bountiful their sport fish are. Mexico is probably the location where you the angler have the best chance, right now, to go out and hit the grand slam. That is, go out in one single day and catch a bonefish, a permit, and a tarpon in an outing. That doesn't happen often but in Ascension Bay it can. You aren't going to jump the 150 pound mega tarpon like you would in the Atlantic Ocean during migration, but a 70 pound tarpon is still a hell of a good fight (a 10 pound tarpon would be a welcome challenge for me!)!

There is a lodge right in Punta Allen that has been getting great reviews from anglers as well as non fishing guests and that's not that easy to find right now in Mexico.. The name of the lodge is fitting, "Grand Slam," a title that many anglers search their whole life to obtain. Grand Slam hoists the title several times a year with all kinds of anglers.

Photo by Brian Grossenbacher

grand slam fishing

The area is best known for its permit population (shown in the picture to the right) and it is said to have schools of permit numbering in the 20's and solo permit similar in size to this 35 lb beast pictured here. 


All this talk about destination angling has gotten me excited... I'm thinking about putting a trip together to head down there late this Spring (mid-late May) ideally with about 6-8 other fisherman so let me know if you are interested! 

Yellow Dog Fishing

If you want to get more info on your own check out their site here!

 GRAND SLAM 

Florida Keys Extravaganza!

Sorry for the delay in posts but Kirk and I had an exciting day of fishing! We started it off by hitting the flats in a pair of Kayaks searching for tarpon, bonefish, or whatever else we could find! We ended up catching a bunch of barracuda and Kirk had 3 baby tarpon eat but couldn't stay connected... Then we went and hit up the canals for an evening of peacock bass fishing! Check out the video I put together and stay tuned for some more pictures and action as Kirk continues to fish his brains out! Enjoy!

Understanding Tarpon.

I have spent my entire life chasing trout, understanding trout, deciphering feeding patterns, learning the spawning cycles, the right fly patterns, how they react to certain climates and weather, and most importantly how to catch them. Now I feel like I'm standing on my head with one eye closed and no idea where to begin. 


I spent a lot of today chatting about Tarpon. About there feeding patterns and what they are looking for. The most important tip that I picked up today is that chances are the tarpon are not feeding. They are competitive eaters, they eat because they don't want their buddy swimming with them to get it before they do. 


Things I am thinking about when I am tying flies now. 


1. Color, what it appears to be in the water, the most important thing to think about is what the tarpon will perceive it as. I'm tying a variety of dark streamers right now, something similar to this EP tarpon streamer shown below.

2. Silhouette vs. Water depth. If you are fishing in the same water column depth as the tarpon throw a tall fly like an Enrico Puglesi Streamer. But, if you are fishing water where you are predominantly above or below the fish throw a crab pattern or something like it. The key is to get the fish's attention. 


Moral of the story, I have a lot to learn. I do however continue to watch videos like this to keep me pumped up about my next shot at a monster! 

Flats Trip

As we were getting ready to close down the store today one of the flats guides came in, Captain James Koch, and asked us if we wanted to go fishing for a couple hours? Of course I answered yes! We closed up shop headed to his boat and went to fish! It wasn't long before we were on a couple of schools of tarpon, and I mean huge tarpon. Unfortunately I couldn't get a strike... We moved on to a new spot and I got another two shots at a moving school and nothing, and thats when the clouds rolled in and blinded us to moving fish. This fishery is so different to me because it relies so much on the sun. If the sun is behind a cloud your ability to see fish is cut drastically. Sometimes so bad you don't see fish until they are right on top of you! It was a blast and James worked hard for us putting us on fish it was just tough to see them. Someday here real soon I'll have pictures of more than just the scenery and the captain, but for now that's all I have! Enjoy!