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Everglades National Park - Flamingo
Capt. Bob LeMay
February 16, 2004
Flamingo - Saltwater Fishing Report
This past week I've been away from Flamingo and have spent most nights fishing the urban areas of Biscayne Bay. It was well worth it. My anglers jumped fish at almost every spot we fished. This time of year the baby tarpon are still keying on shrimp moving with the tide, even though we saw very few shrimp... Some of those "babies" were a lot bigger than the standard 20 to 40lb size that are so much fun on an 8wt fly rod or a light spinning rod. More about that in a moment.
Every year during the boat show local guides are busy fishing some of the folks that work at the show. This year was no exception and it's a welcome break for anyone working the long hours that boat shows require. If you're thinking about some night fishing the timing has to be right since the fish are only feeding heavily on a particular tide. Two of my trips didn't start until 3Am since that's when the tide would be moving just right. We were well rewarded with fish eating flies, live shrimp, and DOA shrimp lures. We even had several fish try to jump into the boat with us during the fight. The best part of fishing late at night (or should I say early in the morning) is that we never saw another angler. By contrast when you're fishing in the early evening you have to spend some time looking for spots that don't have anyone fishing them and dodging the usual boat show weekend heavy boat traffic...
Twice this weekend we hooked up on fish that were a little too big for our gear. Both times anglers tangled with fish from 60 to 80lbs on only light spinning gear with 10lb line. The high point was Saturday morning when we hooked up one of about 80lbs at about 6Am next to a bridge. That fish ran around several sets of pilings and thoroughly chafed the line before heading south on us. As dawn broke we were still hooked up and about 3/4 of a mile from that particular bridge... After fighting the fish to a standstill next to the boat the line finally parted after a 45 minute fight. Next time we'll bring a bigger stick...
For those wanting to tangle with night tarpon around bridges and docks with a fly rod here's how we're setting up. At night the casts are frequently quite close so I use one line size heavier than usual (a 9wt line on an 8wt rod for example). This is not the time to use a nice, new fly line since concrete pilings and docks are hard on your gear... We're only using one fly pattern, a Night Fly on a 1/0 hook (it's a small white tarpon fly on a very strong hook) with 40lb fluorocarbon for a shock tippet. Bring lots of flies and a spare fly line.
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