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Indian River Lagoon & Banana River
Capt. John Kumiski
June 12, 2006
Titusville - Saltwater Fishing Report
Lee County Tarpon Report from Spotted Tail 6/12/06
Lee County Tarpon Report from Spotted Tail 6/12/06
Fishing was better this week, with some bites on fly and even a few caught fish.
On Monday Capt. Rick DePaiva, my host while I’m in Fort Myers, and his son Jhordan joined me on Spotted Tail for a day’s tarpon fishing. We started early in Pine Island Sound and saw reasonable numbers of fish, and had several shots at daisy chains. All was for naught though, as the fish weren’t biting for us. Activity inside slowed down, so we went out along the beach. Fair numbers of fish were moving lazily, most headed north up the beach. We had several shots at strings and daisy chains, but again couldn’t close the deal; that is until Rick tossed a black over purple SexyFly at an oncoming string. A fish of about 120 pounds ate the fly. Ricky stuck him good and was in the process of sticking him again when the fish made a short, fast run, putting line burns into Rick’s hand and fingers. The run ended in a spectacular jump quite close to the boat that ended the four second long battle, as the fish tossed the hook.
Rick had other house guests than I, and on Tuesday morning Jana Weitzel joined me. Jana’s not an angler but she is a lovely young woman who was curious as to what the whole tarpon thing was about. We started at about 8 AM in Pine Island Sound. The numbers of fish were low. I had a brief shot at one daisy chain but didn’t get bit. We did see a tower boat that was using bait get a double hookup, the only fish we saw hooked. We also saw a sea turtle and had three manatees swimming around my boat for about 40 minutes, to Jana’s great delight. We went on the gulfside about 11 AM and spent a couple hours there without seeing a fish.
In the meantime friends Tom Van Horn and Chris Myers were on their way to Pineland. I dropped off Jana and picked up Tom and Chris somewhere around 1 PM (I’m not sure how good of a trade that was!) and headed back out to the beach. We were into a daisy chain almost immediately, and cast flies to fish off and on until almost 6 PM but couldn’t convince one to eat.
Wednesday morning I picked up Tom and Chris at 530. We got under way at 6. The wind was about 12-15 out of the southeast, messing up all possibilities of fishing in Pine Island Sound. The only thing left was the beach, so there we went. We saw fish sporadically until about 10 AM. Then we found a large (100 or so fish) school/ We cast to those fish for a couple of hours, changing flies several times, before spotting another batch of fish and giving up on the first school. We had almost perfect conditions and threw to fish more or less continuously until 4 PM, trying more than half the flies I had, before giving up in frustration. We didn’t get a single take, the first time I’ve ever thrown to that many fish and not had one eat.
Thursday I went out by myself. The wind was southeast again so I went straight to the beach. I anchored the boat and did some rigging of flies we hadn’t tried the day before. Some fish were around but several other boats crowded me so I headed north. I found a big school of fish and threw to them for an hour without success before losing them.
Within 30 minutes I found another school of fish in a daisy chain. I tried tossing a yellow and orange Keys-style tarpon fly to them and on what must have been at least the 50th cast a fish of about 90 pounds surged out of the pack and ate the fly in a twisting maneuver that was just awesome. I stuck the fish and got three jumps out of him before I intentionally popped him off next to the boat about 30 minutes later. I wanted that fly back, but would have had to fight the fish to utter exhaustion in order to get it. It’s hard to handle and impossible to revive the fish when you’re by yourself!
Well now, the ice was broken. I put an olive striproach on and started looking again. There were a lot of fish around and I quickly found some. I had three rods, all with different flies, and tried them all in turn. I had the striproach on when, in hot pursuit of a string, I tossed it into them. I looked down to adjust the trolling motor and the line came tight. I had another fish, this one about 80 pounds! Wanting some photos, I got the camera and snapped some while fighting the fish at the same time. That’s hard to do! I again popped this fish off after 30 minutes.
Another large school of fish was 150 yards away, with a small boat with a dive flag up nearby. I went over to check and a woman was out snorkeling with the tarpon. It was the first time I’d ever seen that!
I cast to fish almost continuously until almost 6 PM but didn’t get another bite.
Friday morning at 630 I picked up Capt. Pete Greenan and Ron Whitely at the dock at Uncle Henry’s. We fished the beach in the morning up north of Gasparilla Pass. We got on a large school of apparently happy fish and all took turns getting rejected by them, trying for well over an hour. We had a few other shots at other fish but no one wanted to play, so we went to the Fishery for lunch.
After lunch we went to an inside spot. I was up when a pair of fish came cruising at us, high in the water. The Cousin Itt was dropped in front of the lead fish, who immediately came over and slurped it off the surface, simply incredible. I stuck the fish, about 90 pounds, who jumped four times. I had him up by the boat for the third time when the line came loose. The hook, a Gamakatsu SC-15, had broken. That was our last bite of the day and Pete and Ron disembarked at about 3 PM> Great having you aboard, gentlemen! Thank you for everything!
On Saturday Don Wilkins, a fly fisher from Pennsylvania, joined me for some tarpon fly fishing. It was overcast but the sea was almost slick, at least at first. We found one school all morning and threw to them for almost 30 minutes without success. Little did I realize that would be our best shot in two days. We were eating lunch at the Fishery when I noticed a really ugly blob on the TV screen. That ugly blob has turned into Tropical Strom Alberto, and the winds and rains played havoc with Don’s attempts to take a tarpon on fly. Yesterday we didn’t even see one.
Last evening I took Jhordan DePaiva out to Boca Grande to fish the crab hatch. The crabs were there but the weather was very ugly, wind, waves, and rain varying from light to moderately heavy. As might be expected there were only a few boats out there, and mine was definitely the smallest. It was really too rough to be out, we couldn’t even stand up. We only saw a few fish and only saw one boat hooked up. We bagged it when a squall approached, racing it back to Tarpon Lodge, where we arrived just before 8 PM.
My feeling is that tarpon fishing here is done for this week, so I am going to pull the boat out and head home today.
But I still think life is great, and I so do love my work!
John Kumiski
www.spottedtail.com
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