Tarpon going airborne is about as exciting as fishing get! Captain Steven’s kids Steven, Ricky and Jess are in town on vacation and wanted to tangle with a big tarpon. To enjoy my kids on the water I enlisted good friend and tarpon guru Captain Billy Nobles of Reel Animals Fishing. Captain Billy has forgotten more about Boca Grande tarpon than I know!
We prefer sight fishing on the beach and Mother Nature provided us with a great day. Light east winds made for awesome sight fishing on the beach. We were armed with pass crabs on 7/0 circle hooks connected to 80 pound fluorocarbon.
Captain Billy amazed once again finding the tarpon within 20 minutes! We set up and let the tarpon come to us which did not take long. We had 3 crabs in perfect position drifting naturally into the school you could feel the excitement mount. Sadly all 20 or so tarpon ignored our baits went down and we did not see them again.
Over the next hour we duplicated this 3 times with no takers. On our 5th pod of tarpon Jess quickly scored with 150 pounds of silver king jumping. It was on one of the amazing jumps that the line went limp. Steven was next in the tarpon parade. The tarpon went nuts and everyone quickly reeled in their lines to get out of Steven’s way. It didn’t last long as the tarpons huge tail snapped the heavy braided line.
As we continued on the same pod Ricky got the next hook up. After several majestic jumps the 130 pound tarpon stayed deeper and went to battle with Ricky. After 30 minutes Ricky had the tarpon boat side only to have it run again, 3 more times the fish ran when seeing the boat. Moments later the leader was in the rod and the battle was over.
It was noon so we headed to a waterside restaurant for lunch and nice conversation. A great day of tarpon fishing and big thanks to Captain Billy Nobles.
