Key West Tarpon Fishing

November 9th, 2008 Posted in Fishing

The tarpon is one of the world’s finest sporting fish. Stunningly beautiful and known as the Silver King, their aerobatic leaps make them a favourite of fishermen worldwide. From March to July thousands of tarpon pass through the harbour in Key West en route to their breeding areas and anglers are attracted into town for the chance to pit their wits against them.

There are a number of varying fishing styles for catching tarpon, the style changing depending on the type of water that you are fishing. Tarpon can be found on sand or mangrove flats and also in shallow river inlets. In this case the favoured method is either fishing a fly coupled to a very strong rod and line or using an artificial lure. At some venues for example Islamorada the preferred style is livebaiting with small fish such as pilchards or herring. The favourite fishing style in Key West is chumming with shrimp boat trash. Let me explain what we mean by shrimp boat trash. Lots of shrimp fishing boats work the waters in the Gulf of Mexico and besides netting shrimp they also catch a lot of small fish called menhaden. These are bagged up in onion sacks and sold as bait to the tarpon fishing boats in Key West.

The method sees the skipper cutting these small fish into small pieces and continually throwing them behind the anchored boat to attract the tarpon. The anglers fish with a whole menhaden on the hook, and it is drifted back in the current towards the feeding tarpon.

The tackle suggested for Key West tarpon fishing is extremely straight forward. Our favourite rod for tarpon fishing is the 7ft 9in Conolon Boat  12-20 lb test curve rod from ABU. It retails here in the UK for £74.99. There is also a 3 piece version of the rod (the Conolon Boat Traveller) which probably better suits the jet-setting traveller. That version retails at £79.99 in the UK. By the way, I use that Conolon Boat rod to fish for sturgeon in British Columbia and last year caught my biggest ever fish measuring 9ft 1inch and weighing…who knows, with only two of us fishing there’s no way we could lift such a beast but we estimated it at around 400 lbs. Anyhow, returning to tarpon fishing. The most widely used reels whilst fishing for tarpon are the Shimano TLD 15 or TLD 20 lever drag multipliers. The TLD 15 retails at around £80 in the UK, whereas the TLD 20 is about £15 more expensive. Whatever reel you decide on, it has to be super free running, since you’re attempting to make your bait drift down in the tide at a similar speed to the pieces being introduced by the Captain. My own preference is for the bigger TLD 20 because the larger spool spins more slowly when you are drifting your bait down in the tide with the other advantage that it needs less turns to reel in when your bait has drifted as far you want. You will need the reel completely loaded with line, I go for the grey Ande nylon in either 15lb or 20lb breaking strain. At the end of the line is tied a 10 foot leader of 50 lb fluorocarbon and a large circle hook. Of course all of the charter boats have first class tackle available free of charge should you not have your own.

OK, now down to the fishing. Your skipper will have motored out to one of the top tarpon spots, maybe the entrance to Key West Harbour, the yacht basin, the North West Channel or maybe Bokacheeka. The boat is anchored at the bow and if there are other boats fishing they’ll very likely be moored only a few feet away. The plan is that if every boat is chumming then there should be a good supply of food going down to the tarpon, keeping them in one big pod rather than splitting it up. The skipper will start throwing in the pieces of menhaden and you’ll hook a whole fish onto your hook. There’s a definite way to hook these baits but don’t worry, the skipper will show you how. You now let your bait drift down the current, paying particular attention to where your line runs from the spool of the reel. A bite can be quite subtle and will normally be detected by the spool of the reel suddenly running faster. As soon as you detect a bite you have to reel like hell….don’t strike !!. The beauty of a circle hook is that it kind of hooks the fish itself once you tighten the line by reeling in as fast as possible.

Once a fish is hooked things will suddenly become hectic, the fish will likely leap out of the water and it will definitely start running towards Cuba !!. Don’t forget that when playing a tarpon that if he jumps he’ll throw the hook unless you swiftly lower the rod to lessen the tension on the line. This dropping of the rod is known as “bowing to the King”, and you’ll get plenty of comments from anybody else on the boat if you lose a tarpon because he jumped and you didn’t bow. If the hooked fish is a reasonable size the skipper will release the anchor and set off in pursuit of the fish. I’ve released fish that were hooked a mile or more away from where they are finally released. It can be a long and hard fight but with a bit of luck you will eventually have the fish alongside the boat ready for a quick photo before it is safely unhooked to fight again some other day. I remember a ‘first-timer’ fishing with us one year. He hooked his first tarpon and as it jumped he excitedly asked “how big is that” to which one wag replied “about forty minutes” !!.