Despite another day of high temperatures on the 7 of July the Tarpon were fairly active this morning and we managed to jump three fly fishing. It is often very difficult for freshwater fly fishermen to remember not to lift their rod to set the hook. It’s a life long learned habit and strip setting the hook is just the farthest thing from anyone’s mind. If your planning on coming fly fishing for Tarpon in Fort Myers please spend the time practicing strip sets at home. It’s very frustrating when you have a homer moment at the worst possible time, but it happens to everyone so you try to remember and move on. The best tip I can give anyone is to keep the tip of the fly rod at least 3 feet in the water while you’re retrieving the fly. This does two things, one it keeps the belly out of the fly line so you’re on a straight line to the fish, and the rod is deep enough in the water that the resistance alone will remind you to strip set as you try to lift the rod this usually prevents most everyone from committing the cardinal sin of lifting the rod to set the hook. We went out into a Esero Bay after couple hours a Tarpon fishing and experienced some fantastic spec trout fishing. We switched over to spinning gear for the trout since it’s just a more effective way to locate the fish then, if you want you can switch over to your fly rod and start catching a few on the fly, after you locate them.
The catch and release regulations on spec trout and redfish are really starting to have an impact. There are more spec trout than anyone has seen in quite some time and there is still almost a year before the catch release regulations run out. The redfish have not at this point made much of a come back, but at least now there are a few redfish in the places where there used to be many so that is some positive news and let’s hope that their numbers continue to grow. FW C did a great job of implementing the right regulation at the right time to really help the spec trout especially recover from hurricane Irma and the red tide.
The best advice I can give you if you’re planning to fish this coming weekend is to get out early. We started at 5:35 AM this morning and a good portion of the fishing action died down by 9:30 AM as a temperatures really started to climb. As always the most important thing is just taking the time to go fishing whether it’s with your family your buddies or just yourself on a much-needed get away, make the time to go it will rejuvenate your soul and definitely improve your state of mind.
See you on the water!
Capt Eric…
Capt Eric Anderson
Capt Scott Anderson
What A Hawg Charters.