Tarpon, tarpon, where are you?

Palm Coast Observer
Opinion

Where are the tarpon?

As I’ve been traveling along A1A in Flagler Beach the past week or so, I haven’t seen the schools of menhaden that were there a couple of weeks ago. Maybe it’s because of the southeast winds that have been prevalent lately. The southeast wind tends to silt up the near shore waters. I believe this causes the baitfish to find cleaner water. Hence: no bait, no fish.

Even on the inshore side, I’m finding a lack of tarpon where I normally find them this time of year. I haven’t seen a single tarpon roll in the canals south of State Road 100 in Flagler Beach or the Sea Ray canal.

I can’t figure it out. It’s not like there’s a lack of bait in the Intracoastal Waterway the tarpon to eat. There’s plenty of menhaden and mullet for them.

The only report of tarpon that I have gotten recently is from Capt. Kent Gibbons. He says there have been plenty of 20-pound tarpon rolling at daybreak across from the boat ramp in the Tomoka State Park, but once the sun comes up, they disappear.

Gibbons also reported to me that he had three snook in the 10-pound range last week.

He has been working the riverbank and the mouths of the mosquito ditches. Soft paddle tails on a jig head have been doing the trick, he said.

When he told me this, I ran up river to take a shot at finding some snook for myself. Unfortunately, I didn’t find any snook, but that’s probably because I got there a little late in the day. I did, however, get a trout and a redfish using a Berkley Gulp shrimp on a jig head.

Last Sunday, I headed out before daybreak to do some flyfishing for trout and redfish. I found no reds but did get three legal-sized trout that I released. All the trout were caught at the crack of dawn using a floating line and a white fly that I tied. Once the sun came up over the horizon, the trout stopped biting.

I have been finding redfish actively feeding along the banks of the Intracoastal. These fish are also appearing at dawn and will stay feeding until the boat traffic picks up.

My buddy Dave Schmeezer and I found some active reds feeding.

I put Dave into position to cast his fly to them, but he got a slight case of buck fever. So in the excitement, I shot off a cast, but the only thing I hooked was the back of my buddy’s arm

Being the trooper he is, though, he reached around and pulled the embedded fly out of his arm. The good news is Dave will live to fish another day.