By Capt. Justin Napior
Happy July everyone! The fishing has been phenomenal here in south west Florida. It’s that time of year for me when I get on the water before the sun comes up, getting bait for my trip or running to summer snook and tarpon spots in the dark with artificials tied and ready. Recently I had a really fun trip with a father and son and they are awesome fishermen! They actually fished three days with me. Jerry and his son Zachary come down from Tennessee once a year to fish; this year was my favorite! All three days they crushed it. Day one was actually my plan B, due to weather we couldn’t fish permit that day. So I said let’s fish snook, and they were in! We spent the morning sight fishing nice size snook with live bait and paddle tails. Jerry got a solid 32-inch snook and Zach sight fished his first ever black drum and it was on artificial! We finished up the day with a bunch more snook.
Day two I saw we had a really good tide for one of my favorite snook spots so I said meet me early so we can get bait together and start fishing sooner. This ended up working really well! We started that morning going 0-3 on big snook. After we broke off a few I stepped the leader up and Zach caught his first ever goliath; he was psyched! He also got a nice 28-inch snook. All of sudden I see a large dark shadow, I said that’s either a little tarpon or a huge snook. We make a cast to it with a large bait and boom! It was a huge snook; it took all three of us to get her to the boat. I reached down to grab her and almost flipped myself out of the boat because she was so heavy! I told Zach to get the camera ready because I wanted to make sure as soon as I pulled her out of the water we could get a fast picture and get her back in the water quick as possible. The hook fell out of her mouth because it had bent out! We were very close to loosing this fish, we got lucky. She was a solid 40-inch beauty! Jerry’s new personal best snook. Day three we took my skiff deep in the back water for juvenile tarpon, on artificial. Zach jumped a couple right away, then Jerry hooked one and was able to finesse it to the boat, knocking the tarpon off his bucket list and it was on artificial! Bonus points. It was a killer three days with them and it was really awesome getting to watch them make those memories. Hope everyone has a happy 4th, be safe and tight lines!
Keep first line
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