978-546-9704
| North Coast Angler 978-546-9704 | |
| Dave's Key Largo Log | |
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Fishing in White Water Bay, January 24th |
I arrived in Florida on January 16, 2006 to find the wind blowing as it usually does this time of year, 10-20 from the north and/or east. On January 24th, we got a window of opportunity with light winds and Stu Apte, Captain Dave Denkert and I made the drive from Key Largo to Flamingo to fish Whitewater Bay. The bay can also be reached by boat from Little Shark River. We started out at 5 am and arrived at the boat ramp at 7am. | White Water Bay is a body of water within Everglades National Park. The bay is approximately 18 miles long and about 8 miles wide at its widest point. The water depth averages about 4-5 feet deep and does not exceed 7 feet. See NOAA chart 11433. White Water Bay is inside the confines of the mainland and well protected from the normal winds found out in Florida Bay. The shallow water tends to warm up faster and usually contains a large concentration of bait; mullet, crab, shrimp, ladyfish and such. The combination of warm water and abundant bait make for good tarpon fishing during the winter months. This was my first trip to the bay since last year and I was amazed at how much damage resulted from the past hurricane season. The entire park has been closed with no services what so ever. The only thing open were the upper and lower launching ramps. As we entered White Water Bay, we noted how chalky white the water was. No doubt caused by the recent winds. And because of this, the fishing was very slow. We could see tarpon free jumping off in the distance, so we knew that they were here. However, we guessed that the numbers of fish were small, so hooking up would no doubt be limited. The three of us tossed plugs (Mirro-Lures and Rapalas) for awhile and had only two strikes and no hook-ups for our efforts. Two weeks earlier, Stu, Dave Denkert and Steve Thomas had 13 hook-ups with two very nice tarpon landed. Blind casting plugs makes it far more difficult to keep the fish on, because you can’t see the take to set the hooks properly. But that’s why they call it “fishing”. No matter, being out on the water with friends is what makes fishing Great! |
Fishing in Florida Bay, February 10 and 11, 2006 | As is the case with a weather front that stalls, 2-10-06 proved to be a good day. The wind died down in the afternoon so I headed the boat over to an area that should have fish in these weather conditions. We were not in the area more than ten minutes when the first tarpon appeared “finning” on the surface. Even though the water color was green with algae, we could still spot tarpon at 100yds out. On board with me were Richard Shaheen and his son. His son stood at the bow with his 12wt outfit in hand. I positioned him for a cast, but his first cast fell far short of the tarpon….no hook-up. It was very exciting to watch young Richard cast to the finning tarpon though! I re-positioned the boat; he made 2 or 3 more casts, all short. I finally managed to get positioned broadside to a laying fish only 30 or so feet away. This time, the fly line “bird-nested” at his feet, with the cast landing well short and again no hook-up! With that we called it a day and headed back to the ramp. Lots of excitement but no fish fights were had.
| The next day started with slightly more wind than yesterday, blowing in from the SW. My friend Dick Campiola and I left the ramp and headed to the area I had fished the day before. This day we fished the southerly bank rather than the northerly bank of the previous day. I made a cast to some working tarpon resulting in two fish that tracked my flies, but didn’t take. We had several fish follow the fly back to the boat, but no takes. As was the case yesterday, no fish fights were had and we headed back to the ramp. Not a bad day for February! It’s February 24th and it’s my good friend Dick Campiola’s birthday, but more importantly, it was a flat calm day in the Key’s. Dick and his wife Ginny and their son Ritchie (age 17) were down on spring break. Our plan was to seek out small tarpon on the flats. On the evening of the 23rd , I spent several hours with my tarpon mentor Stu Apte, who is a wealth of true and proven knowledge on where, when and how to fish for these “silver kings” of warm salt water fly fishing. Stu was quite explicit as to the color and pattern of the flies as well as the type and size of the hook. Later that evening I tied up 6 “purple Apte Two flies” on 1/0 and 2/0 Owner Aki hooks.
 Next morning Dick, Ginny, Ritchie and I headed out into the flats in search of “poons” as Stu calls them. On our first stop we were not disappointed as young Ritchie hooked and landed a nice 40 lb. “poon”. Ginny captured the battle on tape and took several still photos as well. The “Apte Two” fly that I had tied the night before worked as Stu said it would!
 Dick poled us into an area where we found, to our surprise, some much larger poons, 100 lbs. or more. Young Ritchie was up on the bow platform making nice casts with his 8 wt. IM6 G.Loomis rod matched up with a Bauer MR3 reel spooled with a Sci- Angler WF-8-F line. The outfit was much undersized for the poons he was casting too. Approximately 15 minutes later, Ritchie made the perfect cast to a laid up tarpon some 40-50 feet away. The large fish tracked the fly and ate it without hesitation. Bam! The fight was on! I was amazed at how proficient this young angler had become in his 17 years. He fought the running and leaping fish for more than 35 minutes. The large poon was now next to the boat but as luck would have it, we had forgotten the lip gaff! We tried to grab the fish with a gloved hand to no avail and the large poon finally bit through the tippet and swam off free.
   We estimated the fish to be in the 120 lb. class. Great fish and a super battle fought by both the fish and the angler (an exceptional fish to be fought with an 8 wt. outfit). The two old pro anglers screwed up by not having the proper landing equipment on board! Ritchie understood that the fish had been beaten and remarked that his experience was “As Good As It Get’s”. I have to agree, I was in my forties before I landed my first tarpon.
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