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Fall is a funny time for a fishing guide in the Keys. The breakneck pace ebbs a bit, and I have time to get friendly again with all the land-loving facets of my life. Dock duties are essential, for re-rigging and repairs. But a day on the water with clients is a dollar in myRead more

Teaming up again, Sam Kaufman and I are riding out the unofficial “end” of tarpon season by fishing this year’s Gold Cup Tarpon Tournament. (April through June are thought of as the prime tarpon months. But heart-pumping silver king action can be found well into the fall, so don’t scratch them off your to-do list this summer!)Read more

Fly fishing in the Florida Keys brings many rewards: challenging fish fights, views that leave you speechless, and now and then you have to make room on the wall for another award. We were lucky to experience all that and more last week while competing in the Don Hawley tarpon tournament. We caught at least one tarponRead more

Working both shorelines and open water, we logged another tarpon on the score board yesterday, the 4th day in the week-long annual Don Hawley tournament. Weather has been steadily improving since Monday, though the numbers of fish caught haven’t gone up dramatically. We’ve caught a total of 7 – at least a tarpon a day – andRead more

Fly fishing for Florida Keys tarpon continued to be fruitful on Tuesday, the 2nd day of the annual Don Hawley tournament. My angler Sam Kaufman went 4 for 7 on tarpon hook ups, bringing our 2-day total to 5 tarpon caught and released. Sam got to enjoy a little sun on his shoulders, as he stripedRead more

Fly fishing in the Florida Keys isn’t all sunny and smooth, but the rewards are big all the same. Amid less than ideal conditions yesterday – cloudy, windy, rainy – a good number of tarpon were caught by contenders on the first day of this week’s annual Don Hawley Tarpon Fly tournament. Three teams each caughtRead more

It’s the first day of the annual Don Hawley Tarpon Fly tournament.  Organized in 1975, it was the first tournament to stop the killing of tarpon. With a sunrise like this to start out, it feels like a winning day already. It’s a five-day fight, so all this week there are lots of boats out thereRead more

Sam Kaufman reeled in this impressive silver king after hooking it on fly. What’s better than landing a hefty tarpon on a crisp April afternoon? The gravity-defying acrobatics tarpon are known for. With my friend and client on the bow, I watched as his line zinged tight after the hook-up. Seconds later, just 40 feetRead more

This team of troopers overcame gusty cool conditions to earn some great catches – here they have an ornery shark on the line. When anglers flock to the Florida Keys, most envision sunny skies and flat still waters in which to hunt their prize catch. While it is an island paradise down here, we stillRead more

A Silver King doing its signature head shake, attempting to throw the hook. Tarpon demand respect, thus the saying, “Bow to the Silver King!” So excuse the fuzzy phone picture. It hardly gives that whopper due credit. But it was all I had time for yesterday as I blazed through a busy half-day charter whereRead more