Patillo Creek Tarpon Fishing

Late yesterday afternoon I had originally planned on doing some Patillo Creek Tarpon fishing, but decided instead to fish closer to home around Peacocks Pocket road.

As it turned out, I would have probably done better fishing the Patillo Creek area.

Last Sunday evening while I was fishing Peacocks Pocket Road, Craig Bates told me about the fish he and Mary were catching on their vacation as well as that day in the Pocket area.  He sent me an email along with some pics of fish he caught in that area this past Monday which I thought I'd share with you below.

"When we saw you Sunday night on our way out, we told you about hooking some tarpon in the river side of the access road.

At home Monday morning I was thinking on being slapped to the curb by that handsome 3 footer.
A couple cups of coffee later I was loading up and heading back over for a chance at redemption. Maybe a little OCD?

Last summer we saw lots of baby Tarpon in Patillo Creek so I drove in there first. Sure enough, fish were rolling all over in the finger.

I launched the canoe and quickly observed 3 manitee’s munching mangrove branches hanging in the water. I took several pictures and backed away.

My forest green canoe must have looked like the next meal as 2 of the manitees came over to me and were nudging me and floating right next the canoe.

They have some stinky breath! One of them was so close I could have touched him.

I counted 10 manitee’s in the canal I wanted to fish. I had to be carefull where I cast to. Tarpon were rolling and splashing everywhere but would not take an artificial.

I tried small minnow plugs, swim baits, jerk baits and suspending baits. A slot sized Redfish picked up the Yozuri3D suspending plug. But those tarpon were not feeding.

Rumbling of impending showers told me it was time to relocate so I loaded up the canoe and drove over to Peackocks Pocket.

It started raining and blowing pretty hard as I drove around towards where I wanted to look for Tarpon. 
 
I waited out the storm as the radar showed it wouldn’t last long.

I pulled up to where I saw them the previous day. Sure enough there they were, rolling within a cast from the beach.

It was still sprinkling lightly as I geared up. Tied on a new 25# leader with a 3/0 screw lock hook and a Kietech 4” Easy Shiner.  I like the Kietech Silver Flash Minnow and Bluegill Flash colors. Both are Squid scented. Trout, Reds, Snook like them too.
 
A nice one rolled right in front of me. Led him by 10 feet, cranked twice and BANG! The fish instantly went into the air about 5 feet.

On the 4th jump the fish tossed the hook. One cast! Incredible!

I let the area cool down for about 15 minutes and the fish started to come back in. I checked my hook and saw that the hook was bent open and my leader was chaffed.

Tied on a new hook and another bait. I made some random casts but tried to wait for a fish to roll and cast in the direction he appeared to be headed.

This worked pretty well. You gotta love it when you cast to specific fish and hook them up.

I landed 2 nice fish and jumped off a couple more. Even jumped one on a top water prop bait.
The floating grass was really heavy so the weedless swim bait was much better.

I’m including a shot of one of the Tarpon I was landing when some friendly fisher folks drove up.
The other is a nice snook caught Sunday while fishing the same spot for Tarpon with the swim bait.

I think you wrote a story a while back where you fished the marsh right after a storm blew through.
It’s amazing how crazy the fish get. Yesterday some really nice fish were hammering the mullet in the river for about an hour after the storm.

Hope you get back soon."

The pics below were included with his email.

 

Patillo Creek and several other areas around Peacocks Pocket road have always been good spots for river Tarpon and Snook, and this year is no exception.

Tight Lines.