Water Depth?

[Captn C]

I think I seen some Tarpon about 100 yards off the beach front last Friday 8-6-04 just west of the pass near Sargent, but I didn't have anything in the boat to handle one so I didn't bother them. I also heard another guy seen some Saturday about half way between Sargent and Matagorda.

I caught one about 5 1/2 foot long in 1996, but until last Friday hadn't seen any since.

Any way my question is what water depth do you guys fish to target tarpon?

[Scott]

Anything from twenty feet out to fifty foot. Prime are is between thrity and forty feet along the upper Texas coast. In Louisiana, we fish from 20 feet all the way to 100 foot of water, depending on where we are fishing off the Delta. Deepest I've caught fish over there was 140 foot of water. Deepest I've caught fish in Texas was 50 foot of water.

[Captn C]

Thanks Scott.

There must be more tarpon around than most folks think, we are in such a big hurry to get out deep we run past them.

The only day I have fished for tarpon was the day after I caught the one I've caught and that only lasted about two hour then we ran out because we didn't see any.

Here is photo of it before we lip gaffed it:

[Scott]

Try not to lip gaff these fish. You can just reach down and grab them like a big bass. Its better that way. The only time I lip gaff is if there is a trebble hook in there. With the circle hooks we don't have the same issue. Boy that water looks great!!!! Tarpon don't always show themselves so sometimes its best to stay in a general area you saw them the day before, so long as the weather hasn't changed significantly... eventually they'll show up again... at least most times.

[Captn C]

Yeah...the lip gaff thing turned out to be a bad idea. The fish flipped off the gaff before we got it it postioned for a proper photo and fell back into the water. And all that weight on their lower jaw is not good for the fish, although I didn't know that back in 1996.


Thanks again!

[cfred]

Forgive my ingnorance but, what is the difference between gaffing them in the bottom lip and grabbing them by the bottom lip? Aside from the obvious. I have hooked two landed zero, but would like to know how I should land them.

[Scott]

The hole for one... also, when you lip gaff a fish, and the fish struggles, the fish gets jerked around by the lower jaw. If you grab it and the fish jerks too hard, you simply can't hold on. I think the stress on the fish is less. When you stick a lip gaff in the fish, 9 times out of 10, the fish goes nuts. They usually don't go as nuts when you grab them.