# Elusive Texas Tarpon



## Jacko (Aug 12, 2005)

You guy's catching Tarpon in Texas have my FULL respect. I started fishing the Texas coast (~75 trips/yr) in 1990. I've set tough goals for quantity and size of many salt water species. And in every case within a year or 2 accomplished the inshore or offshore challenge.

In 1998 I decided to catch tarpon, so in early May I hooked up my boat and slipped on down to Boca Grande. What an experience. It was fantastic! But I got the fever, tarpon fever. This was a much deeper ingrand desease than my "redfish obsession" or "kingfish passion". And I had not even caught anything to really speak of?

So in May of the next 5 years I was in either Boca or KW to get my annual fix. But these trips were just making the fever worse. Once a year was not enough. So one month as the Texas summer heated up and my jigging for red fish slowed I ventured out with Catain Mike. No silver kings on that trip, but I learned some stuff. The aproach was quite different from Florida. Shark, shark, shark, Jack, shark, shark shark. Ooh what an exercise in patience.

After observing the master I felt ready to give Texas Tarpon an honest try. I did not go to Florida last year, my plan started with an ambush in May out of port Isabel. I was going to catch the migration as it started. Four days no tarpon. June-August it was out the Galveston jetties a couple times a month (OK, maybe it was'nt an honest try, but I had to catch some fish in between my failures). Floating poggies in a variety of manners for hours and hours in the midsts of tarpon guides and other weekend warriers (not that type of weekend warrior, I'm from Lake Jackson) was not delivering the goods. Of course I was also using some left over break away jigs ("**** pops" west of the mississppi) from my last Florida trip. And I always have a plug tied on (chartreuse bomber long - A is my favorite. I call it the mangrove bait, but that's another story)

And then it happened in 34' of water a few miles out the north jetty. I was tying a rig and my perivual vision caught a silver flash 10' off the transom. No, it could'nt be, probably porpuse. I did not even raise my head (must have been in denial, what was I even doing out there with that attitude). But there it was again, so I looked up, I had to shake my head could it really be? TARPON! I yelled. TARPON!!!

I was with 2 Boca compadres. They new the real thing when they saw it. 130-150 pounders. Whooaw, here comes that rush. There was 4 or 5 of them slowly working a shrimp boats buy catch. Are hands were shaking as we stumbled towards our weapons choice. We thew and we threw and we threw to no availe. They were moving off no trolling motor and I was scared to spook them off with the outboard. Get a live bait out, get a poggy out, keep chunking the hard plastics I directed,............ but they were gone. My son had thrown a fresh poggy rght in the middle of then that I was sure they would take, I'll never use wire for tarpon again. A few minutes before the poons showed he had swithed to wire because of the number of sharks we were dealing with.

A few minutes later we simultaneously broke the silence. 
"So there are tarpon in Texas and they're big!" Our first texas tarpon sighting kept us enthusiastic for a few more hours, put once again went home with no photos. How could that be so much fun? We did not even hook up? It had been 2 years since we'de seen that beautiful sight. Oh Yea, the year before we did 4 days in Venice with plenty of fish, but no silver kings.

I elected not to go to Florida again this year. I decided it would require more focus to figure this Texas tarpon thing out. This year I've been around a dozen times. I was in Venice to early, so that does'nt count. Four times at POC, once Port A, 3 at the brazos, 2 out San Luis Pass and once out of Galveston. I finally saw tarpon in Texas agian. It was on the trip to Port A. They continuesly were rolling around the north jetty. Most were under 50#'s but I did see a couple approaching 100#s. I fished all day with 10-15 other boats. It was frustrating. Five of them looked like indians dancing around a campfire as they teased me while circuling a balloon. I did not see anybody hook up, other than on sharks and kings.

I think I've read everything there is to read. I can only think of 1 additional thing to do. Go more often. For the first time in 10 years my freezer does not have any trout or reds or snapper, its emprty. The fever has come to a boil. I call it shark fishing now to reduce the ridicule from my wife and friends. This year I've caught the 2 biggest sharks of my life. What an accomplishment??

So I'm going shark fishing tomorrow and probably Sunday. I will bring my camera,............ just in case.


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## Capt. Lowtide (Jun 30, 2004)

Good luck, it sometimes takes weeding out alot of sharks and jacks to get a scale!


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## crtarpon (May 11, 2005)

God bless you!!!

Someone else is as rabid and luckless as I am! We should start a club. T-Shirts could say 'I Have Texas Tarpon Envy.' Our secret signal could be a look of utter exasperation. 

Last Saturday at Port O'Connor I watched 100s of tarpon roll all around me--threw multiple jigs, rat-l-traps, Rapalas, Mirrolures, live bait, dead bait, chummed menhaden oil, held my mouth in different ways, crossed my fingers, prayed, etc.--and the best part of my story afterwards was sitting at Clark's for 2 hours later on waiting for the locksmith to unlock my running truck. I was hoping he would hurry because I was also watching one of my pickup tires going flat. 

The next day Tarponchaser took me to Port A. We anchored at the north jetty and had a similar experience--tarpon rolling here and there (I swear I saw one that was about the size of a loaf of bread--shouldn't he be in a swamp somewhere?) and I threw everything at them again. Tarponchaser eye hooked a live mullet under a cork and drifted it out behind the boat. Tarponchaser dropped the rod in a rod holder, and about two minutes later a little beauty of about 35#--maybe 45" long, hooks himself and starts jumping. Tarponchaser grabbed the rod and the little devil threw the circle hook somehow. I think these things jump, see that I'm in the boat, and make darned sure to get unhooked before they get too close. 

And I was standing in the front of the boat shaking my head. Monday I had extra keys made and replaced my tires. This weekend I'm going to mow the lawn and stay home to lick my wounds--emotional and financial.

I think I'm going to wait a couple more weeks before I go 'gafftop fishing' again--that's what I'm going to call it from now on, I think. 

Tarponchaser has caught 10 or so the past three years and jumped two or three times that many. I've been standing next to him with the same bait in the water for several of them. Of course, he's able to keep his line in the water more than I am as he doesn't seem to enjoy backlashes and hooking the jetties for the regular break offs and re-ties as much as I do. The way I look at it, if you can't catch a tarpon, a granitefish really pulls hard, too, and boating one is a real challenge. 

I like to think that the harder it comes, the more I will enjoy it when it happens. If this lasts couple of more years, you may hear about a guy who finally caught a Texas Tarpon and died from terminal f-ing joy.


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## Redfishr (Jul 26, 2004)

Its bound to happen , hopfully sooner than later.
Good fishin............


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## Bruce J (Jun 27, 2004)

Put me down for one of those t-shirts! I've caught one tarpon in Mexico that couldn't have weighed 3 pounds. I've jumped three Florida tarpon on my fly rod (in many days of trying). One of them was hooked for about 10 minutes. He never jumped and was trying to tow our skiff to Cuba. I think we were both happy that the hook pulled out.

So, I too decided to focus on Texas Tarpon, and my goals for this year are these:


See a Texas Tarpon, and 
Hook a Texas Tarpon. 
 If/when I knock off the first two, I will then add "Land a Texas Tarpon". We gave it a shot in POC last week with Curtiss Cash (Capt. Lowtide). We gave it the full effort, but the big boys were definitely off the feed. We saw a couple of kinda/maybe/coulda/sorta tarpon sightings, but nothing that I could swear to.

There's lots of time left and we will keep after 'em. A t-shirt might help, though! :smile:

Bruce


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## expressfish (Jun 8, 2004)

*they are there----*

I hooked one out of POC last year at the big jetties---it was on the gulf side of the east jetty or gulf jetties---I dont know the proper name but we clear the jetty to the left everytime we head offshore. Anyway I wasent looking for tarpon, but anything that would take a live shrimp. I never felt a thump or peck, peck, but It was a instant screaming run. I have never had a fish pull line off a reel like that before---I got two jumps and on the third one my bullet weight came flying at me like a bullet !! I was only maybe 36 inches or so , real wide at girth and full of power. Probably my first and last.


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## Jacko (Aug 12, 2005)

Glad to hear I'm not alone. As with most fishermen, I'm not giving up. Persistance is a a trate we all share. But I'm afraid the Texas Tarpon have delt me a new trate that in the past was foreign to me............ humility

This Saturday was even more humbling than most. It may make me a charter member of the club of those that have been Tamed by Texas Tarpon (The 3 T's). It started with a friend that could not go fishing. Staying home was not an option for me. I had to get out since there was going to be a baby shower (grand babies, twins!) at my house.

Not a problem. Solo trips are common place for someone whom is obsessed. I passed the first gas station, prices were to high. And then the next and the next. My gosh? $2.50/gallon, this is getting out of control. I started doing the math in my head. $25 for 10 gallons. Am I going to have to find a new hobby? Now I was really missing a fishin pardner $$$. $100 for a trip to POC, if only there was a gaurantee. I could'nt do it. I started thinking of the reports recently heard. A guy at work reported small tarpon in the Brazos river. My neighbor was prevy of several jumped fish in close at San Luis Pass. If they're at the pass and the river, then why are'nt they off the Freeport Jetties? Three weaks earlier there were clouds of poggies around the jetties. I loaded up with all I could handle in 30 minutes of thowing the net.

So not willing to bare the financial burden of going to a traditional tarpon spot, I slipped out the Freeport Jetties. Within a mile of the jetties there were 2 shrimp boats working the area hard for the poggies. The school was huge and their were about 6 boats leap frogging behind the shrimp boats that were practically doing figure 8's as they mopped up on the shad.

The brown pelicans and seagulls were in full force. Diving averywhere after the bait. There were huge mats of birds, bigger than the scaups and red heads in W Maty, floating around looking fat and happy. I've never seen so many porpuse in the area. A couple we're even doing acrobatic jumps in their joy of the smorgasborg.

There had to be tarpon in that mess. So I joined the frantic party. I started out floating a single poggy on 1 rod. I started thinking about how to single handedly catch a tarpon. From my experiences in Florida the captain is more important than the fisherman when it comes to boating a fish. Haa, don't really need to worry about that now do I? i've gotten some pretty good solo fishing practice with 5' sharks.

After 3 sharks and a dripping wet Tee shirt I started to loose faith. As I guzzled some cold water that I had payed more for than the gas, I watch the others boats. Most were hooking up and really getting there line stretched. No, even though there were 3 acres of poggies and a feeding frenzy going on, I was moving on. I convinced myself if there were tarpon someone would have caught one by now (2 hrs).

So I headed towards the mouth of the Brazos. A guy at work had jumped several tarpon slow trolling russel lures. They even got 1 to the boat, I saw the scale. The wind was a good 10-12 knots straight out of the south. My plan was to get in 40' of water and drift back towards the mouth of the river. Since I was buy myself I figured I should only float 2 baits. I've done 3 and even 4 baits by my self but it can get hecktic when the sharks move in.

Live is good. I'm out floating some baits relaxing under the bimini top, not really hurt bad by the coast of fuel. Suddenly a real starts screaming! I jump to attention, but before I can get the rod out of the holder, BANG!, spinner shark comes flying out of the water doing 100 RPM. The long leader and circle hook pays off. So I horse him in. He's not that big, 3.5', I can handle him. This is 1 circle hook I'm getting back.

So I manhandle the chunk of solid muscle. Circle hook seems to be coming out OK, but the rod tip is kinda tangled with the other rod so I move the rod that is still out, to the center rod holder which is mounted to the front side of the motor well. Just then the shark struggles and I loose my grip. &*%#@, I dropped him in the boat, he's thrashing around trying to bust a hole through the gunnel.

While I'm focused on the kaos on the deck I hear something funny. I look up and my other rod is bent in 2, but the drag is not releasing (I had just loosened it earlier?). SNAAP!! the 4 bolts on the rod holder simulatneously strip through the bulk head. It sounds like a broken bat as my favorite rod launches into the sea and in less of 1 second leaves nothing but a signature of bubbles, like shooting a rifle round into the water. What the blazings was that?? Now I'm ****** and I still have a shark to deal with. I guess it could have been a shark but I've never seen anything take off like a locomoitve like that?

Soon I'm back in business stewing in anger. Maybe the trip to POC would have been cheaper? A few sharks later, Whooa this is a dandy. Took 15-20 minutes to bring up side the boat. I'm not going to try to tangle with this bad boy. So as I grab the leader, I put the rod in a holder and reach down with pliers to cut the leader near the hook. Kinda spooky when your alone with a 100 pounder. He thrashes and I loose grip of the leader. SNAAAP!!!, there goes the rod tip on my second favorite rod.

OK, something is not right. I bought that rod 7 years ago for a Boca Grande fishing trip. I'm going home, but first I need to get my life jacket on. Since under the present circumstances if I don't drowned, I'll probably be boarded by the coast guard on the way in.

Humbling, humbling, humbling. I know I desrve it for the many years of boasting my conquests at sea.

Anyone looking for a well used boat? It's got some new real neat troll-n-tabs. They're ideal for slipping up on tarpon.

Just kiding, Ill be back. As long as I can aford it???


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## hookguy (Aug 15, 2005)

How's it, This is my first time posting yet, i read the boards alot. I understand this issue with the all mighty tarpon. I reside here in Houston, TX, yet i fish quite often in Islamorada, FL. I have hooked, jumped or whatever you want to call it, to so many tarpon you would puke. I was there iun late june, one night under the bridge; i dozen tarpon jumped in the moonlight. Not a sinlge tarpon in the boat. These fish are absolutly the most elusive fish in the ocean. I think i have seen ever trick any tarpon has got up his sleeve. Thats why there is yet to have been one in my boat. I have now relocated the boat here to TX, and fish out of SLP. I want nothing more than to have the first tarpon in my boat be from Texas.


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## crtarpon (May 11, 2005)

Jacko:
I love your stories as they make my personal fiascos seem trivial.

I am going to Port O'Connor tomorrow for some more 'gafftop fishing.' 

Rest assured that Monday there will be a post on here with me and a tarpon or another tale of humility and human degradation on a biblical scale. For me it seems there is no middle ground.

Last time I went to Port O, I had a flat (blowout going 70 mph), locked my keys in my running truck at Clark's (still can't figure this one out, but you can bet your *** I know where my hide-a-key is right now and at all times), and was so exhausted by the time I got home I fell asleep with gafftop slime all over me still and my shoes on. I can now honestly tell you that day old gafftop slime is nothing to trifle with. Turpentine works, but using it on sunburnt areas is painful.

I have become the 'Texas jackfish guy.' When I used to work in Costa Rica, it seems like every trip had a guy in it that became the 'jackfish guy.' Say there were three guys, and two of them would quickly hook, jump, and catch a tarpon. The third guy would break his line, lose them on jumps, straighten out hooks, have a reel seize, etc. until he was the odd man out without a fish. The others would rib him and he would generally get a little cranky as the others caught their seconds and thirds (or more). Finally, we would get into a giant school of tarpon rolling all around us and give him the first shot. He casts his Coast Hawk out, gets a bite, sets the hook hard over and over, celebrates loudly, and waits for the jump that never comes because he is hooked up with.......................a 30 pound jack he has to fight for 15 minutes while the school of tarpon swims away. How anyone could find a jack in 5,000 tarpon--and this happened to the bad luck guy regularly--is beyond me, but I am beginning to understand now. Some folks are just the 'jackfish guy.' I am 'jacked,' and all around me is despair.

So, it's back into the fray for me in an attempt to shed the stigma of the jack. Wish me luck and stay clear of me if you see me as like an evil sprit, eventually I will exorcise the jack and he will go on to haunt someone else. If you see a guy sitting outside of his locked, running truck at Clark's, don't try to help--just look away and keep walking briskly as the risks of contamination are too great.

Of course, if you see a guy laughing maniacally, it is safe as the jack has found a new victim, and may God be with him and have mercy on his soul. Only hardheaded, slightly dimwitted sorts such as myself can bear this type of thing. Smarter, softer folks could die from it. Apparently there are two of these haunting Texas at the moment--so beware of Jacko, too! If it doesn't go away soon, we'll get rounded up and placed in a leper colony kinda joint so as to not infect others.

If you've already caught a Texas Tarpon, you can consider yourself vaccinated and need not worry. You lucky so and so.


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## Captn C (May 21, 2004)

I guess I am one of the lucky ones.....normally I'm not?!?!?!

I "lurk" this board a lot...so I follow a lot of y'alls stories....

I ran into three bunches in 1996 that were greyhounding though the waters south of Sargent. I casted a dead herring out in front of the first school and hooked up on one that was less than 100lbs....it threw the hooks on the first jump.....so we chased the school and got back in front of them three or four times before I hooked up again. This time the fish stay'd pinned and I fought it for 1 hour and 45 minutes... guess-ta-mated @ 150lbs 5' 6"...on a 7000 and a heavy popin rod loaded with 20lb line....my Kingfish rig. I forgot to get a scale, but I kept the hook....until I forgot it in my truck when I sold it last month! See what I said about my luck.....I'm glad I saved the pictures in every computer I see! LOL

Any way....that was the first and last time I seen them! We went out just for Tarpon the next day and didn't see any!


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