Key West Tarpon Fishing

The tarpon is one of the world’s leading sporting fish. Stunningly beautiful and known as the Silver King, their aerobatic antics make them a favourite of anglers worldwide. Each spring thousands of tarpon travel through the harbour in Key West on their way to their breeding areas and fishermen are drawn into town for the chance to do battle with them.

There are many different methods for catching tarpon, the method changing depending on the type of water that is being fished. Tarpon can be found on sand or mangrove flats and also in shallow river inlets. In this case the preferred method is either fishing a fly coupled to a very strong rod and line or using an artificial lure. At other venues such as Islamorada the preferred method is livebaiting with small fish such as pilchards or herring. The preferred fishing style in Key West is using a by-product from shrimp fishing. Let me explain what we mean by shrimp boat trash. Many shrimp fishing boats ply the waters in the Gulf of Mexico and apart from catching shrimp they also catch a lot of small fish called menhaden. These are bagged up in onion sacks and sold as bait to the tarpon fishing boats in Key West.

The method involves the Captain cutting these small fish into small pieces and continually throwing them behind the anchored boat to attract the tarpon. The anglers fish with a whole menhaden on the hook, and it is drifted back in the current down to the feeding tarpon.Eagle Claw Fishing Hook


The tackle recommended when fishing for tarpon in Key West is very simple. Our favourite tarpon fishing rod is the ABU Conolon Boat, 7’9” 12-20lb test curve. It retails here in the UK for £74.99. ABU also offer a 3 piece version of the rod (the Conolon Boat Traveller) which probably better suits the travelling angler. That one sells for £79.99 in the UK. Incidentally, I use that very same rod whilst fishing for sturgeon on the Fraser River near Vancouver and last year caught my best ever fish with a length of 9ft 1inch and weighing…who knows, with only two of us fishing there’s no way we could lift such a beast but we estimated it at around 400 lbs. Anyhow, back to tarpon fishing. The most widely used reels for tarpon fishing are the Shimano TLD 15 or TLD 20 lever drag multipliers. The TLD 15 sells for around £80 in the UK, whilst the TLD 20 is about £15 more expensive. Whatever reel you decide on, it has to be super free running, since you’re attempting to make your bait drift down in the current at a similar speed to the bait being thrown in by the Captain. I prefer to use the larger TLD 20 because the larger spool turns more slowly when you are running your bait down in the tide with the other advantage that it needs less turns to reel in when your bait has drifted as far you want. You’ll want the reel fully loaded with nylon, I go for the Ande grey in either 15lb or 20lb breaking strain. To the end of that is tied a 10 foot leader of 50 lb fluorocarbon and a large circle hook. Naturally all of the light tackle boats have excellent tackle for you to use should you not have your own.

OK, now down to the fishing. Your captain will have taken you to one of the top tarpon spots, perhaps the entrance to Key West Harbour, the yacht basin, the North West Channel or maybe Bokacheeka. The boat will be anchored at the bow and if there are other people tarpon fishing, their boat will very likely be moored only a few feet away. The plan is that if every boat is chumming then there should be a good supply of bait drifting down to the tarpon, keeping them in one substantial shoal rather than splitting them up. The captain will start throwing in the pieces of menhaden whilst you hook a whole fish onto your hook. There’s a particular way to put these baits on the hook but don’t fret, the skipper will show you how. You now let your little fish drift down the current, paying very close attention to where your line leaves the reel spool. A bite can be quite gentle and will often be just a speeding up of the line leaving the spool. As soon as a bite is seen you need to reel like hell….don’t strike !!. The beauty of a circle hook is that it kind of hooks the fish itself once you tighten the line by turning the reel as fast as possible.

When a tarpon is hooked things will suddenly become hectic, the tarpon will likely leap out of the water and it will definitely start running towards Cuba !!. Remember when playing a tarpon that if he jumps he’ll throw the hook unless you immediately lower the rod to ease the tension on the line. This lowering of the rod is known as “bowing to the King”, and you’ll get plenty of comments from everybody else on the boat if you lose a tarpon because he jumped and you didn’t bow. If the hooked tarpon is of decent size the Captain will release the anchor and set off to follow the fish. It’s not unusual to unhook a fish a mile away from where it was hooked. It can be a long and hard fight but with a bit of luck you will eventually have the fish beside the boat ready for a swift photo before it is safely unhooked to continue its journey to the spawning grounds. I remember a ‘first-timer’ fishing with us one year. He hooked his first tarpon and as it jumped he excitedly asked “how big is that” to which one wag replied “about forty minutes” !!.