I have told many clients of mine that if you really love to fish, don’t become a fishing guide. I got a chance to break out my fly rod and go flats fishing. Long-term client and friend of mine Ricky and I, shared time pulling my boat. We landed several bonefish. I also landed a barracuda, bar jack and had a permit tail up on my fly but not eat.

I had 2 wonderful days of fishing with Chris Wells. the first day we landed a nice 60 pound tarpon and a bonefish. We lost several barracudas and had several shots at permit but we were not able to get the slam. The second day the winds picked up and we struggled all day. we did manage to land a small lemon shark on a nice white flat.

The past few days I have been struggling to catch tarpon , that being said I have been catching plenty of huge Barracuda, sharks and bonefish.

Key west flats fishing report by A.W.S charters January
Another January has passed and I would like to thank all my new and repeat clients for a great month of flats fishing. Key west had a very warm month and many of my clients were able to hook up on tarpon. A big hats off to Tom Rosenmayer, Chris Beatty and Mark Thompson for landing silver kings. The permit fishing was steady all month around Key west, I guided many of my anglers to shot at tailing fish but only Tom Rosenmayer landed 1. Toms fish was a very large permit weighing in over 20 pounds. Bonefish were quite scarces this month with only long time client Matt Calcaterra having a shot. Barracuda fishing started slow this month but really starting heating up towards the end of the month. My best day out on the flats was with Tom and Larry, They landed 4 or 5 and had plenty more hits. I tried a new method of shark fishing this month, I had my clients cast a popper with a piece of cut bait trailing. This did not work well but the eats we did have were truly spectacular. Backcountry fishing was fantastic for many of my anglers with catches of jacks, pompano, bluefish, ladyfish, and look downs. My favorite trip is a yearly trip with Chris Beatty and his family, between the 3 of them they landed 5 truly huge jacks.
All and all the flats fishing this month was very good and I expect the same for February so please check out www.keywestflatsfishin.com and book your day.