TARPON: A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

TARPON

CONSIDER THIS A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT FOR ANYONE CONSIDERING THE FOLLY OF FLY FISHING FOR TARPON. I AM HERE TO TRY TO SAVE YOU TIME, MONEY, AND, QUITE POSSIBLY, YOUR SANITY.

I had just returned from a three-day trip fly fishing for tarpon in Florida when my old man called. A seasoned fisherman, he cut right to the chase: “How many did you catch?” he asked.

I responded in tarpon-speak, a language that originated and is most frequently spoken in the greater Florida Keys region. I told him that I’d had half a dozen “shots,” two “eats,” and one “jump.”

“Okay,” he said. “But how many did you catch?” “Well, I didn’t actually catch any.” “None? Really? That’s too bad.” There was a hint of judgment in his voice.

In years past I had fished for tarpon in April, but I’d gone in June this year. He asked if I would go in June again. I immediately said I would.

There was a brief silence on the other end of the line before the former trial lawyer started in with his crossexamination. “Let me get this straight.” Pause. “You fished for three days.” Pause. “You didn’t catch a single fish.” Pause. “But you want to go back for three more days in June next year?” “No,” I said. “I don’t want to go back for three days in June next year.” Pause of my own. “I want to go back for seven days in June next year.”

“Son,” he said wearily, “I think you need to get your head examined.”

My father does not stand alone in his assessment of my obsession. My wife, friends, and colleagues all think I’m absolutely nuts—just flat out, bat-shit crazy. They share the same look of disbelief when in one breath I recount how I spent three days not actually catching a single fish— and then in

[A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT ]

by Brent Hannafan Photos by Zane Taylor

the next gleefully say I can’t wait to go back next year to do it all over again.

If I could, I would fly fish for tarpon every day. But that would leave me broke and divorced, neither of which I want to be. Sadly, unlike your average fly fishing trip for trout, my recent “zero-for-three-day” trip is not an anomaly. Tarpon are really, really hard to hook—much less land—on a fly rod. There are many reasons why this is true, which I will share below. But one of the reasons is because, quite frankly, tarpon can be real assholes.

The first time I fished for tarpon was off the Everglades with my friend, guide Andy Lee. I had met Andy while he was guiding in the mountains of Colorado years earlier. He had moved to South Florida to guide in the salt, and I lucked out when he had a free day while I was visiting my retired parents several years ago. I had been fascinated by videos of the Silver King’s jumps and wanted to try my hand at catching one on a fly rod. As Andy and I raced out into the Gulf that fateful morning, tarpon were still a mere concept to me. Nonetheless, I was confident I’d catch at least one tarpon that day. My confidence stemmed in small part from my experience fly fishing for trout, and in large part from the fact that I had zero clue what it took to fly fish in salt water, much less fly fish for tarpon. Andy slowed his boat as we eased into a back bay. Surrounded by mangroves, I stood up to take my post on the bow’s casting platform. Andy had been rattling off a litany of pointers and differences between fly fishing for trout versus tarpon as we motored to this spot. It sounded different, but as I stood staring out at the calm surface, I thought, “How different can it really be?”

Fair reader, with a dozen tarpon trips now under my belt, I can assure you that the difference is immense. Like, night-and-day different. Casting an Elk Hair Caddis with a 5-weight to a rising rainbow as you stand in a serene mountain stream is one thing. Casting

an 11-weight to a seafaring prehistoric monster whose mouth is the size of a gallon of milk while you try not to get pitched off the deck of a small boat in a large ocean is, as they say, a different kettle of fish. They are, in fact, different sports. To quote Andy Lee, “If everyone could catch tarpon on a fly, they’d call it trout fishing.”

Before I sink into the depths of why they are different sports, let’s first get the difference in size of the respective quarries out of the way. Your average tarpon would inhale your average trout as easily as you’d inhale a pig in a blanket at a cocktail party. Adult tarpon are 4 to 8 feet long and weigh 60 to 280 pounds. Yep, there are tarpon cruising the oceans blue that are the size of Shaquille O’Neal (before he got really fat). Bigger quarry require bigger weapons. That’s why fly rods used for tarpon are commonly 11-weights. If you want to catch a tarpon on a fly, you will first need to learn how to handle a bigger rod— and by “handle,” I mean learn how to double haul.

Fly fishing for trout rarely requires a double haul. And it most certainly does not require double hauling an 11-weight with intermediate sinking line directly into a 15-mile-per-hour wind. If you cannot competently double haul, you cannot fly fish for tarpon. Trust me, double hauling is not a skill that you can just pick up one afternoon like a six-pack on your way home from work. And the reason you have to double haul in order to catch tarpon on the fly is the wind— commonly known in tarpon-speak as the “f-ing wind!” Now, the problems the f-ing wind! causes the fly angler are intuitively obvious. But the real problem that arises with the f-ing wind! out on the salt is, literally, the waves. There simply aren’t waves to contend with when trout fishing. When fly fishing for trout, you are either standing on terra firma or safely ensconced in a drift boat. Either way, your torso is stationary when you cast. You may have to navigate slippery rocks or adjust to varying degrees of pressure as water rushes by your legs while wading, but your torso nonetheless remains stationary. Out on the salt, simply keeping your balance with the roll, pitch, and yaw that comes with standing on the bow of a small boat in the ocean is tough. As the f-ing wind! and corresponding waves increase— which always seems to occur exactly when you see the day’s first tarpon gliding toward you—it gets tougher. On top of trying not to get pitched ass-over-tea-kettle into waves now cresting over the side of the boat, you have to double haul a big boy and shoot 50 feet of line to a moving target.

Different skill set. Different sports.

Still unconvinced? Take a folding chair out to your nearest park. Get up on it and begin spinning a hula hoop around your waist. Now have the biggest fella on your block randomly give the chair a few swift kicks. Tell him to really whale on it a few times. Simultaneously try to cast a fly into the wind and have it land in another hula hoop you’ve placed on the ground 20 yards away. Are you with me? If you can’t land your fly in that hula hoop under those conditions, then don’t expect to catch many tarpon. I have fly fished for a variety of species of fish that move to the fly. I have seen northern pike create a wake as they race the length of a free throw with felonious intent to crush a topwater fly. I have seen thick-shouldered browns glide several times the length of their body to grab a streamer. Not so with tarpon. If you don’t put your fly into a beachballsized area in front of and slightly above their face, you ain’t getting an “eat.”

I’ve watched laid-up tarpon rudely give me the middle fin as they refuse to move for a fly that lands 4 feet— instead of 3 feet—in front of their smug faces. (They are smug. Like a rich, elderly Brit with a monocle.) Then, when you overcompensate on your next cast because of the f-ing wind! and your leader barely lands on top of their back, they spook and jet away. That’s right, a big, bad, 6-footlong tarpon will spook when a little bit of fluorocarbon lands on his back. All that will remain is a cloud of mud and a pile of frustration. When you experience that moment firsthand, you can’t help but call that fish an asshole.

Another issue you never have to deal with when trout fishing is the tide. The tide can affect when, in which direction, and at what speed tarpon may (or may not) swim. Tides are the worst. Or the best. Depends on the moment. But they will affect when and where you can catch these magnificent creatures.

And what goes hand in hand with the effect the tides are having on your tarpon fishing? Wrong. The answer is not the moon. It’s the sun.

Should we all roll up our sleeves and dig into how the angle or amount of sun makes it easier—or harder—to see tarpon? Frankly, I don’t have the space here to get into even the basics of light refraction, and no one really understands that shit anyway. Just know that if you aren’t seeing tarpon, your guide will blame the sun, the tide, and/or the f-ing wind!—and could actually be correct! As an aside, has anyone in the history of fishing ever been on a trip when the guide didn’t say at some point when the fishing was slow, “I’m tellin’ ya, we killed it here yesterday”? Asking for a friend.

Unlike tarpon, you don’t have to see trout to catch them. You can run subsurface flies through a fishylooking riffle or deep into a pool and, if you have the right fly tied on, you’ll eventually catch a trout sight unseen. Once you find the right fly and depth, you can often catch one trout after another. But if you can’t see a tarpon, then you can’t put the fly into the beachball and, therefore, you can’t catch one. Blind casting into the ocean will get you as many tarpon as casting into your front yard.

When hunting for tarpon in back bays or out on the ocean on those rare calm days, you will occasionally find a group of tarpon rolling as they mill about like teenagers at a dance. To “roll” in tarpon-speak doesn’t mean they roll on their sides like you have never been able to train your dog to do. “Rolling” means they surface, oftentimes gulping air, such that you can see their back, dorsal fin, and massive eyes. It resembles a dolphin breaching to breathe, only it’s more subtle because tarpon are gulping air in rather than blowing it out. I

witnessed this phenomenon my first day out with Andy when a 6-footer rolled no more than 15 feet from the boat. It genuinely startled me. I thought, “That’s what we are trying to catch? Holy shit.”

If you see tarpon roll in calm enough water, your guide will attempt to go all ninja on their asses and slowly push-pole you up to cast into the area you just saw one. You have to get close enough to get a cast into the beachball without spooking them. That these massive, ocean-going predators can also get spooked by a measly 2-inch wake is near the top of my list of how they can be real assholes.

The wake from the boat, vibrations from anyone moving around in the boat, and certainly the sound of your bored father slamming down the lid of a cooler after you have already asked him six times in the name of everything that is holy not to slam it—these can all cause tarpon to bolt. In order not to make a wake, the boat has to move very slowly. Just as you are at the point where you think you can cast to where you last saw your tarpon roll, that tarpon (or its twin) will inevitably appear again as it rolls 10 yards off the back of the boat. Which starts the process all over again. You can play this maddening

YOU CAN PLAY THIS MADDENING GAME OF WHACK-A-MOLE FOR HOURS ON END WITHOUT EVER GETTING EVEN A SHOT TO LAND ONE OF THESE ASSHOLES.

game of whack-a-mole for hours on end without ever getting even a shot to land one of these assholes.

It is said that muskies are the fish of 10,000 casts because that is how many casts it allegedly takes to catch one. Similarly, tarpon are referred to as a $10,000 fish—that being the amount of money people have to spend to catch one tarpon on a fly rod. This is why I am here to beg all of you trout fishermen contemplating a tarpon trip: Don’t do it. Save your money and your sanity and go instead to a new spot in Colorado to hunt for hook-jawed browns. Or break out of your comfort zone and head to Canada to try your hand at pike. But whatever you do, don’t head to southern waters in pursuit of tarpon. Leave those assholes to me and Andy, and I promise to write all about how awful they were after my next trip.