Captain’s Corner: Jim Lemke

Capt Jim Lemke Times Correspondent

With the New Moon in 2 weeks all that means is the Tarpon are moving down the beaches and making their way out of the bay and moving out to the bridges and the passes to feed before some of them leave to go out and spawn on the moon. In the early morning hours along the beaches look for rolling Tarpon and use your trolling motor to get your boat setup and cast your favorite bait 10 feet up current of the school so it will drift down to them. On the afternoon hill tides that happed two times a month on the Full and New moons in May, June, and July the fish tend to eat on the outgoing tides as the bait starts to flush out of the bay. The main thing I look for are the Blue and Pass crabs flushing out in the tide lines. If you drift those tide lines with your engine off accept to adjust the boat you should get hooked up, once you’re hooked up on a Tarpon you do want to get on your fish so you don’t get broke off and mess up the other people fishing.

 Using the proper equipment is very important from the rod to the hook. I like a 7’ to 8’ foot rod with a light tip with a lot of backbone so you can cast a small bait. You should look for a reel in the 5000 to 6500 size loaded up with plenty of 50 pound braid. Now for a leader I like a 40 to 60 pound fluorocarbon leader to a 3/0 to a 6/0 circle hook.

Capt Jim Lemke charters out of Tampa, St. Petersburg and Clearwater and can be reached at (813) 917-4989 and at captjimlemke@gmail.com.