I headed out recently with Wyler Gins of Florida Fishing Products. We had a great forecast and hear some reports of tarpon migrating north with the warming water temps. We packed a mix of tackle and were prepared for anything the Gulf would share with us.
The surface glare was pretty harsh as we cruised south, parallel to Fort Myers Beach, pushing out into the thirty-foot depths a few miles offshore. Scummy crab trap buoy lines were dotted along the surface and we zig-zagged along them, carefully peering below the body for any suspended tripletail. During our first hour or so cruising, we only spotted one rather large tripletail that wasn’t in the feeding mood. We pushed a bit further offshore in search of migrating tarpon, but only found ravenous sharks and Bonita.
It was around 10 am when the sunlight was getting right for sight fishing the crab pots. We pushed around various depths, finally finding a few strings that were holding decent trips. I was excited to get my first few casts in with his companies flagship product, The Osprey Spinning Reel. Wyler had a variety of sizes rigged up on cobalt blue TFO rods. They looked pretty slick! I grabbed the 4000 size with some 20lb fluorocarbon and stuck a lively pilchard on the small circle hook.
As we looped around a spotted tripletail, I prepared my cast beyond the pot, gave it a steady retrieve, keeping the bait right along the surface. There were two trips hanging under this specific pot, one in the mid twenty-inch range, and the other a possible slot sized fish. Fortunately, the bigger of the two inhaled my pilchard the moment it came into view.
I really enjoyed battling this nearly double-digit tripletail on the Osprey. I utilized a fairly light drag, as to not pull the hook. The drag released buttery smooth and the everything felt perfectly solid. The hand feel and EVA knob were quite comfortable, capturing the key features I look for in my personal spinning tackle.
After a moderately eventful tussle, we netted the fish, snapped a few photographs and let her splash back into the emerald green waters to breed again next season.
