I hear the weather hasn’t been that great back at home. I wish I could say the same just to make you feel better, but apart from the usual tropical thunder storms every evening, the weather here in the Florida Keys has been exactly as you would expect – bright, sunny and hot!

After touching down just a few days ago, it has been all systems go! I’ve collected the new boat and set about fitting her out, in a mad dash to get out fishing, and by some complete miracle, everything seems to have gone to plan...so far.

To fish the shallow waters off the Gulf coast of the Florida Keys, you need a specific type of boat, and this is why I chose a Bay Ranger 2200 by Ranger boats. Quite unbelievable but at 22ft, and fitted with an enormous 250hp Evinrude Etec outboard, she was designed to do speeds of up to 50mph, and able to fish depths as shallow as 12inches. A deadly combination!

Fishing in shallow water puts its own particular demands on a boat too and this opens up a whole new world of gadgets to get used to. A jack plate is a hydraulic lift which is used to raise the engine a further 6 inches out of the water to run through shallow channels. A trolling motor and push pole are used to stalk fish without engine noise scaring them. And I’ve also added the most modern of gadgets, a PowerPole, which is a shallow water hydraulic anchor system. This is basically a pole - that at the push of a button - will stake it’s self into the ground to hold position, in depths up to 8ft.

This boat has been designed to catch fish. She has 3 live-bait tanks, tons of rod storage, fore and aft casting decks and all-round fish-ability. If boats were weapons, my Bay Ranger would be likened to an AK47 – an inshore, shallow water, terrorist’s choice!

Naming a boat is always a difficult task and even more so if you want to use loved ones names. My girls are called Keira and Lola, then there’s Barbara my wife, and we have another girl on the way, so using my loved ones names wasn’t going to be an option – I just couldn’t see how they could all work together without sounding long-winded. Living in a house full of girls can be quite demanding at times to say the least, and with another girl on the way, life certainly isn’t going to get any easier. So after much deliberation I settled for the name “Too Many Girls” (there are too many girls’ names to sign write on the stern of my boat!!)

After a quick naming ceremony with canapés and champagne with our neighbours here in the keys (pizza and a quick shake of Budweiser to the bow) it was time to get fishing. It had taken almost two days, start to finish until the boat was launched and as it was now late in the evening, we decided to leave her maiden voyage until the following morning and go shore fishing from the Tiki bar instead.

The Tiki bar is a small boulder breakwater, with a Tiki bar on it and this area is particularly good for Tarpon at night. In the 4ft deep waters beyond, under the marina flood lights, Tarpon can be seen cruising up and down. A simple float with a live crab free-lined 2ft underneath is cast uptide and drifted down to the waiting fish.

Now the Tarpon at the Tiki bar aren’t usually big fish (as Tarpon go that is) and usually range from 10 to 50lbs; but as I trotted my first crab-bait back to the waiting shoal, a large shadow peeled off from the rest and within seconds I was into a fish that was too big for the test tackle I was using!  In a mass explosion of water, a Tarpon clearly in excess of 100lbs left the water, crashed back down and the games began. Now I’d like to tell you I landed this fish as it is another ambition of mine to catch a ton-up Tarpon from the shore – many keys locals have – but it wasn’t to be this time.

On a 6lb spinning rod, fixed spool, loaded with 10lb braid, this Tarpon headed for Texas emptying my reel until I could see the silver spool through the line. At that point I was lucky to turn the fish and regain control. 40 minutes, several more 150yrd runs and a lucky escape with a wooded jetty and we were near the end. But just 30ft in front of me, this Tarpon made a last attempt for freedom – she jumped, violently shook her head and threw the hook. Tarpon have a horrible habit of throwing hooks and it is actually one of the things that make them appealing to catch if you’re an angler like me who likes challenging fish. Next week I’ll have another go for a tarpon from the shore!

The following day it was time to give my Ranger her first run. First things first we decided to stock up on bait - live pinfish for the Tarpon and some barracuda for shark fishing. This involved a run some 12 miles into the Everglades, and cruising at 38mph, it only took minutes from dock to mark.

I’ve been learning to throw a Yankee cast net and I have to say I’m getting quite good at it. After several slings, we had a hundred or so pinfish and it was time to move on. Fishing for barracuda is a little bit more exciting. We drift the boat down the edges of shallow banks which break the surface, casting surface poppers and retrieving them back into deeper water. Again we had a quick result.

With all the bait in the bag it was time to get off and do some real fishing. The Florida Keys are a chain of over one hundred islands, linked via bridges and all these bridges produce big tarpon, lots of them, and our local bridge (just half a mile from our dock) is no exception.

We’ve had two tarpon trips now – one last night and one this morning and so far the tarpon are winning!!! Last night Andy (who has accompanied me on this trip) hooked two and I hooked three over 100lbs and we lost all five! This is quite regular with tarpon – they’re a painfully difficult fish to set the hook into because they have a jaw of solid bone. The biggest tarpon we had on yesterday evening was in excess of 150lbs, which I hooked just ten feet from the boat. As I struck, she left the water by six foot, blowing the hook and bait back out as she completed her second leap. Quite impressive to watch – this is what tarpon fishing is all about... the more big fish you hook and loose, the more your determination and anticipation levels rise – it’s like a drug!

This morning we were a little more successful! We hooked and lost another six tarpon over 100lbs but Andy managed to land two – one about 65lbs and another about 80lbs. Neither stopped for a photo – both broke the leader at the side of the boat (which is another thing all tarpon are well known for). As a bonus this morning Andy picked up a big Mangrove snapper (which is now sat in our freezer ready for dinner) and I fluked a 15lb barracuda whilst trying to catch small resident bridge tarpon on a fly.

Just for interest, mainly for bass anglers, I’ve include some pictures of popping corks (floats) which we use here in the Keys. These are live bait floats, scooped out on the top like a surface popper. After trotting a live-bait back in the tide with no success, when you retrieve you pop the float, like a plug, to attract attention to the bait which is some 3 – 5 feet behind. This is a very successful tactic for shore fishing and I have a gut feeling this would work great for bass fishing in shallow water (10ft or so) using baits like live sand eel or live prawn. I shall be bringing some home with my tackle.

Its midday now – just time for a quick dip in the pool and then it’s off to see if we can find some big bull sharks in 3-4ft of water (hopefully they’ll be kinder on us than the tarpon). I’ll let you know how we get on next week.

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