Hello,
The year has started off well, with guests visiting both the main Lodge and Long Caye Resort. Fishing has been good some days, and when the weather is not so good, we are grateful for the baby tarpon and snook in the rivers. Below is our January/February fishing report and we hope you enjoy. We look forward to visiting with you all soon,
Warm regards,
Mike & Marguerite
FEB 5, 2012
FISHING REPORT – Slams, Big Bones and Late Large Tarpon
Two Grand Slams were landed this past week despite two back to back weather systems with cloudy and rainy conditions some days.
Fortunately at BRL we have the Belize River and the Sibun River as backup whenever weather conditions out on the flats are difficult. On a recent bad weather day, one boat in the Belize River landed a seventy-five pound Tarpon, jumped twenty five Baby Tarpon and landed four. These “Baby Tarpon” ranged in size from six to thirty pounds, averaging about fifteen pounds. They are the acrobatic jumpers that challenge the angler to keep one on for even a few minutes.
Spin fishing with deep divers and jigs in the rivers was also very successful for big Snook, and several beautiful twenty and twenty five pound Snook were boated (and weighed); most were released. Several other fishing days in the rivers also produced good Tarpon and Snook action.
A lady angler on her very first time Tarpon fishing quickly got educated during a twenty five minute Small Tarpon feeding frenzy. Yes, she finally boated a nice one.
Heavy overcast skies and sometimes rainy conditions did however dampen Permit fishing on the flats, though spending time on Bonefish flats, some first time salt water anglers landed nice four, five and six pound Bones.
Snook on the mangrove edges of the flats were especially obstinate some days, totally ignoring many well placed flies. Sometimes it took only one hungry one to start the action and then the obstinate ones seemed to come alive.
Puglisi Everglades, Clousers and Deceivers were the best producing flies for the sometimes elusive Snook and Small Tarpon, while Gotchas and Charlies worked best for Bones. On one very calm morning Mike’s Wiggle Jig on ten pound spinning gear out performed the Bonefish flies. Other game fish caught were Cubera Snappers, Barracudas, Ladyfish and some big and small Jacks.
All BRL guides have been getting great compliments for consistently putting their guests on fish even when conditions were difficult.
The big migratory Tarpon have not shown up yet, but we expect to start seeing them in the next few days. We are looking forward to again tagging some hundred pounders with satellite tags in March. Hopefully this time around, they will be the migrants so we can see where they go when they leave here later in the year.
Our MAYA 2012 fishing and tour packages are off to a good start this year and many hard core fishing guests are enjoying their first visits to our famous Maya sites. In 2012, a few guests have visited the sites of Altun Ha, Lamani, Xunantunich and Cahal Pech – all are very unique and we hope you will come visit with us again or join us for your very first time and “sea” a little of Belize.
It is easy to get to Belize: just about two hours from Miami and Houston, and just a little more from Atlanta, Charlotte and Dallas. Regular flights to Belize can be booked on AMERICAN, CONTINENTAL, DELTA, US AIR and TACA.
And Belize River Lodge is just fifteen minutes from the Belize international airport.
Mike Heusner
Update – February 20, 2012: Though the big migratory tarpon are still late in showing up, they are still expected any day. But in the mean time, guests are enjoying the bones, resident tarpon, snook and within the last week, two big permit were landed and more seen, casted to and spooked. More on the Permit in the next fishing report.
