Rick Crawford
Like many of you this time of year I get fishing fever. But not just any fever…tarpon fever! My friends and I make our annual pilgrimage to Everglades National Park to attempt to deceive a backcountry tarpon with chicken feathers that result in newfound explosions in the ocean and bays.
There is just something about tarpon. How else can one explain how milliseconds of a tarpon jumping can be burned into someone’s memory for a lifetime and in constant playback mode? They are a species that stick in your mind and are difficult, if not impossible, to stop obsessing over. Maybe it’s because they are living dinosaurs that have survived for millions of years, or because Michelangelo painted a tarpon on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel that demands reverence?
There are a number of ways tarpon haunt my memory and envelope my mind, but it is for these same reasons that they deserve the upmost respect when being handled. There are basic rules for catch and release such as: keeping any fish wet is always a best practice when releasing, and if you must take a photo make sure you and the camera man are ready before holding any fish out of the water for a quick shot. That said, our friends at Bonefish and Tarpon Trust have a more complete list of how to best handle and protect tarpon once landed, which can be found in their excellent article “Best Practices for Catch & Release Fishing for Tarpon.”