juLY 2, 1898.] 
m nt\d j^ivqr ^telling. 
Boca Grande's Great Tarpon Fishing 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
I think an account of some wonderfully good tarpon 
fishing that a friend and myself had lately in Florida 
would be of interest to your readers. 
The place where we fished is one that hitherto has 
not been used for tarpon fishing, although some anglers. 
I believe, have given it a few hours' trial at different 
periods. As it is in my opinion the best tarpon fishing 
grounds in Florida, and may prove to be the best and 
most convenient to reach along the Gulf Coast, our ex- 
perience may be of some use as a guide to anglers during 
the coming winter. 
Mr. W. Littauer and myself left New York for Florida 
on May 15, and on June 1 we were back in New York 
with an even 120 tarpon to our credit, fishing one rod 
apiece. Flaving fished tarpon for some ten winters, and 
fully realizing how hard it is, at times, to get even one or 
two in a day, I am quite prepared to have this statement 
received with incredulity. 
Our best fishing, by all odds, was had at Boca Grande 
Pass, some eight miles to the north of Captiva Pass. 
In fact, we only got a dozen at Captiva Pass, all the 
others being got at Boca Grande. 
A short summary of our trip will give some idea of the 
extraordinary good tarpon fishing we met with: 
Arriving at Punta Gorda the night of May 16, we 
went on board the schooner Decoy and sailed the follow- 
ing morning for Captiva Pass. Owing to the very light 
winds we got there late that night. We began tarpon 
fishing the next morning. May 18, and got a few, but 
there were not many showing themselves in the pass. 
On Thursday, the 19th, we got a few strikes and landed 
one tarpon in the morning. Not satisfied with the fish- 
ing, we sailed for Boca Grande Pass. For several winters 
I had felt convinced that in this large, deep water pass 
there must be good fishing, if any one would take the 
trouble to find out the best places, and the. proper time 
of the tide for fishing in those places. 
We cast anchor on the south side of Boca Grande Pass 
at 3 P. M. At 4 we started out in two rowboats to see 
if we could find any tarpon about. My friend stayed on 
the south side of the pass, while I rowed over to the 
north side and tried that. I saw a great many tarpon in 
the pass, and by 7 o'clock had managed to land two, and 
had had several other strikes. 
This seemed promising for the next day, so on Friday 
morning, the 20th, we started at 5 o'clock in the morn- 
ing, and rowed over to the north side of the pass. The 
tide was slack low water, but we could not find any 
tarpon about. We rowed about hunting for them. Fi- 
nally roAving about a mile outside the pass, we found our- 
selves literally surrounded by hundreds of tarpon. In 
fact, for half a mile in every direction one could see 
them curving out of the water, blowing, playing and 
chasing small fish. We started to troll for them, using 
the white belly of a mullet as bait. 
We got strikes at once. In fact, from 6 until 8 A. M. 
. one could get a bite as soon as the bait was in the 
water. Between 8 and 10 o'clock the biting slackened up 
a good deal, but if five minutes went by without a strike 
one really felt quite neglected. By 11 o'clock I had 
hooked eight tarpon. Three of these I landed. , Three 
more were taken by sharks after I had played them from 
; twenty to thirty minutes each. One got off after playing 
; for twenty minutes, and the other broke the line by 
; falling on it. I probably had twenty other strikes. L. 
1 caught five, and had two taken by sharks. 
After 11 o'clock the tarpon stopped biting. We fished 
: again at 3 o'clock, on the ebb tide, but got no strikes 
1 until after 4 o'clock, when they bit for two hours. L. 
i managed to get one more, and had another stolen by a 
: shark. My total catch for the day was four caught, four 
I taken by sharks. L.'s catch for the day was six caught, 
t three taken by sharks. Our fish averaged about i2olbs. 
Altogether the sharks were very bad that day, and al- 
! though the tarpon were so thick, it did look as if we 
would have all our work and trouble simply to furnish 
i food for the sharks. However, the sport was gloriously' 
exciting, and next morning, Saturday, the 21st, saw us 
-,up at 4 o'clock, and at 5 A. M. we were on the fishing 
rgrounds, a mile outside Boca Grande Pass, surrounded 
Iby even more tarpon than the day before. The same 
rstrong east wind was blowing against the tide, and the 
^wateT was very rough. By 6 A. M. I had caught four 
tarpon from the boat, weighing from 50 to ioolbs. each. 
Then the wind began to fall and the water became 
smoother. By 8 A. M. I had caught four more, three 
from the boat and one from the beach, making eight in 
four hours. • The last four averaged over ioolbs. 
The wind was getting lighter all the time, swinging 
around to the south, preparatory to getting to the west, 
as it does on most afternoons in May and June. After 
8 o'clock the fish did not bite s® voraciously, but still 
one could get a strike every three to ten minutes up to 
12 o'clock, during which time I had caught five more 
tarpon, making in all, between 5 A. M. and midday, 
thirteen tarpon to one rod. The fish seemed to steadily 
increase in size as the day wore on, the last three landed 
by me measured 6ft. 6in. by 4oin. girth; 6ft. 8in. by 4iin. 
girth, and 6ft. ioin. by 42m. girth. At 12 o'clock I 
stopped for lunch and rested until 3 P. M. Starting to 
fish at 3 P. Mv, I tried from anchor by the lighthouse 
pier, on the ebb tide. There were quite a number of 
tarpon about, but they would not bite. The water was 
about 60ft. deep, and when we left our anchor, the tide, 
owing to the length of rope, dragged our buoy out of 
sight, although an eight or ten gallon can. The tide was 
too strong to row against, so having lost our buoy, we 
-went ashore to wait until the tide slackened up, At 4:30 
■/clock we saw some tarpon jumping inside the pass, 
vhere the current was more slack, so we rowed there 
and started to fish. There were quite a number of tarpon 
about, and they kept increasing up to dark. Between 
4:30 o'clock and 7 I landed six more tarpon, whose 
lengths were 5ft. ioin., 6ft. 2in., 6ft. 3in., 6ft. 6in., and 
two small fellows, making a total catch of nineteen tarpon 
for the day. L. landed ten tarpon during the day, losing 
three others by sharks. 
The sky was slightly overcast, and the new moon was 
of no use, or otherwise we might have gone on. But 
between the darkness and being absolutely tired out we 
gave it up for the day. I had only two taken by. sharks, 
which was a small proportion compared to the total 
number that I had on. Neither of us kept any ac- 
count of the strikes, as from 5 A. M. to 10 A. M. and 
from 5 P. M. to 7" P. M. the strikes were practically con- 
tinuo'us. The water was beautifully clear and transparent, 
and altogether it was a marvelous day's fishing, and one 
long to be remembered. That I ever would have a 
better day's catch never entered my mind, and yet four 
days later showed me better luck. 
On Sunday morning we found ourselves so tired out 
that we decided not to fish, but do our duty and rest. 
On Monday, the 23d, I caught eight. 
The 24th I caught six in the morning at Boca Grande 
and two that afternoon at Captiva, where we had sailed 
to meet a friend. 
On Wednesday morning, the. 25th, we tried Captiva 
again, but so few tarpon were about that we sailed back 
to Boca Grande, arriving at 4 o'clock. Between 5 
and 7 P. M. I caught four tarpon. 
On Thursday, the 26th, 5 A. M. saw us about a mile 
outside the pass, on the old fishing grounds, where we 
found all the tarpon as usual; simply thousands of them. 
From 5 A. M. until 9 A. M. they bit like catfish. From 
9 A. M. until 3 P. M. they bit fairly well, but falling off 
toward midday. Although the guide and myself had 
only had a cup of coffee for breakfast at 4 o'clock, we 
fished steadily from 5 A. M. to 3 P. M. Too much ex- 
cited to notice hunger, we would rather starve than miss 
such wonderful fishing. During these ten hours I 
caught thirteen tarpon. The two biggest measured 6ft. 
join, by 42 in. girth, and 6ft. n>4in. by 44m. girth. 
These fish I sent to Meyers, to have mounted. At 3 
P. M. we had breakfast or lunch or dinner, I do not 
know what it was, and both of us slept until 7 P. M. It 
turned out to be. a lovely evening. A light westerly .wind 
was blowing and the tide was running out; with not a 
cloud in the sky and not a mosquito about. In fact, an 
absolutely perfect fishing night. We fished in the lagoon 
inside the pass. Between. 7 P. M. and 11 P. M. I got 
nine more tarpon, averaging about ioolbs., making a 
total of twenty-two tarpon for the day to one rod. 
Every fish was played squarely to a finish without any 
help whatever. Only three tarpon out of the twenty- 
two were gaffed. I find that it is not necessary to gaff 
tarpon in order to land them. Once a tarpon is brought 
with his head up on the beach, the guide only has to take 
hold of the wire snell and pull his head up on the sand, 
when he can take the hook out and turning the fish 
hack into the water let him swim off. If not taken to 
the shore, but caught from the boat, I found that as 
soon as the tarpon is tired and lying on his side near 
the boat, playing him hard for two or three minutes 
and holding his head at every chance flush with the sur- 
face of the water prevents him from diving down, so that 
he can only flounder about and is soon piayed out. Then 
the guide, with a heavy glove on his left hand, seizes the 
fish by the jaws as he lies motionless on the surface and 
removes the hook. A slight blow from the blade of the 
oar starts the fish off once more on a career of useful- 
ness, little the worse for wear, and sure to be all right in 
ten minutes if not caught by a shark while getting back 
his wind. 
It particularly pleased me to originate this scheme, as 
formerly one of the great drawbacks in fishing tarpon 
has been to me the-unnecessary killing of so many fish 
merely for the sake of sport. 
I am quite certain that from 80 to 90 per cent, of the 
fish we caught at Boca Grande, in the manner described, 
and let go, recovered. 
L.'s catch for the day was fifteen in all, making 
thirty-seven to our two rods. L. had very hard luck in 
the morning. After catching four tarpon, he had three 
in succession taken by sharks, the last a very large tar- 
pon, which he had been playing for well over an hour, 
stolen just as he got him near the boat. This disgusted 
L. so that he gave up fishing at 11 A. M. Had it not 
been for this, he would have caught quite as many as I, 
for he had better luck than I that night. Between 7 
o'clock and 11:30 he caught eleven tarpon, which is one 
about every twenty minutes. Between 5 and 9 A. M. 
the tarpon bit so frequently that it simply became a ques- 
tion of physical endurance on our parts in playing them, 
and good "luck in escaping the attention of sharks. 
On Friday we missed the best fishing from 5 to 9 
A. M., being too tired to get up. Between 9 and 12 
o'clock I got three. Between 8 and 10 P. M. they bit 
fairly well for an hour, and I got two more. 
On Saturday, the 28th, we sailed at 7 A. M. for Punta 
Gorda to catch that evening's train for Tampa. Before 
we set sail, between 5 A. M. and 7 A. M., we fished about 
a mile and a half outside of the pass in the gulf. I 
caught three tarpon; one big chap 6ft. ioin. long, which 
I took on board and transferred to the Meyers steamer, 
which we met on our way up to Punta Gorda. 
Our total catch for the nine days was 120 to two rods, 
Littauer landing forty-two and I seventy-eight. My best 
one day's fishing in ten years was eight in one day. 
This jump to nineteen and twenty-two in a day is so 
wonderful that it is" only explainable by the fact that 
better tarpon fishing can be had at Boca Grande than 
anywhere else. Certainly I have never seen tarpon in 
such quantities. 
All sorts of other fish can be had here too, and what 
should prove of particular interest to yachtsmen is the 
fact that this pass is one of the largest and deepest in 
Florida. Vessels drawing up to 20ft. of water can get 
in the pass and find good anchorage inside. Again, what 
is unusual in most passes in Florida is the large body of 
deep water to be found in this pass. Inside and outside 
there are several square miles of water varying from 30 
to 50ft. and over in depth, which for Florida is most un- 
usual. In the pass itself the depth in places reaches 80ft. 
We got quite a number of kingfish, mackerel and chan- 
nel bass. There were thousands of mackerel about on 
every flood tide. 
Mr. Lester, who is in charge of the lighthouse in the 
pass, and who was very much interested in watching us 
fish, told me that in the four years that he had been 
there he had always seen tarpon about in large quantities. 
Strange to say he had never seen one out of the water in 
his life until we landed our first fish on trie beach Oppo- 
site his house. 
Dr. Blunt, who was in charge of the quarantine station, 
assured us also that there were tarpon in large quantities 
to be seen most of the year in the pass. The fact that good 
tarpon fishing had not been had before at Boca Grande I 
attribute to the fact that the pass being so large and 
deep is at times very rough, so that the few anglers who 
tried fishing there gave it only a few hours' trial, prob- 
ably not at the right place or at the right time. For 
instance, when we were there it. Would have been ab- 
solutely useless to have fished inside the pass in the 
mornings. All the fish were about half a mile, to, a 
mile outside the pass in the gulf, and it was only in the' 
evening on the ebb tide that the tarpon seemed to come 
into the lagoon inside the pass. At such times one could 
not get a strike outside the pass. 
There are so many square miles of deep water that it 
takes some conscientious hunting to find out the best 
place and time to fish at. 
I feel convinced personally that Boca Grande will 
turn out to be one of the best, if not. the best, tarpon 
fishing grounds in Florida or anywhere else along the 
Gulf Coast. I know there is excellent tarpon fishing 
along the Texas coast, but I think such fishing as we 
had at Boca Grande will be very hard to equal elsewhere. 
From what Mr. Lester and Dr. Blunt tell me about the 
tarpon continually showing themselves in large num- 
bers in this pass, I feel sure that we had not exceptional 
luck, but that -any angler who devoted some time to 
this pass would meet with just such good days. A 
great point in favor of Boca Grande Pass, as a tarpon 
rendezvous, is the fact that the largest yachts can sail 
right in and get good and safe anchorage practically 
right on the tarpon grounds. The Nourmahal was in 
there last year, and this year an English yacht equally 
as large was anchored inside. Strange to say, both the 
owners did their fishing at Captiva Pass, eight miles 
off. Had they only known it, they might have done far 
better within a mile of their yachts. It is possible though 
they had very windy weather, when the water at Boca 
Grande gets too rough to fish in from small boats. 
As far as I can see there are only two drawbacks to 
Boca Grande. One is the fact that in strong winds it 
gets rough. The other that sharks are very thick at 
times, and steal a lot of fish. However, one can afford 
to lose a tarpon now and then when there are so many 
about. It is exasperating though to have a fine large 
tarpon on your hook an hour or more and then have it 
taken by a shark. 
I advise anglers doing tarpon fishing at Boca Grande 
to use especially strong and stiff rods, in length from 
6ft. Sin. to 7ft. The water is so deep (80ft. in one place) 
that a stiff rod is needed to lift the fish when they start 
boring down, and to keep thenf near the surface. If the 
rod is not stiff it is impossible to play a tarpon hard in 
these waters, and so a man may be kept busy for hours 
with one fish. 
There is a fish ranch around the southern point of 
the pass, where bait can be bought. 
O. A. Mygatt. 
Tea Creek. 
This could be properly entitled "To the Memory of 
Tea Creek," for this is one of the saddest examples of 
man's ravages on a stream which once swarmed with 
brook trout. The fashion of fishing which has played 
havoc with all our streams can be described as follows: 
The men on a farm a dozen miles distant, having 
planted corn, in the interval which intervenes between 
the planting and the working decide to go fishing. They 
roll up their lines on a piece of cork, take bacon, bread, 
maple sugar, and a frying pan, in a sack around their 
shoulders. A good deal, of rivalry exists and when the 
fishing begins the object is to catch the most, and a 
count is had at the end of each day. The result is 
that the smallest trout counts as much as a large one, and 
every one is retained. They fish from sun-up to sun- 
down as if they were sawing wood, and take maybe 
1,500 trout, to be gorged by the whole neighborhood. 
Such fishing has effectually depleted our streams, and 
they are given a forced rest. One of these parties do 
more harm in one trip than all foreign sportsmen, of 
whom they are inclined to be jealous, accomplish in a 
whole season. 
Such is the condition of Tea Creek. A good fisherman 
can catch a good many by the exercise of all his finesse, 
but the man who only fishes for blood goes there no 
more. 
Then the only thing that makes it remarkable is not 
the fish in it, but the stream itself. After an acnuaintance 
of several years with the streams in Pocahontas and ad- 
joining counties, where the Potomac, James, Greenbrier, 
Elk, Tygart's Valley, Cheat, Williams, Cranberry, and 
Ganley rivers have their head, I felt myself competent to 
say something of the beauties of the streams which are 
found in the very apex of the Alleghanies, and I said to 
a friend of wider experience than mine, "Do you not 
think that the North Fork of Cranberry is the prettiest 
stream in West Virginia?" He replied, "With the ex- 
ception of Tea Creek, I think it is," and when I came 
to see Tea Creek even the glories of the North Fork 
paled in comparison. 
The day I went to the Big Lick at the forks of Tea 
Creek I count as one of the most eventful of my life. 
It is just about a year ago, and I can still derive some 
satisfaction in thinking on what I saw and how the 
day was passed. I do not intend to give you any special 
word pictures of the scenes along the stream, for you 
have all seen some scenery yourself, and if I chortle con- 
cerning the beauties of nature you must excuse me, for 
I can assure that, as a usual thing, I can look upon 
mountain scenery without becoming the least hysterical, 
so you must believe that what is to be seen on Tea 
Creek is extraordinary. 
This is to be a narrative of how the Commonwealth's 
attorney and myself, on the 28th day of May, 1897, took 
in the sights of Tea Creek. We were camped at the 
mouth of the creek where it flows into Williams River 
just below the Deadwater. 
Five lawyers and their wives comprised the camp. 
The first, last, and only time the ladies went to the 
