While the rest of the country is getting hammered by wicked weather, we’ve caught a nice break here in the Florida Keys. Sunny days and a slight breeze have made the flats come alive this week. Our weather gets warmer with each passing day, bringing it past the 80 degree mark today.

To a tarpon, that’s a sign to move onto the flats and look for food. Tarpon feed on crabs, shrimp, pinfish and mullet and will strike at anything that immitates that. Another tarpon behavior this time of year is eating shrimp off the surface especially in the evening hours. It’s a sight to see and for fly fisherman, a gurgler shrimp pattern works pretty good.

We’ve had just as much luck during the daylight hours with tarpon, jumping some nice fish in the 80- pound range.

Permit fishing has been pretty good but should be thinning out on the flats this month. Permit spawn on the shallow wrecks and reefs around the lower Keys from April through May. Although the majority of larger permit head offshore, there are still a few spotted on the flats along with many smaller fish in the 5- to 10- pound range.

My angler, Bryan Byerly of Littleton, CO, had a fabulous day of permit fishing last week just before the last cold front. He landed two permit on fly, one 21- pounds and the other 19- pounds. Congrats to Brian! Bryan fishes with me in the Del Brown Invitational Tournament and he’ll be back in July to give those permit another go.

Bonefishing has continued to be good in the lower Keys. Bonefish enjoy live shrimp and for fly fishing - they love the foxy clouser. There are certainly many other bonefish patterns that work during different times of the year, but a foxy clouser is universal.

I expect our weather to stay consistantly warmer for a while now giving us a tremendous opportunity to enjoy some great Key West fishing.