Recommended Fishing Guide in the Cape Coral, FL Area

Wife, I and another couple are heading to the Cape Coral area end of February. The guys are tossing around the idea of hopping in a boat to do some fishing one of the days we are there. Does this area have decent fishing that time of year? Does anyone have some good contacts who could take us out or have had good experiences in this area fishing?

Any other must see or do’s while we are down there?!

thanks!

Saturday Feb 22 and Tuesday feb 25 are twins spring training home games. And fishing is good anytime down there. Sheepshead whiteys sea trout grouper and many other good eaters to be had.uou are a little early for tarpon at that time but can always get on fish down there.

Thanks Michael, do you have any contacts to fishing guides in that area? I did see the twins were playing the Yankees on the 25 might have to add that to the list!

I had a good recommendation but it looks like the guy we went with closed-up shop. I think Hurricane Ian was hard on the charter business down there. Still plenty of options, though. You can definitely get on Trout and Reds that time of year. We went in early April and saw Tarpon, the guide said it was his first sighting that year. So Feb might be a bit early for them, but plenty of other species.

You’ll see manatees and dolphins – the latter of which get old REAL quick as they’re worse than sharks in the keys. They’re smart and they key-in on fishing boats, we lost a lot of fish to flipper.

I used Captain Tim Jones of Matlacha Fishing Charters back in August. He is a local and has lived out on Matlacha/Pine Island for many years. We fished that sound between Pine Island and Cape Coral. We pounded the reds and caught plenty of other species as well. Saw manatees and dolphins. He goes out and catches his own bait before picking you up.
He does NOT have the fanciest of equipment. If you’re looking for a guide with a brand new $150K boat, this is not your guy. But, if you look at his website, Google reviews, and Instagram; you’ll see how successful he is.

https://matlachafishingcharters.com/

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I don’t really have a recommendation. We just used a broker to book the last few times the guy we used to use retired and have not found anyone even close to him i will say stay far away from capt welsch on the blue ivy if he is still around if it wasn’t for his helper being awesome I don’t think he would have made it out alive.