The Connected History of Tarpon Fly Fishing

What struck Monte Burke most about the tarpon world record story wasn't just the obsession—it was how everything was connected. Bill Smith, who may have caught the first bonefish in the Florida Flats, connects to Stu Apt, who connects to Billy Pate, who connects to Tom McGuane, who connects to Nathaniel Linville and David Mangum. It's a continuum that Burke didn't fully understand when he began reporting, but the deeper he dug, the more the pieces fit together. When Burke decided to write this book, he made a critical choice: show how this moment didn't happen in a vacuum. Learn how the history of fly fishing shaped the Homosassa era at [00:07:05]

The Intensity and Madness of Homosassa's Golden Years

In those incredible years in Homosassa, you had the world's best fly anglers—Stu Apt, Billy Pate, Ted Williams, Tom Evans, guides like Steve Huff, Dale Perez, and Bill Curtis—all there at the same time, all hunting for the same goal. The competition was fierce, cordial on the water but turbulent beneath the surface. Burke recounts stories of fiberglass poured on boats (rendering hatches inoperable, steering wheels frozen), sunk boats, slashed tires, and the kind of sabotage that seems fiction but was entirely real. Yet beneath the chaos was a respect: newcomers who didn't challenge the establishment would be left alone, but anyone bold enough to jump in front of a veteran would face consequences. This wasn't genteel fishing—it was competitive at its core. Discover the intensity of these years and the acts of sabotage at [00:09:00]

How Burke Discovered and Researched This Story

Burke's entry into the tarpon world came through Steve Huff, one of fly fishing's greatest guides. When Burke was assigned a Garden & Gun story on Huff about a decade ago, he spent two days on the water and hit it off. From that point forward, they fished together every year, and Huff would tell stories about Homosassa late into the evenings. Eventually, through Steve and Andy Mill, Burke was connected with Tom Evans—a man who had fished Homosassa for 41 out of 43 years, spending roughly three and a half years of his life on a boat in those waters. Burke spent two full seasons (two weeks at a time) with Tom and his guide Al DePieric, poring over Tom's detailed logbooks that documented every day of fishing. The reporting was a treasure hunt: finding sources, making phone calls, discovering that casual details held massive stories beneath the surface. Hear about Burke's Fortune meeting Steve Huff at [00:10:28]

The Environmental Collapse of Homosassa

As compelling as the human stories are, Burke couldn't ignore what happened to the fishery itself. Homosassa was home to a specific subgroup of tarpon that arrived every May, thriving on abundant blue crabs in the bay. The theory is that these crabs were crucial to why the fish grew so large. But the fishery didn't collapse just from the crowds of anglers. Burke's research revealed a more complex picture: the aquifer feeding the springs that empty freshwater into Homosassa Bay has been depleted. Florida state government attributes this to drought, but the reality involves decades of unregulated water extraction. With less freshwater input, fewer crabs survive, and the fish either stop coming or stop biting. The water quality declined too. Burke emphasizes that you can't tell the story of Homosassa without addressing its collapse—not just the human drama, but the ecological crisis. He connected this to larger conservation movements, including his own reporting on the Everglades and the fight to restore freshwater flow. Explore the environmental factors behind the fishery's decline at [00:24:46]

The Moral Questions Around Fly Fishing and Conservation

Burke doesn't shy away from the harder questions: Does catching and releasing fish harm them? Are we contributing to the problem by pursuing these species? He quotes Steve Huff saying, You wrecked that guy acknowledgingaching that even catch-and-release is stressful for fish. Yet Burke also argues that anglers—through fishing licenses, gear taxes, and conservation organizations like Trout Unlimited, Captains for Clean Water, and the Atlantic Salmon Federation—put their money where their values are. Hunters and anglers fund more conservation than virtually any other constituency. Burke's perspective: if anglers didn't care about tarpon, permits, and Atlantic salmon, there would be no funding, no political will, and no organizations fighting for these species. The act of fishing, complicated as it is, creates stewardship. Listen to Burke's nuanced take on fishing ethics at [00:30:06]

Key Takeaways

Final Thoughts from Tom

I got an early copy of Monte's book, and I loved it. This is one of those stories that seems stranger than fiction, but it's all true. When I started in Key West, I heard the stories about Homosassa—the guides, the characters, the intensity—and I was honestly intimidated. That's the big leagues, I thought. But reading this book, I realized those stories were missing pieces. There were parts and fragments I'd heard a hundred times on skiffs or around docks, but Monte put the whole puzzle together in a way that showed me the full history of fly fishing, not just the history of chasing world records.

What struck me most is Tom Evans' dedication. Here's a guy who can barely walk, can't really stand, basically a shut-in in Vermont most of the year, and yet he comes down every year for a month to fish and try to break a world record he's been chasing since 1976. That's obsession to a fault—but it also shows you what it means to care that deeply about something. The fishing world doesn't have another example of someone putting that much of their life into one pursuit.

The environmental part of this story matters too. The conservation movement in fishing isn't just about ethics; it's about understanding that we protect what we love. When you read about the connections between all these anglers going back to the first bonefish ever caught on a fly, you understand that this continuum—this lineage—is worth fighting for. Monte's book does that. It makes you care not just about the obsession, but about the fish, the places, and the future.

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Guest Bio

Monte Burke is an acclaimed author and journalist whose work focuses on obsession, competition, and niche worlds that captivate human attention. A former staff writer at Forbes where he honed his reporting and fact-checking skills, he now contributes to Garden & Gun and The Drake. Burke is the author of a New York Times bestseller about Nick Saban, as well as Sowbelly (the largemouth bass world record chase), Leaper, and Lords of the Fly (the tarpon obsession in Homosassa). His approach to storytelling involves deep historical research, patient reporting, and the belief that people genuinely want to tell their stories if asked the right questions. Burke spends his reporting phase as an extrovert gathering sources and tales, then retreats into introversion during the writing phase, allowing him to connect disparate threads and uncover how everything relates. He lives in Brooklyn and continues to pursue his own fishing obsessions while documenting the obsessions of others.

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