Fly Recommendations

RIO Fly Recommendations | Tarpon Patterns with Jillian Tisdale

Jillian Tisdale, Operations Manager & Buyer at Seven Mile Fly Shop May 22, 2026

Jillian Tisdale is a Florida native and has been living and fly fishing in the Florida Keys for almost a decade. She's a respected tarpon angler known for her big-game saltwater chops and deep technical knowledge of rigging and knot systems.

Grand Champion of the 2025 Ladies Tarpon Fly Tournament, RIO Ambassador and Sage Elite Pro, Jillian serves as Operations Manager and Buyer at Seven Mile Fly Shop in Marathon, FL.

She's known throughout the Keys fly fishing community for her relentless pursuit of tarpon and thoughtful, conservation-minded approach to angling and close ties to Captains for Clean Water. Jillian’s very protective of the Keys flats fishery and the guides that make a living on it so don’t ask her for spots, but if there’s someone to wax poetic about tarpon flies, it’s her.

My favorite time of year, as it is for most anglers, is when the humidity levels start to peak and our Royal Poinciana turn bright, fiery red. The large migratory tarpon start to show up in the Glades, down the back side of the Keys, and eventually start swimming on the ocean over bright white sand and grass flats.

Unlike bonefish and permit that tend to pin crustaceans to the bottom of the ocean to crush and eat them, tarpon often eat baitfish, crabs, shrimp and worms in the middle and on the top of the water column…from underneath, which makes for a hell of a show.

Here’s a selection of RIO Flies you can find somewhere in the tarpon box. -JT

RIO'S OLD SALT

Black & purple, size 1, on my favorite hook - the SL12S short. The deer hair pushes just enough water while the marabou wrap moves effortlessly at the slightest touch. I like this one in the Everglades in dirty water. 

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RIO'S KINGSLAYER

This fly slims down quite a bit and sits perfectly in the water column for laid up fish over light or light grassy bottom. These fish can be tough to feed, so fluttering a small fly in front of their face is key here. The Yellow/Chartreuse colorway is a winner.

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RIO'S PALOLO SLIDER

I don’t know a Keys tarpon box that doesn’t have a worm in it. The RIO Palolo Slider is an interesting one. It has a single feather stuck between two pieces of foam, imitating parapodia. It also has a green foam head which sits at the very top of the water column making the fly easy to see, which is many anglers’ biggest hurdle when throwing worms at Oceanside tarpon. 

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Setup for the Silver King

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