RECORDED:88 °FISHING: Excellent JUNE 27, 2009I had the best of times and the worst of times this week with Al Kestern and grandsons Bradley and Mike.Al grew up in Rocky River, Ohio, not far from where I long ago was a sportswriter for the Lorain Journal. Both boys were born there, but Bradley lives here in Florida. Al moved here from Pittsburgh 10 years ago, and took a fly casting class from me in January.Ergo the Tuesday fishing trip in the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) around Venice, Nokomis and Osprey. And geeze we absolutely slayed ‘em.The boys had taken a short fly casting class from me on Monday, but things just weren’t working out with the long rod so we switched to spinning gear and they each hooked fish after fish after fish. A very good day indeed.So then Al tells me they’re going down to Everglades City for a few days and have I ever fished down there.“Yes, I’ve had an Everglades National Park (ENP) permit for five years. Fished there a lot of times.”“Can you guide us down there?” Al asks.Yes, I can.We set the trip for Thursday and I get up about 5am and pull up the radar, since I’m hearing rain falling and some boomers. The screen is filled with green and yellow and red. I go back to bed.At 7am I call Al and we reschedule for our alternate “rain day” on Friday.Big puddles in the parking lot of the Rod & Gun Club. And my buddy John Wilson had called Thursday afternoon to tell me about the rain that had gone through. “I made a good call on this one” I think to myself.So, I get Al and the boys aboard the Hewes Redfisher and off we go to one of my favorite spots.We set up for a drift and there are pushes by big fish everywhere we look. Snook and reds. However, we spent three hours out there and not one single fish ate the Gulp! Shrimp the boys were pitching. First time I’ve ever been skunked down there.Of course, there had been heavy weather the day before and more was on its way. We were running out Indian Pass toward the Gulf when I throttled back. The clouds were building, the wind had picked up and there were whitecaps outside.“Let’s tuck into this cove and get out of the wind,” I said. “I don’t like the way it looks out there.”Two drifts later I heard the thunder.“Reel up, guys,” I said. “We’re heading back toward the ramp.” My plan was to get closer to home and maybe stop and fish a couple more spots that have been good to me. Uuhuh! The clouds got bigger and blacker. More thunder.We got to the ramp at the Rod & Gun Club and I got the boat loaded. BOOM. The rain started and never stopped. It got so bad on the drive back to Venice that my flashers were on and sometimes I was at a crawl on I-75.To make matters worse, I hadn’t eaten much that day OR Thursday, and my blood-sugar levels had crashed. I had to really focus on the driving (compounded, of course, by the weather) and by the time I got home I was shaking so badly I could barely flip a light switch.That happened to me a couple of months ago, when Kate and the dogs were still down here with me, and I THOUGHT I had learned my lesson. Sorta like when I was a kid and my grandmother would yell “EAT, EAT!” Who knew how right she was!A sandwich and a lay-down was all it took to set me straight within a bit more than an hour. But it was scary stuff and the moral of this story is “Don’t Be This Dumb!” Make sure you have enough fuel in your system to keep running on all cylinders.As usual, I’m spending today and tomorrow in the Casey Key Anglers & Outfitters fly shop because I really don’t like to guide on weekends unless it’s mandatory. I’ll get some bugs tied—maybe even some trout stuff since I hope to get home not long after a tarpon trip I have booked July 10 with Mike Vallis from the UK.Speaking of which…ENGLISH SETTER UPDATEGhost, the 12-year-old, and Heart, the eternal puppy at 2-years-old, are keeping Kate hopping. Literally. Up from her editing chair to put them into the 800-square-foot pen. Back up from her computer screen to let them in for nappy-time in their crates. Back up from the chair when there’s a whine that signals “Mom—I drank a lot of water and need to go back outside.”And so it goes.“But Heart’s showing signs of growing up,” Kate told me last night, after I’d recovered from my “crash.”“He’s getting calmer. Doesn’t leap up as much. And he’ll lay down here on the kitchen window seat and sleep.“He’s still not much of a guard dog, though. The FedX truck pulls up and he never barks. I think it’s because Ghost can’t hear very well anymore and she sleeps so soundly. She doesn’t react the way she used to, so he doesn’t have a role model to learn from that when somebody pulls up to the back door you bark like crazy.“But, he’s coming along.”Which is a very good thing. Since grouse season will only be two months away once I finally get home!I have days open for float trips on the Au Sable and Manistee rivers during the “Hopper Hatch” in late July and August, and for the beetles, crickets and ants in early September. Check your schedule.Always remember the immortal words of Sparse Gray Hackle: “The trout do not rise in Greenlawn Cemetery.” Tight Loops,Capt. Tony
RECORDED:90 °FISHING: Excellent JUNE 20, 2009I’ll tell you all about the marvelous fishing we’ve been having in a moment. Tarpon everywhere. Big trout. Ladyfish. And “an old home week” morning.But first, I’ve gotta say the biggest news in the past two weeks—for me at least—is that a lump on my chest is not cancerous! Having gone through that whole scene with Kate five years ago, I DEFINITELY was not looking forward to an encore.I called Dr. Melinda Beth Hart, who took care of Kate, and she got me right in. Sonogram inconclusive. “Since you’re here, let’s do a biopsy.Just so we know what we’re dealing with.”“Do we really have to do this,” I say. “We won’t do anything you don’t want to, but we really should know what we’re dealing with.”Okay, I say and she jabs a needle the size of the space shuttle into me. Hurt like hell. Then she tells me “this is going to sound like a dentist’s drill” Four holes later she says “you might experience some bruising.” Right. My right tit is still as purple as an eggplant!THEN she says I need a mammogram. Uuhuh. So I get squished and squashed for about a half hour on both sides.BUT!!!!! Everything came back clean and I’m still gonna be taking you fishing and telling you very politically incorrect jokes and going grouse hunting and generally having a very fine time in This Wonderful Life.Speaking of which. This is probably the best tarpon season in the last three or maybe four. Lots of fish. Eating fish, I mean. Lots of jumps. Plenty of action and excitement.First, though, I’ve gotta tell you about Fran and Joe Roberto, and their kids Nate and Melissa.I get a phone call from Bob Wiser, who’s been working with me at Casey Key Anglers & Outfitters. “I met these people on the beach at Siesta Key,” Bob says, “and they want to book a charter. Here’s the phone number.”Humm. A 330 area code. Ohio. Where I was born and raised. So I dial and Fran answers. We chat a minute and I ask, “so where are you from in Ohio?”“Little town called Warren,” she says. “Near Youngstown.”A pause. Then I tell her “I was born in Warren. But grew up in Niles”A pause. “NO WAY!” she yells. “My husband grew up in Niles!”So, we spent a morning catching fish and talking about all the people we knew and grew up with and some like Richard Albarini (who owned THE restaurant in the area) who died. Melissa caught the most fish (she kept track) and we had a lot of laughs. Which is how it’s supposed to be.Anyway, we caught a whole bunch of fish that morning in the Intracoastal Waterway around Nokomis and Venice. The next day—my 60th birthday, by the way—I got the news that everything was clean and green!This week I got Tom Ladimir and his wife, Gladys, surrounded by a horde of tarpon on the Myakka River. Gladys was in the dreary throes or Dramamine and didn’t participate much, but Tom hooked two poons and was shocked at the number of fish around us.Yesterday my ophthalmologist, Mark Johnson, hooked his first-ever tarpon on a fly. It was a really magnificent fish, well over a hundred pounds. He set the hook hard. But kept too much pressure in his excitement and it broke off at the 20-pound class tippet.“You are immortal,” he said as we were no-waking back to the ramp. “That fish and this day will live forever in my mind.”Pretty good morning, I’d say.ENGLISH SETTER UPDATEKate says a raccoon has been hanging around the bird feeders up at the Michigan house driving the puppy (two years old) absolutely CRAZY.“That coon comes to the feeders about 9:30 every night and Heart goes absolutely berserk! Runs the length of the (36-foot-long) porch constantly. I mean his tongue is distended when I finally get him back into the house.“Fortunately, the coon doesn’t appear rabid at this point. BUT, you might have to take extreme measures whenever you DO get back home!”Ah, yes. Home. Anybody out there interested in catching some very large brown trout on hopper flies up on the Manistee or Au Sable Rivers in Michigan during July or August? Let me know. Kate, Ghost and Heart would be VERY happy.Me too. But, I’ll stay in Florida chasing tarpon till August 1 if need be. See you soon—one place or the other!Tight Loops,Capt. Tony
It’s been blowing and raining hard the past couple of days, but tarpon are absolutely EVERYWHERE! They’re just off the beaches of Casey Key, Venice, and Manasota Key, and they’re inside all of the creeks and rivers.
Fortunately, the forecast is for clearing skies and hardly any wind for the foreseeable future. Which means Bob Pascal and his ladyfriend Terry "should" have an enjoyable day on Tuesday. I certainly HOPE so, since he couldn’t break away from his world-famous St. Michael’s lodge in Maryland last month and generously gave the days to a mutual friend from Nokomis, Bob DeBoer.
Unfortunately, when Bob fished with me we were once again surrounded by fish with a bad case of "lockjaw."
One day later, Rande Yeager had four "grabs" with flies, but just didn’t get a solid hook-set on any. "Setting the hook on these tarpon is like setting the hook on the side of this Hewes Redfisher," I told him. "Slam the hook home with your line hand, then bang him boom-boom-boom with the rod."
His son, Brooks ("I tell everybody I named him after the finest third-baseman in the history of baseball," Rande says) made up for it the next morning, though—in spades!
We got onto the water at 6am, and in less than 15 minutes Brooks hooked a 50-pounder. Thirty minutes later he brought it to the boat and that tarpon absolutely went berserk when I reached down to lip it. Thrashing, churning and finally crashing away, it totally slimed me!
So, no Pentax Moment for posterity. Except in everybody’s mind.
Of course, things got incredibly exciting a little while later. Tarpon kept milling around everywhere. Rande and Brooks were sharing the trip with another of my regular clients, Mark Goodnight, of Charlotte NC. The anticipation level was off the charts.
Finally, Brooks grunted. "Got one," he said, and line peeled off the reel. One HUGE jump later a magnificent tarpon in the hundred-pound class was six feet out of the water and then off the line. Turns out Brooks had tightened the drag a tad too tight. BIIIIIIIING!!!
"Damn," he said, with a bit of a tremble in his voice. "I sure would have liked to keep him on just a little bit longer!" A beautiful fish, to be sure. Rande was so thrilled that Brooks got into those fish that he barely wet a line. Mark, on the other hand, was frustrated. So many fish, and no hookup.
Rande and Brooks could only spend a couple of hours that morning, and the rest of the day Mark was casting to fish that simply wouldn’t open their mouths. "I’m gonna take up GOLF," he wailed at one point. "And that boy hooked TWO!"
But, a couple of days later (when he was SUPPOSED to be back in Charlotte), he yelled from the dock where was sitting on his bucket of lures. Capt. John and I had decided to break our two-year (or was it THREE) streak of not fishing together. Our guide schedules are so conflicting that we never get a chance to share a boat ride.
This time, we each had Thursday morning open and decided we were going fishing. Sort of. We each had three "grabs" but hadn’t put any silver into the air when Mark recognized me and called out.
"Let’s go get Mark," I said. "He fishes with me a lot. Give him a bit of a freebie."
"Tell you what," John replied. "Drop me off and fish him for a while before you come to my house." I was having trolling motor issues (again—as usual) and John was going to zap an ohm meter on the various electrical items.
Poor Mark. Still dozens of fish with no hookups.
"I guess I’ve just got bad karma," he drawled.
Nope. It’s just tarpon time! Have I told you I hate fish?
ENGLISH SETTER UPDATE
Ghost—who’s 12—and Heart—who turns two on Saturday think it’s bird season!
Kate says the weather up in Michigan has been absolutely horrible. "You wouldn’t be guiding with the weather this cold," she told me AGAIN today. "I can’t imagine any brown drakes coming off with the air temps in the 30s at night and barely 50 during the day."
BRRRRRRR!
Kate said that when the dogs came in after being in the 800-square-foot pen for a couple of hours, Ghost ran right over to her cozy little nest next to baseboard heater and curled up. "I think she figured Heart would try to claim it," Kate said, "and she wasn’t having ANY of that!"
Smart dog. Of course, she always has been. Which is why she’s a legend among grouse hunters in northern Michigan. Made her first retrieve at 21 weeks old and has absolutely beaten herself up damned near every hunting season since. God, I can’t imagine the pain of losing her.
And the puppy is still ALL puppy. "He’s been going NUTS over the mourning doves," Kate said. "Gets up on his hind legs and looks out the dining room windows when he sees them at the bird feeder. Dances around on his hind legs and whines."
Yep. He’s gonna be a good one. And I’m gonna try real hard to never look down on him in comparison to Ghost. Of course, I might not have to. The boy has a nose on him. I just have to keep him in the same county.
RECORDED:83 °FISHING: Excellent MAY 24, 2009Tarpon season is in full swing here in southwest Florida. We’ve got migrating spawners in the 150-pound class cruising the beaches off Casey Key, Venice, Manasota Key, and Gasparilla Island. We’ve got “juvies” in the 20-to-80-pound class in the rivers. And, we’ve got very largePre-spawn snook patrolling the beaches.What a delight. Except for getting up before light. Sigh. That’s the one drawback to being a guide. Up between 3 and 4 in the morning, and then in bed about 7pm. Which is why Kate, Ghost and Heart are back in Michigan (more about them later).We’ve had some wind and rollers on the outside during the past week or so, which meant I stayed in the rivers. Where we were absolutely SURROUNDED by tarpon. I felt like George Armstrong Custer on his worst day. Tarpon, tarpon, tarpon everywhere!And I was extremely happy that Will Bouck, who lives near Grand Rapids, Michigan, boated his first tarpon ever on a black-and-purple streamer pattern. As you can see from his grin on the Featured Photo he was one very happy angler.One of the most important things Will learned during our two days together was that keeping the rod tip high on the backcast makes all the difference in the world. “Stab the sun with your rod tip,” Lefty Kreh told me many, many years ago. “Keep the tip way up in the air. Then stop the tip about six feet above the water on the forward stroke.”What I try to point out to my anglers who drive the rod tip too low with a sidearm sweeping motion is that you have to remember basic physics. (Which I regret not studying hard enough when I was in school!) You have to stop the rod tip high enough above the water surface in order to let the line travel through the air.Common sense dictates that if you drop the rod tip low to the water on your forward stroke you not only “open” the loop into a wide C-shape (destroying your line velocity), you also simply don’t give the fly line enough room to travel through.Bottom line: longer casts mean you reach fish who haven’t been spooked by the boat, the angler, the guide, or the rod swinging through the air! Which, in turn, leads to more hookups.I went through the very same evolutionary process when I started fishing salt water 14 years ago. I was a small-stream Michigan trout guy whose longest cast (with a 4-weight) was maybe 30 feet. Distance? You gotta be kidding me!But one month down here tossing lead-eye flies with an 8-weight showed me the flaws in my preparedness. Like most northern trout anglers I guide, it was a very real revelation. Now add a 12-weight rod to the equation! Anyway, Will worked and worked and worked and finally jumped (and landed) his tarpon!Gary Sibbald, from Ontario, had been down fishing with me the week before and landed a bunch of fish, including a very fat spotted sea trout. But the tarpon just wouldn’t co-operate for him, either with fly or spinning gear.Gene Kahn and Steve Nelson suffered similar frustrations—tarpon that had us absolutely surrounded and would NOT eat live crabs. Go figure! But, I keep threatening to have T-shirts printed up with a succinct phrase emblazoned across the front:“It’s PronouncedGuideNot God”Gotta get to the shop----OH, yeah! Kate’s doing great—looking for a hatch of very special flies out front of the house every afternoon. And Ghost, who turned 12 years old last week, is frisky and frolicking. She’s even bedeviling Heart, who’ll be two years old next month. They had a special event a few nights ago when a bear was lurking around the house. Kate said Ghost was roaring and Heart was walking the length of our 36-foot screened porch on his hind legs!Sure do miss them, but hey—it’s Tarpon Time! You do what you’ve gotta do.Tight Loops,Capt. Tony
“Ole Blue Eyes” sang something about “the winter winds, are blowin’ in…” well, he might as well have been crooning about southwest Florida these past several weeks.
But, here’s hoping the past couple of days finally have blown out all that cold, blustery air!
Chris Counts and his wife Kate came down from Michigan with their friend Andy Woodrich and we had to do a bit of shufflin’ around to get them into fish.
Thursday afternoon, which was supposed to be “prep time” for night snooking, we no more than got lines in the water when it started raining. And raining. And raining harder.
“We’re going home,” I said. And, we did.
Friday morning found us back in the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) around Nokomis, but the wind was howling and I decided to put the boat on the trailer and seek refuge in Lemon Bay’s creeks.
Good plan, except the fish didn’t want to play. Except for one small lizardfish. Sigh. Another tough day. Okay, we’ll get out Saturday afternoon and catch some fish, then do the night-snook thingy. Everybody was good with that.
So, Saturday morning I drove to the Warner’s Bayou boat ramp in Bradenton to meet Rich Hunter and his old friend Tony Booth. Rich was still VERY pumped about catching that 4-pound jack crevalle and 3-pound ladyfish last week. “That crevalle is now my screen-saver,” he told me. “It bumped my grandkid!”
Oops! Gotta be careful about that kind of thing, Rich.
We drove into Miguel Bay and Tony promptly got into a ladyfish. Then another one, and another one and Rich still hadn’t caught a fish. We poked around some docks while the wind corkscrewed my Hewes Redfisher, and I finally decided to hide behind Bird Key.
The guys ate lunch and I slow-walked the boat westward. Once we got into the lee, I climbed onto the poling platform and started looking for redfish. Found some, too.
That was the good part. The not-so-good part was that Mr. Booth couldn’t quite pinpoint them and all of our best efforts “went for naught,” as he would have said in his native England.
Rich is still pumped up about his “new love”—fishing, however, and wants to go out again Sunday “when my son and daughter will be down visiting.” Attaboy, Rich. Great attitude!
Kate, Chris, and Andy also had great attitude when I met them at 4 o’clock. We got out into the ICW and Kate was charged with the responsibility of catching the first fish. Which she did in hardly any time at all.
The guys got into the act after that, and boated quite a few fish before it was time to get set up on my favorite light for snook.
Interestingly enough, the guys caught several ladyfish, and Andy boated a hefty sea trout, before Chris finally brought a respectable snook into the boat.
The pearl estaz shrimp with white hackle reverse-palmered down the body seemed to work best, although Andy lost the best fish of the night on one of my glass minnows with yellow/black lead eyes. That was one very large snook!
They’re on their way back to snowy Michigan today—from which we just had a call from our plow operator telling us his tractor’s broken and getting our road plowed might be, uh, problematic.
Marvelous. Simply marvelous!
Oh, well, I’m taking Jim and Denise Depaepe back out for night snook this evening. So the hell with snow!
When we fished together last week Denise—as always—caught bigger fish than Jim. So I can’t send them back to Washington state without at least giving Jim a CHANCE to redeem himself.
I am IMMENSELY relieved to report that February in Florida is back to being February in Florida!
That is to say, warm, sunny and relatively windless. Sort of. I mean, it IS Florida and there’s always going to be some sort of breeze. Just not the howling 29-knot blows that kept me beached for nearly THREE WEEKS.
Well, anyway, it’s good to have the weather back to normal so that my people can relax on the water amid the frantic disruptions of hungry fish inhaling flies and jigs.
And I am indeed gratified to tell you that those disruptions were frequent indeed during this past week!
Bill Riccardi, who’s fished with me many times, wanted to get his wife Karen interested in fishing. “I really want her to get into some fish so she’ll get excited about it,” Bill had told me weeks ago. But, the weather simply wouldn’t co-operate.
Until Tuesday, that is.
Bill was casting his fly rod, as usual, and Karen was using some of my light tackle. We had to root around a little bit, hitting several different spots in the Intracoastal around Nokomis and Osprey, but finally the water warmed up or the moon and stars were in perfect alignment or something.
We started catching fish.
Lots of fish.
Several different kinds of fish—including a flounder on fly. Ultimately, Karen landed a very respectable ladyfish and the moment was historically preserved thanks to Mr. Pentax. We never did take a picture of Bill, but the day was all about Karen anyway!
I can only imagine the expression on her face when we put her into a school of Spanish mackerel or bonito in a couple of weeks!
Rich Hunter and his old buddy Jeff North joined me in Lemon Bay the following day. Rich finally retired, came to Paradise, and decided to learn how to fish. So he called Sarasota County Adult Ed, where I’ve been teaching some fly fishing classes, but the one he wanted to attend had been cancelled.
“Can I just schedule a day for you to take me fishing?” he asked. Yep, I replied, and suggested that he stop by Casey Key Anglers & Outfitters for a preemptive fly casting lesson.
We booked a half-day. Unfortunately, the wind was too strong for Rich to use the fly rod, but things turned out pretty well anyway.
Jeff, who’s spent a fair amount of time on the water “Up East,” joined us and caught several fish before Rich got on the board. But when he scored, he scored BIG.
ZIIIIIING, went the reel. “Whoa!” said Rich. “Whoa, fish!!!” But the jack crevalle we ultimately weighed at four pounds didn’t want to whoa very easily. As jacks do, this one put on one helluva show before coming to the net.
“WOW,” Rich said when the photo-thing was finished, “that was really FUN!” Not long afterward, we got into a school of ladyfish, and then a bunch more jacks. Heck, Jeff even managed to hook a fairly decent fish.
Naturally, since he was the more experienced of the two, and Rich was boating larger fish, I dug in the needle. But not too deep—Jeff’s thinking about a bonito trip, and you’ve gotta keep the clients happy!
Apparently Rich was happy. He called the next day to schedule another trip later this month. Attaboy, Rich! That’s what keeps Kate happy—and if Big Red ain’t happy, there’s no peace in the cave.
Speaking of “happy,” Tony Newman finally got away from his snow removal business in Minneapolis and we cruised all around Lemon Bay yesterday.
Tony had been urging his friend Jim Jensen to come visit for the past four years, and Jim (or maybe his wife Sandy) decided it was time to get out of the cold, snowy northland for a few days.
They spend a lot of time chasing northern pike and musky on “The Tundra” but Jim never had been fishing in saltwater before.
His first ladyfish convinced him that there’s a lot to like about tossing jigs in this part of the world. “They really put up a fight!” he marveled. “Look at the way it jumps!”
The only disappointing part of the day was the total reluctance of the dozens of redfish we saw to eat a lure. We must have watched and poled after tailing redfish for an hour and not a single one would accommodate us.
Well, Jim Depaepe is in from Washington state on Monday. Perhaps those redfish will be a bit more co-operative then!
RECORDED:60 °FISHING: Good
The best fishing opportunities during the past week have been around lighted docks at night in the Venice/Nokomis "Snook Alley."
Our anglers also have been catching snook to four pounds, and sizeable jack crevalle in Lemon Bay and its tributaries.
Size 4 glass minnow patterns have been very effective. Also cast Commissioner Johnson, Copper Commissioner, and Silver Anchovie patterns in size 4 and you have a very good chance of having a great deal of fun.
The current "front" has brought wind to 20 knots, but it's supposed to lay down by the end of the week.
WOW! It seems like only yesterday we were all caught up in the frenzy over whether or not the millennium change was going to kaput everybody’s computers.
Remember all the fuss? Thank goodness THAT’S all behind us. Now it’s just a matter of concentrating on catching fish—something Rande Yeager, his son Brooks, and their pal Rod Chapman didn’t have to worry about.
Nope, they kicked off the New Year in fine fashion! They’re from Minneapolis (although Brooks lives in Tampa now), so the morning’s slight nip didn’t bother them a bit.
“Hey,” Rande pointed out, “it’s something-below-zero back home, so this feels GREAT!” Brooks and Rod nodded in agreement as I backed the Hewes away from the ramp and we launched our assault upon Lemon Bay.
The first “beach-head” was the big flat along the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) channel just north of where Stump Pass dumps in. The result was a small pinfish and an even smaller lizardfish for Brooks.
“How weird that thing looks,” Brooks commented about his lizzy. Well, he “hadn’t seen nuttin’ yet!” We worked our way into the Pass, and Rod boated the largest Sea Robin I’ve ever seen.
You wanna talk about weird! Man. Go to the Photo Gallery dropdown to see one that Wally Henderson caught (we failed to get a picture of Rod’s). This is something that obviously got lost somewhere during evolution’s train ride.
This alleged fish has gills and fins, of course. It also has, So Help Me God, wings and legs and tiny little feet! That’s right: fins AND wings AND feet! And no, none of us had been drinking. In fact, that’s one of the reasons the guys booked me.
“When you told me on the phone that no alcohol is allowed on the boat,” Rande said, we knew you were the guide for us.”
“Yeah,” Rob chimed in. “We figured you were pretty darn serious about fishing, not just having a boat party. We take our fishing real serious. In fact, we’re two of the better walleye fishermen in Minnesota.”
Well, they certainly showed nearly everything in Lemon Bay how The Guys From Minny do things. In no particular order they caught a bunch of spotted sea trout, grouper, ladyfish, pinfish, lane snapper, mangrove snapper, jack crevalle, snook, and flounder.
The jigs I tie using eight-ounce and quarter-ounce heads, with the same materials I use to tie Commissioner Johnson and Petrella’s Glass Minnow flies, were absolute killers. As usual!
About the only thing the guys DIDN’T catch were some redfish. Which surprised me because reds have been very prevalent in Lemon Bay. But, as I always point out, the fish down here move around a heckuva lot more than brown trout back home on the Manistee or Au Sable rivers!
Ah, well. Rande’s coming back down in a couple of weeks, “and I want to spend the day fly fishing,” he said. “And I guess we’d better start talking about a tarpon trip next summer.”
I like the way you think, Rande. I like the way you think! Which reminds me of a joke…well, maybe that’s better left for a one-on-one conversation on the boat.
Who says you can’t catch fish when a cold front moves into southwest Florida???
BAH, HUMBUG!!!
Yeah, it did take a little bit of time to “crack the code,” but my guys the past few days managed to put a pretty good hurtin’ on a whole bunch of fish. Mostly down in Lemon Bay, of course.
Let’s see.
Last week started with Dave Dillman, his stepson Ross, and son-in-law David. We worked Snook Alley pretty hard and it conversely worked US pretty hard.
Then Ross caught a keeper-sized flounder (which was released), and that opened the gates. Trout and ladyfish abounded. The best trout was Mike’s that was thismuch shy of the slot, and the ladyfish were everywhere once the water warmed a bit.
The next day was off-limits to fishing because Kate and I celebrated our 38th anniversary with our tradition of trimming our Christmas tree.
This year was a bit different, though. A gecko had taken up residence during the week our tree was in a bucket on the side of the house, and it hitched a ride inside.
Now, it’s living amid the boughs and ornaments (some of which are about 70 years old, passed down from Grandma Lucy to my mother and then to me.
“He’d better not knock down any of those old ornaments,” Kate wailed—after trying to catch it in an empty apple sauce jar. “The darn thing’s just too quick, and he won’t jump down out of the tree onto the rug!”
I really don’t know what Mr. Gecko is eating, but he appears to be healthy and happy. Go figure!
But, I digress. Back to fishing.
Ann Peters bought a surprise Christmas present for her dad, Bill, who recently retired after a career owning an insurance agency in Watkins Glen, NY. So, Saturday afternoon found us in Englewood, along with Ann’s fiancé, Glenn Harrison.
It was tough going for a while. We scoured Lemon Bay in search of redfish, but they kept eluding us. Lots of activity and swirls, but no hookups. We finally ran up into one of the small tributaries and Bill tagged two small snook real quick.
He wasn’t very impressed until a fairly large jack crevalle inhaled his fly. When the water finally stopped splashing all over the place, he was out of breath and a LOT more impressed.
“That fish, uh, gave me a pretty good workout,” Bill said. “Yeah,” I replied. “Jacks have a way of doing that to you.”
We went back outside and worked a couple of flats that have been generous to me. FINALLY, Glenn and Bill hooked up simultaneously. Bill’s was another jack—but not as large as previously.
Glenn, on the other hand, had his hands full. When he finally managed to bring the fish alongside my Hewes Redfisher 18, I slipped the net under a very healthy 6-pound bluefish.
I know it was 6 pounds because for the sake of accuracy—as well as my fingers—I slipped a BogaGrip into his jaw. That’s the biggest Blue any of my anglers have ever landed down here.
Sure, sure, I know that’s nothing compared to the Blues Up East. Glenn’s from Falmouth, MA, and he’s caught plenty of them WAY bigger than that.
But, it’s all relative. For US, that’s a darn big Blue!
This morning, Trey Zoeller met me with his dad Chet, who lives on Casey Key, and brother-in-law Aaron Willis, from Louisville, KY.
The wind was humpin’ pretty hard out of the northeast, so I didn’t even waste any time trying the flats in Lemon Bay. We headed for the creeks, and almost immediately got into trout and jacks and snook.
It waspretty constant action, too.
In fact, Chet commented at one point, “Gee, we’ve gone 10 minutes without a hit!” At which point he promptly hooked and boated a 22-inch redfish.
We decided to leave the creek and head back out into Lemon Bay, and were rewarded with trout and ladyfish one after another. Several times they “doubled up,” at one point narrowly missed getting a “triple” when Trey’s fish threw the hook.
“That was great, Trey said as they piled into Chet’s car for the ride back to Casey Key. “I’m bringing several guys down here in May. Maybe we could chase some tarpon?”
“Sure,” I said. “But that’s a very narrow window of opportunity, so get with me as soon as possible. Especially because it sounds like I’ll need to book a couple more guides.”
“OK,” he said, nodding. “I’ll let you know. And I might be back down another time or two this winter.”
Well, the fishing is only going to keep getting better and better and better! For him and for YOU.
I guess the only positive thing I can say at the moment—now that the thunder and lightning have stopped—is that I’m not buried under four feet of snow at my house in northern Michigan.
Really, though, things have been very strange the past couple of months! The weather, of course, dominates my world since it directly effects my ability to earn a living.
And so far, November and early December have been tough, tough, tough. In fact, the Sarasota newspaper ran a story last week saying this November officially was the coldest on record for southwest Florida.
Yikes!
Fronts have been coming and going with too much regularity. In between, the fishing has been pretty darn good. But 25-knot winds and six-foot waves are hard on fly casters!
Considering the weather right now, it’s probably a good thing that my trip scheduled for Saturday has been moved to Monday. Perhaps things will have settled down by then.
We did have a reasonably good day earlier in the week. Started out tough, though. We were looking for pompano, but had to settle for small snook, snappers, ladyfish, and the opportunity to hook a baby tarpon.
However, Jason Roberts found out that tarpon have mouths about as hard as the side of my Hewes Redfisher. Ah, well. Next time, eh Jason?
We’ve started doing our regular series of casting clinics at Casey Key Anglers & Outfitters. The next one’s scheduled for Dec. 21 from 1pm to 3pm at the shop.
The Tuesday and Thursday fly tying sessions are up and running from 6pm to 8pm, and we’re doing seminars one Tuesday a month. The one this week was “Successful Saltwater Tactics.”
January 13’s topic is “Snook—Day and Night.” And believe me, if you’ve never played around the lighted docks at night chasing snook you’ve missed out on one of angling’s great thrills.
I wrote an article for Fly Fisherman magazine (March 2007) that lead off with a recount of Bernie Shapiro’s Great Adventure. In three hours he boated 37 fish in the 18-inch to 25-inch class before wailing: “Uncle! Take me home! My arm’s ready to fall off!”
And we had fished one dock the entire time! Incredible.
Gotta truthfully admit that last season’s night-snooking was “off” for some reason that nobody could figure. The fish were finicky.
Maybe I need to develop some new patterns. Sorta like trout Up North that have seen the same stuff for years and somehow genetically pass on the info “that’s fake—don’t eat it!”
Monday’s trip is with three spin-fishermen, so I’ve been busy tying jigs. I use the same fly patterns, just tied onto eight-ounce or quarter-ounce heads.
Maybe I’ll “get creative” at tonight’s tying session. Stop by if you’re in the area. It’s “free-form,” meaning we have absolute beginners mixed in with Northern Trout Guys who want to learn saltwater stuff, and saltwater guys who want to learn new patterns.
Plus the (mostly) guys who just want to get out of the house for a while and talk about fishing.
ENGLISH SETTER UPDATE
Heart gave be a real scare a couple of days ago at the shop. I’d leash-walked him, and was putting him back into his crate inside the Tahoe.
Foolishly, I unhooked him without tossing an Alpo Variety Snap into the crate first. He looked at me indignantly, then the light bulb flashed on inside that Hard Head of his. “I’M FREE!” And off he went, taking MY heart with him. I was absolutely TERRIFIED he’d run out into traffic and be killed.
FORTUNATELY, he ran behind our building, then behind the windsurfing and ice cream shops. He stopped, raised his head defiantly, then (thank GOD) stepped into a patch of sand-spurs.
They dug into his skin between the pads of his feet and he stopped cold. I hobbled over and snapped the leash onto his collar, then tugged about a dozen of those nasty (but at that moment very WELCOME) spikes out of him.
Lesson learned, believe me!
Ghost is doing great. I can tell that her vision still hasn’t recovered from August’s laser surgery on her left eye, but she’s more than 11 years old now and usually acts half her age.
I’ve got a quail trip booked in mid-January at Dream Lakes with Bill Delaney, which will give Ghost and Heart great pleasure. I’m hoping to get up there yet this month, too, but work always comes before play.
So, if you’ve got southwest Florida in your holiday plans, shoot me an email and we’ll compare schedules.
