Fishing Report 8/17/2014 Part 2

Nice Florida sunset. For the past several nights, as I've done errands in the evenings, I would shine a headlamp beam over the water and the mullet would explode - much in the same way the Asian Carp go nuts on the TV shows. I figured fish that eat mullet would be swimming around in the mix also, but no matter what I pitched - surface poppers that look like mullet, popping corks with DOA shrimp, flies, rocks and cuss words - I got nothing. Well - I broke out Marlon's cast net and I caught what was swimming around. Mullet - several, and some twice as big as this guy, and a Needlefish. I felt like I had cheated in a way - but that feeling didn't last long.

Another one off the list

I caught a mullet on the fly today. Hooked its tail with a Meko Special as the school was passing by - HUGE fight!!! These fish are nearly as hard to land as bonefish (of which I caught a few - almost at will if I could see the school - hooked up and spat - 4, landed - 4). I have been trying to hook a mullet for a year now - felt good to get another one checked off the list!

Cast Away

Big M has been asking to learn how to catch the smaller fish we see at the beach every time we go. He asks if I can chase them down with the hand nets that we have and I've said 'no - they are too fast - I need a cast net to do that'.

So what would a 7 year old do after that?

He asks for a cast net.

Well we finally got one for him - a 3.5' radius net. He'll need to grow a little bit taller before he can throw this one proficiently.

I did catch quite a few and as luck would have it, the tide was way out. And there just happened to be an isolated tide pool. We threw the finger mullet that we caught into the pool and Marlon got to practice there. "Shooting fish in a barrel".

He did get the net to open several times.

Another fun day at the beach!