We (me and my captain) are trying to present a fly to fish we have seen. Tarpon can be caught with live bait and are, I am sure very exciting with light tackle, but that is not the same as actually seeing the fish you are presenting your fly to. Today we saw few fish, and had few opportunities to present the fly, but for those we did, we had 3 "eats". An eat is defined as a tarpon went totally ballistic when it saw what it thought was food and ate it. Since tarpon fishing is at best a low percentage sport, this is actually a good day. One of those eats might have been a caught fish if I hadn't been so enthusiastic about striking the fish and breaking the line.
Yesterday, day 3 was actually more typical. It was storming early, so we went out late, it was blowing like stink, the push pole broke, and I spent a couple of hours casting blindly in the back country waters. I wore out very quickly, so we quit early.
I really should keep better records of eats, jumps and caught fish, because Day 2 was magical. I had lots of eats, but the highlight was hooking and keeping on my line a 90 pound Tarpon. Because the Tarpon are so valuable as a sport fish, we count a fish as "caught" when we have the leader in the guides of the fishing rod.
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| The Big fish ... Almost to the tippet! |
I did that twice with this fish before we set the reel to maximum drag and it broke itself off. I feel I could have landed the fish, but it would have taken another 45 minutes and the fish would have been totally whipped before returning it to the sea. Sport fishing is called that because it is a sport to hunt and catch one of these magnificent ancient creatures on a rod and reel. We don't want to tire them unnecessarily.
Day one: I always consider my trip to be a success if I catch one fish. That i did within 20 minutes of stepping into the boat. There was something going on to excite the fish ... my Captain referred to it as a "hatch". There were lots of birds wheeling around us and dipping into the water to feed. The water was dead calm, and the sun was still below the horizon. We could see the Tarpon moving on the surface ... it is said they come up for air and actually process air for oxygen exchange. I threw my fly out, and lo and behold , the water boiled and I had a hold of 15 pounds of furious fish leaping out of the water to escape my line. This little fish I actually handled with a special pair of gloves and retrieved the fly.
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| See the red lights on the horizon? Still before sun-up! |
A jump is defined as ..the hook went into the fish, he started screaming line off your reel and he makes a jump. This first jump is critical because when it happens, it is very early in the fight and you will find out if the fish is well hooked. So a jump is an eat with a little more excitement.
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| A jumped Tarpon |
I plan to be on the water again tomorrow at 6 AM ... wish me Tight Lines.
