A little writing from a while ago... worth sharing...
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I had my first gulf coast fly fishing experience this past weekend. I was the only fly fisher in the bunch… sort of. One of the other guys likes to vacation in Colorado and is a once a year fly fisher type. He came with a shiny new 8wt. Or at least one that doesn’t see much daylight. Our hosts were groovy – this trip was a fundraiser for a local Christian camp for disadvantaged kids. We pay the money, but it all goes to the camp, as the houses and guides were donated by these two, Nate and Brandon (seen here cooking the night before, when we had an awesome redfish dinner):
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With tummies full of shrimp, hushpuppies and redfish, we spent the night in bunks in the “basement” (the houses are all on stilts) of Brandon’s house. This little guy stood guard over me all night:
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We got up early as all fisherpeople do, snagged some java and breakfast, and headed out to meet our guides. There were four guides, four guys each. I got in the boat that would be wade fishing. Our guide, Blake Muirhead, was obviously very experienced with gear fishing, and was gratefully open to my fly fishing… we chatted about it throughout the day. I told him I would fish the fly until it was proven not to work versus the other methods.
I had all the right flies, but man, mother nature was against us. A front moved over and through the day before, muddying things up quite a bit. There was a 5-15 knot wind, but casting the 10?6? Meiser switch was not an issue – I had it loaded with a 7wt Hardy shooting head line (It’s a 5/6 if you spey with it…) and it handled well casting overhead, and when the arm got tired, the 10?6? was sooo nice for lazy downwind speycasts. I was impressed with the rod, but also see how a nice fast 7 or 8 wt would rock in these situations. My old Loop Blue Line 8wt would have been ideal here if it weren’t being used in British Columbia for steelhead by the guy I sold it to.
We began the day in a cool “lake” across and off of the main bay – wet wading, doing the stingray shuffle, we fanned out across the lake like pheasant hunters and worked our way down it, presenting a buffet of piscatorial choices: One guy with a gold spoon, another with live shrimp, me with flies, and yet another with plastic “gulps.” The guide waded with us, coaching, and tossing a “gulp” of his own.
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We worked the lake. This is new to me… so it was all very interesting. Looking for the birds diving on bait, mullet jumping every so often… it was fun. But the fish were not there en masse like the guide had hoped… Near the end of a 300 yard or so walk, Blake (the guide) hooked a keeper Sea Trout. We thought it was a good sign:
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A few minutes later, Warren, one of the guys from Church who was fishing a rattlecork and live shrimp, hooked a keeper Redfish – the biggest fish he’s ever caught, so that in itself was TOTALLY cool. It appeared to be a better sign:
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We finished wading the lake, and by then there were about eight other people on it. We had been there first, and decided that since we weren’t lighting them up, we’d move. We headed over to another flat, and did the same thing. I took the slot second closest to shore, about knee deep, and we started the march. Warren caught two or three more smaller than legal reds, and then another legal one in about 150 yards on shrimp. With that apparent success, Blake went and got the boat, and we all hooked up with shrimp and rattle corks.
Yes, even me. I’m not too proud. If they were catching fish and I wasn’t, I would step off of my pedestal of fur and feathers and chunk bait. I wanted to catch a Redfish.
We casted those little crustaceans for close to another hour before moving again.
Alas, it seems Warren had used up all of our fish mojo for the day, and it was only 11am.
We moved again.
I went back to my fly rod, staying closer to the boat, waiting to see if the shrimp would be the bait of choice… but it came up empty. No more fish would be caught this day, not for a lack of trying.
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We moved one last time, and decided that the water was greening up nicely and we’d try for trout… so we found a spot, rigged, waded out to water as deep as we could stand and cast in to the green. Nada. I decided that if I was catching nothing, then I wanted to catch nothing on MY rod, and started prowling the shoreline. What? the water was clearing! Here it was, 3:30 in the afternoon, and I was seeing little redfish in the sand holes… cool. Now… to get them to come to Papa…
..and the wind kicked up. It’s amazing how Mother Nature teases you. I looked back at the boat and all of the guys were up on it, watching me… They were fried to a crisp and done with the whole thing.
Blake was apologetic, if not embarassed. Three fish among five guys, nothing like his nice glossy brochure of stringers too heavy to carry. You can’t blame him for not trying though. Had the others not called the day, we might still be out there. I’d recommend Blake Muirhead if you’re a gear fisher. Great guy. Seriously. 361-790-5203, captgatortrout@aol.com
So with the others done, I rolled on to the boat and we fired up. We motored in, and I closed my eyes for a second and listened, smelled and felt the spray and sun. Opened my eyes up again and watched the pelicans dive, and porpoises swimming just off of on the right… It was a new experience. The saltwater is huge, even the small parts. It was a cruddy day of catching, but an ok day of fishing.
