Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Key West Fishing

Blue Water
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Bar Jack
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My Permit
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Releasing the Permit
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Silver King
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My Tarpon, all 140lbs
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Big Mouth
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Holland's Island Humming Bird

Eyeing up dinner:
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Wearing Dinner
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A few recent Pictures

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Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Lousiana Redfish

Flew into the Big Easy for a little fishing with Jeremy Mercer. We were after jumbo red drum, and we were not disapointed. Fish were big, dumb, and plentiful. We were stalking the brutes on the shallow flats of the bayous, in the areas between the Mississipi and the Gulf. We were sight fishing, so we spotted the fish first then made our casts.

Our guide, Capt. Brian, poling us in search of Red:
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Standing ready for a fish:
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A tail, sure sign:
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These fish were dumb, you could plunk the fly down as hard as you wanted, and as long as you didn't smack them on the head, they would see it as food.

A take:
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Battling the brute:
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Landing him:
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Photo op:
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Another fish, despite the look, Jeremy was happy:
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Release:
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Jeremy also caught Black Drum:
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Even I caught a fish or two:
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Flora and Fauna
White Pelicans:
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Oyster eatin' 'coons:
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Roseate Spoonbills:
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Oysters, so many beautiful oysters. How I wish they grew like this on the Bay:
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Parting Shot:
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Saturday, January 03, 2009

James Island

Hunted Bobby and David Connolly on their yacht, Lucy. They took me to a Chespeake island several miles north of Hoopers, called James Island. James is separated into three islands, we hunted on the southernmost island, which is also the largest.

Bobby docks Lucy:
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The next photo was taken looking to the next island North. All the islands have a strong stand of evergreens, but not much else. The banks are undercut, and the trees are being dragged off by erosion:
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I brought Cobi and Fin today to retrieve our birds. Cobi is a puppy, and loves retrieving, but she hates giving up. If she can't find a duck, she will usually grab a decoy. Here she grabbed a whole string and spent 10 mintutes trying to pull it in before we could get to her in the boat and make her release the string:
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The hunt was slow, however, we had a raccoon visit us. Odd to see a raccoon in broad daylight, as they are nocturnal, however, it appeard healthy:

First View:
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It had no fear of us, I think it expected to pick up our scraps. It never threatened us, though it would not leave.

Coming up on the boat:
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Checking out Lucy:
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We tried to chase it away, but it was intent on holding its ground. We threw a rock at it, which landed in the water, and it chased after the splashes, trying to retrieve the stone:
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It swam back to shore, and unconcerend with our presence, dried itself on the bank:
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We chose not to kill it, though as a bird hunter, that was probably a mistake. Because it was getting late, and we were worried about the dogs tangling with the coon, we packed up to leave.

Dave spied a crab buoy behind the raccoon. He wants the bouy for a project, and went after it to carrying a tomato pole in case the varmit attacked. The coon held its ground, and made no moves towards Dave, however, it did stare him down:
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As soon as the boat pulled off shore, the coon made its way to our blind site, and started scavaging for scraps. Bobby had trouble with trailmix, and the coon reeped the rewards. However, a few bits of nuts didn't satisfy it, so it went for our decoys:
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It gave up on the decoys, and swam back to shore. We decided to give it one of our ducks to see its reaction.

Evaluating our gift:
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We thought it would bite the duck, instead it grabbed it with its "hands":
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The duck in its paws, it then dunked its head to mouth it:
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Once it had the duck, its curiosity with us was over, and it took off for a private dinner. I'd hoped it would come up for a shot with the duck in its mouth, but it was in flight mode, and I was only able to capture a brief glimpse of the bird:
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