I slipped down to south of New Orleans again for a day
of fishing. I called a guide friend when the weather
looked just right and he had a day free. As it turned
out the tides and winds had the water really riled up and
finding clear water was the problem, certainly not the fish.
Not all days are perfect down that way but they usually turn
up some experience that is memorable. This day would not
break this mold.
The day started as a contest of seeing the fish before
they bumped into the boat trying to see us. Casting under
your feet is pretty hard.
I managed zero fish until after lunch when we finally figured
out where some "almost" clean water could be found. I had
four fish within a hour but only after finding them within
twenty feet of the boat and getting a fly right in front of
their noses. The casts were more like cane pole fishing for
tin fish in a washtub using magnets.
We finally found a flat with little water and fish where you
could see them as their backs were almost out of the water.
The first fish to pop up attacked the fly so hard it surprised
us. It stirred up the mud in the attack and had problems
finding the fly. I switched to a popper. It is my favorite
way to catch these fish and in this case the mud would be on
the bottom and the fly on top in the clear.
The theory worked out and the next fish must have attacked
the popper a half dozen times without ever getting hooked.
He knocked it out of the way, dropped it after having it and
even overran it and turned around and missed it on a slashing
attack. The fish almost ran into the boat on the last attempt
before seeing us and leaving in a huff and with a splash.
Both of us were laughing so hard it hurt. The show was almost
as good as a catch.
The next fish left us with our mouths agape. It showed up from
about twenty feet in a slight hole. The sun angle allowed me to
just make him out on the bottom under about a foot and half of
milky water. He was sitting with his nose slightly pointed away.
I dropped the popper about a foot off his nose and popped it once.
He "alerted" and froze looking at the bug. A fish like that is
either concentrating on eating or getting ready to go running.
Either of the two choices is usually dramatic. An attack is
violent and fleeing is too. To make one or the other happen
I moved the popper just a little to make it look like a shrimp
on the surface. The fish did neither of the two expected choices
but came up off the bottom and tried to just "sip" the fly in like
a trout sucking in a small bug. Because the boat was moving and
the fly creeping toward the fish's nose it ended up right on top
of his nose between his eyes. I think this confused the fish a
bit and he just came up through the surface and ended up with his
head out of the water with the popping bug lying on its' side two
inches above his mouth directly between his eyes. The fish and I
were both at a loss of what to do for about three seconds. The
act was happening within fifteen feet of the boat and I considered
trying to slide the fly off his nose so he could try again. I
think I actually saw the fish's eye go from the cross-eye look
it had when it was trying to see the thing on his nose to the
eye focusing on me looming over to his left side, along with a
boat and all. His indecision evaporated and his leaving act
threw water all over the place and the popper went flying. Both
of us in the boat were dumbfounded at what we had both watched.
It was the funniest attack we had ever seen out of a redfish.
None of the options we though might have worked would have given
us as much pleasure as just having seen that act. The photo
below is a re-creation of course.
The day went on with a couple more redfish, a shot at a monster
black drum and finally an attack by a herd of fish the really
did hit the bottom of the boat trying to get at the fly. Only
the powers above knows how many fish we polled by this day
without a hint they were there.
The day had produced few fish, but nice ones of extraordinary
beauty. They ranged from five to eight pounds. It was nothing
like the recent outings with dozens of monsters, some over
twenty pounds. But, the two popper attacks will be remembered
for some time, especially the confused fish with the lure on
his nose. ~ Capt Scud Yates/ April 2006/ scudyates@cox.net
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