2009 has been on on fire. Bones, Snook, and Tarpon said “yes we want to play”. The bones have been more than willing to play in good numbers, and I have had the pleasure to guide all “newbies” to their first bonefish on the fly. Some bones above 7 pounds were lost, but many schools of 6+ lbs average were on most flats. Baby Tarpon where numerous in January, but the water did not warm up enough to make them stay. They thinned out in Feb, but we managed to jump some nice ones in those early months, from 8 lbs to 15 lbs. With the summer months coming and the water warming up, some big tarpon have started to show up sporadically, and laid up babies from 8 to 20+ lbs are now waiting along the mangroves to smash flies! June is coming and I’m awaiting it eagerly as it’s one of the greatest times to catch tarpon up to 150+ lbs in channels and some rivers. when the conditions are right we even catch them up to 100+ lbs on the flats at sun rise. On the snook side, the fishing has been top notch! Sight fishing for them on shallow mud like what Jeff, Kevin, Bill and Dave do in the Everglades is just one of the most thrilling games we have here in Guadeloupe. Some spots where crawling with fish up to 20+ lbs. We’ve caught mainly snook from 8 to 13 pounds and Mr. Wallner’s son, on his first day, with his second cast, hooked up and landed a 17 pounder 10 feet from the front of the skiff.
Tarpon season will be on heat in June, and until end of October. September and October being the months after June that I prefer to fish for Tarpon. For those who can’t make the move in June, September and October often have great fishing as well. The summer months of July and August are a great time to wade for bonefish and permit…take your chance on Guadeloupe flats, you can’t be disappointed!!!
I don’t know where to begin…its been a long two months since we got back from Louisiana. I found myself sitting in the Rathole for about 6 weeks, just waiting on the weather. When it finally came together, we made the most of it. We fed 7 permit in 2 days, my friend Shane Smith landing his first, and friend from up the road, Capt. George Wood, came down for 1 day and got his paws around his first permit on fly in 18 years. We also whacked a bunch of bonefish. Jeremy Cameron caught his first Florida Keys bone on fly, and I caught my first ever in the Keys using nothing more than man power – my kayak, some wading boots, and my favorite 10wt. Jeremy was also lucky enough to catch his first laid up tarpon on a calm afternoon. I think there is a video and fish tale coming this week on fliesandfins.com.
Jeremy’s tarpon was my cue to head back north. The tarpon are showing up, and I needed to get back home to put in some serious bow time for the tarpon portion of the Everglades movie that we are filming. Before I could go home, I stopped by the Fly Fishing Film Tour events in both Stuart and Orlando. Both shows were rocking, but the venue in Stuart was epic. Thanks John and Mike, RA, and Chris’s crew at Orlando Outfitters for throwing down.
So now, back in Naples, I once again await the good weather. We play this same game every year, and its always worth the wait.
Drew Pearson was a faculty member at Florida Gulf Coast University, a general manager at Bobcat Trail Golf Club, a new father, and most of all an upstanding member of the community. He passed away on December 29, 2008 on his way into work from the hospital, where his wife had just given birth the night before to their daughter. He was involved in a terrible car accident which involved a semi truck and took his life. The Drew Pearson Memorial Fund was setup to help his Wife and his new daughter. We held a group meeting a came up with the idea to hold a redfish tournament. We decided that this would be a fun and exciting way to get the community involved. Also, the fact that it is all for a worthy cause.
The captain’s meeting will be held at FGCU’s student union on Friday April 3rd at 7pm. The entry fee per team is a $50 donation. Prizes and Rules will be discussed at the meeting.
It was a tough 3 days fishing in Key West. Day 3 of the March Merkin yielded 0 fish on the board resulting in a wire to wire victory for Will and Mike with a total of 2 fish and 197 points.
Congrats
On another note, the Madfin Shark tournament is about to get going, and look who showed up…the Holemans. Both of them. Travis was waiting in the driveway at Rathole Studios with this shiny new Lake and Bay that looks like it just came out of the mold. He going on and on about chum, wire leaders, bloodbath, and all that other googan fishing shit.
.
.
It looks like I’m going meat fishing for a few days…I’m not too proud.
It is officially a go. We will be hosting the Fly Fishing Film Tour at the Tropic Cinema (416 Eaton St. Key West) on Tuesday, March 17, 2009. It should be a perfect way to kick off your St. Patricks Day. The doors open at 6:30 PM and the show starts at 7:00. Tickets are available at the door only, for $15.00, on a first come, first serve basis. I believe there are 200 seats. Afterwards, the Saltwater Angler will be hosting an after party. There will be like 15 headline dj’s from around the planet, all the big names, free alcohol, strippers, P-Diddy’s yacht, everything you could ever want on spring break. Actually, I am not sure what is going to happen at this “after party”, but there will be a bunch of us hanging out shootin the shit.
We are very excited to be showing a piece of our newest film, Drum, to a home audience for the first time. The full version is still very in the works, but the preview on the tour has been getting some decent reviews.
Let us introduce Drum:
We’ve spent 12 weeks over the last 2 winters chasing big redfish on fly in Louisiana, and we’ve been lucky to have caught a pile of them. In doing so, we realized that these big hungry redfish would chase down ridiculously huge bright flies and gobble them up right next to the boat. This gave us an idea… strategically position 4 HD cams around the boat, and tease these fish into the “zone” and give them the fly on camera. What we ended up with is some of the sickest most visual eats of big fish in clear water (other than tarpon) that we have ever captured. 1.2 terabytes of it!
We really want (need) to produce something that we can attempt to bring in some income with. In order to do so, we need to make sure that the final product is truly worthy of peoples’ money.
As it stands, Drum is in my opinion our best work to date. We tried to include something for everyone. Fish Porn, some short storytelling, some actors (the fish), some friends, and a plot with some twists and turns, will accompany a handful of the rawest fly fishing scenes we have ever seen. We even took a guy who has been fishing that area his whole life with conventional gear, and gave him some beers and a fly rod. Needless to say he told us it was the best day fishing he ever had.
We are excited to put an end to the editing (4-6 months) and release Drum to the masses. In the meantime, check out the preview on the Fly Fishing Film Tour (which will be posted on the web sometime in late April or May), or watch this sneak peak that we made to promote the tour stop here in Key West:
2009 has been on on fire. Bones, Snook, and Tarpon said “yes we want to play”. The bones have been more than willing to play in good numbers, and I have had the pleasure to guide all “newbies” to their first bonefish on the fly. Some bones above 7 pounds were lost, but many schools of 6+ lbs average were on most flats. Baby Tarpon where numerous in January, but the water did not warm up enough to make them stay. They thinned out in Feb, but we managed to jump some nice ones in those early months, from 8 lbs to 15 lbs. With the summer months coming and the water warming up, some big tarpon have started to show up sporadically, and laid up babies from 8 to 20+ lbs are now waiting along the mangroves to smash flies! June is coming and I’m awaiting it eagerly as it’s one of the greatest times to catch tarpon up to 150+ lbs in channels and some rivers. when the conditions are right we even catch them up to 100+ lbs on the flats at sun rise. On the snook side, the fishing has been top notch! Sight fishing for them on shallow mud like what Jeff, Kevin, Bill and Dave do in the Everglades is just one of the most thrilling games we have here in Guadeloupe. Some spots where crawling with fish up to 20+ lbs. We’ve caught mainly snook from 8 to 13 pounds and Mr. Wallner’s son, on his first day, with his second cast, hooked up and landed a 17 pounder 10 feet from the front of the skiff.
