Super-Yachting

After 10 weeks living and working in Palatka I have returned home to Nashville. There were fish, and I did catch them, but overall I was disappointed with the fishing in Central Florida.
To be fair, my expectations were high. My previous trips to the Sunshine State had left me with the impression of an excellent fishery - great diversity in species and habitat coupled with a large biomass. Central Florida, in particular the stretch of the St. John's River where I stayed was pure freshwater. Despite being advertised as great bass water it didn't hold a candle to the bass fishing in Tennessee. The only bass-like fish I caught were two little sunfish:

I decided to change tactics. Based on advice from the locals, I began setting fixed lines baited with pieces of hotdog. I would set the lines when I got home from work and check them periodically until I finally reeled them in and went to bed.
This technique was much more successful. I caught plenty of bullheads and other small catfish, as well as a few big channel catfish:
I also hooked a variety of other creatures. By some strange accident, I managed to pull in a crab, caught in the act of stealing my bait:
I also landed two freshwater stingrays. I couldn't identify the species, but I was very happy to get a close look at such interesting critters.
Besides fish, the river was home to a number of other animals:

Our resident alligator. This one is about 1 meter in length.

A tiny turtle!

The Islander

I am travelling to Florida for about 8 weeks to work on the Islander, a luxury charter yacht captained by a friend of ours. The boat is in dry dock for some renovation and I will be joining the crew in cleaning and refitting as much as possible before the ship is put back in the water.
I believe that the dry dock (see map below) is run by St. Johns Ship Building, located near Palatka, FL. I will be staying in a house across the river. Hopefully, in my spare time, I will be able to track down some fish, and catch them.

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Bluegill Soup

Labor Day weekend, Tara and I took three of our friends fishing. Heather has been fishing with us before, but she had never actually caught a fish. Hang and Dapeng, two of our friends from China, had never even been fishing.
I knew the best way to remedy this situation was a tub of nightcrawlers and my favorite bluegill spot. I only have one light tackle spinning rod, so we had to take turns, but it wasn't long before everyone had succeeded in landing fish.

Dapeng with a hungry bluegill

Hang with her very first fish

Heather landed a big'un with the fly rod

Tara showing off her skills

Dapeng with a keeper

We had a great afternoon of fishing. Everyone easily caught fish with bait so I broke out a fly rod and let everyone take a turn at that. It turned out that nymphing produced the biggest fish of the day.

On our walk in, we came across this strange little fellow:

catching (up on) carp

Though I've only mentioned carp in one of the past six posts, I have been chasing them quite a bit. Here are a couple of photos from recent trips...

Felix

It's been a little while since I've gotten out after carp. While nothing gets my heart pumping like fly casting to a tailing fish, I figured that since I have a bunch of juglines rigged up, I may as well set some out with carp bait and see what happens. Dedicated British anglers have developed complex baits based on very scientific nutritional guidelines. I don't know if "Rob's Carp Assassin" is such a bait, but the directions read like a cookie recipe so I thought I'd give it a try.
The morning started brilliantly, right away I hooked up a beautiful fish on my version of the carp carrot fly.Next I paddled into a small lagoon, the same lagoon where Tara and I had placed our juglines a few days before, and baited 8 jugs with sweet smelling dough-balls. The lagoon lies right between two good flats and I knew that carp often hang out there between meals. Having just landed a fish in one area, I left the jugs and moved on to the second flat. The carp were everywhere! Even though the wind was blowing, the morning sun penetrated the water and I could see orange tails in every direction. After missing a few, I hooked up to a medium sized fish. Some carp don't run far when they're hooked but this one took off like a rocket. It paused about 100 feet away, and then swam off in a completely different direction. Unfortunately, my leader had tangled in some algae and the direction change pulled the hook free.
I reeled my fly in and looked over my shoulder. One of the jugs was moving! In fact it was twitching violently as though something was trying to submerge it. I quickly weighed anchor and paddled over. At the entrance to the lagoon is an old submerged bridge, and as I got close I saw that indeed something was trying to pull the jug underwater and under the bridge.
I grabbed the jug and hauled it in. Hoping for a carp and expecting a turtle, I was thrilled to see I had caught a big ol'catfish:
I'm pretty sure this is a big channel catfish. Though big channel cats are hard to distinguish from blue catfish, blues often have more than 30 rays on their anal fin. This fish only has about 23:
With only 8 jugs out for less than an hour, I caught this fish on a carp bait in the middle of the morning; it makes me question some of the conventional catfishing wisdom.

Got Milk?

Jug-fishing for catfish is a popular southern pastime. A jugline is simply a float with a baited hook suspended below. Some jugs are weighted while others are left free to drift. Jug fishing is often done in the dark when catfish move out of their hiding places to feed.
After a recent, and unsuccessful jug-fishing attempt I decided to try again. I bought more foam pool noodles, which I cut into "jugs" and rigged up a total of 29 new juglines:
Surely, I thought, this would be enough to tip the scales in my favor. So, Tara and I headed out one evening in the boat. We baited the hooks with pieces of squid and placed the jugs in a shallow bay. After several hours paddling around in the dark and having caught nothing but an unfortunate snapping turtle, we headed home.
Maybe, I thought, squid wasn't the right bait. So I called up Matt and headed out one morning to catch some panfish. Fresh cut bluegills, I had read, were an excellent catfish bait:
With our superior bait, Tara and I once again headed out into the darkness. This time we placed the jugs carefully, 25 of them in a long line along a submerged road bed, and four of them in a small lagoon nearby. Then we paddled in and headed home, leaving the jugs for the night. We returned early the next morning, anxious to see what we had caught.
The jugs were still in a long line. A bad sign. Indeed the baits were untouched all along the road bed, until the last one. The last jug had been pulled 20 or 30 feet from its original position. Expecting another turtle, I grabbed the line and gave it a pull. I felt a fish on the other end! We had caught a small flathead catfish.
After releasing our catch, we paddled over to collect the last four jugs from the lagoon. Mysteriously, all of these baits had been taken! In fact, one hook was missing completely, and the swivel-snap that held it had been twisted apart:
Later, I told all this to Ronnie "Grumpy" Howard. If Ronnie lived near the ocean, he would be the saltiest sea-dog I know - even though now he is primarily a fly fisherman and trout guide, when it comes to catching fish in Tennessee, Ronnie's been there and done that. When he heard about the broken swivel-snap he told me that when a big cat gets hooked, it will spin in an attempt to free itself.
Had we hooked and lost a lunker?

The Hazards of Fishing

Besides hooking oneself, freshwater fishing has a number of other hazards. I ran across two of Tennessee's more dangerous residents this morning - the dreaded denizen of the deep, the snapping turtle (look closely, it is there):
Even more fearsome, I also ran into the deadly
cotton-head rattle-moccasin!

Post Script: This snake is actually a cotton-mouth! Thanks to Bill Bailey for the I.D.