Florida: A Really Big New Year's Day Snook

When the clock struck 12:00 and signaled that the 1st day of 2019 had started, the state of Florida detonated. Noah and I were awoken from our less than completely restful living-in-a-tent-for-a-week sleep to the sound of hundreds of explosions and celebratory gunfire, which we had to put up with for a little while before being able to doze off again.

The morning dawned foggy and cool. More than 1,400 miles away back at home, it wasn't even getting light out yet, and in a few hours my small stream friends Mark, Alan, and Kirk would be meeting on a wild trout stream to spend a relatively warm winter's day observing the traditional New Year's Day outing. I stood outside barefoot in shorts and a suede button down shirt. It was already more than 20 degrees warmer than it would get in CT that day, though the fog made it feel cool. I hoped that I would get my redfish today. 

As you already know, that didn't happen.

Noah and I found ourselves launching just a couple miles from where we had started our morning. The fog which had already all but burned off on the redfish flats was still hanging on over the river. Just outside the launch, we were treated to quite a sight. A lone roseate spoonbill stood at the upper end of a sand bar. That moment, right there, is where 2019 actually started for me. 

Shortly thereafter, a paddle repair I made mid summer gave way and I was left with a one ended paddle. I could make do with a one ended paddle. The going would be a little slower, but I stand up in the yak whenever I can so I use the paddle like one for an SUP a lot. For that, the one-endedness would not by an issue. For sitting and truckin' it to and from spots in current or wind, well, that was going to be a pain. But I am stubborn, persistent, and gritty, and I was going to fish and fish hard. 

We entered the mouth of a creek we had found a lot of snook in the afternoon before, and though we had found no fish at all in the first few hundred feet of bank I started working it. These fish move with the tide and the temperatures and the light. The conditions were different. There was good structure there. I was going to give it a fair shake. I had tied on a fly that I refer to simply as a Devlin Blend Deceiver. It's tied pretty much the same as a buck-tail deceiver but with Ian Devlin's yak hair blend in place of bucktail. It is slimmer, flashier, and if given a good wide epoxy head and tied on a stout hook, it swims with a great cadence when worked with fast, abrupt strips.  And that's how I was fishing it here, laying it up into and under the laydowns and brush and stripping like mad. On about the fifth cast I put the fly right under an overhanging tree that had a few branches running into the water. As had been the mantra I let the fly sink for 5 seconds, then made 3 strips with long pauses before increasing speed. Right after I sped up I saw a flash. I didn't think it was a particularly large fish. It missed the fly. It came back on the next pause and inhaled the fly. Seeing the size of the lateral line and the distance between the dorsal fish and the start of the tail made me forget to breath. I hammed the hook home into dead weight. The fish acknowledged it with a couple disdainful head shakes and sulked down on the bottom where I couldn't see her, as if deciding what the best course of action was. Before making the initial, authoritative "you can't stop me now" run I had come to expect from every snook I caught, this one jumped. She couldn't even get her whole body out of the water. The sound she made, not just landing back into the water but by thrashing her head back and forth, is something I will remember forever. Picturing it now in my mind I feel the same feeling I did in the moment: a massive knot in my stomach as I could actually hear my fly getting knocked around. I had bowed to the fish like I was supposed to and the hook held. She righted her self and took off. Not in the way the smaller fish I had caught had, but much slower and much more confident. It made the pit in my stomach grow more still. It was as though this fish knew she could beat me. At fifty feet she stopped again and showed signs that she might make another jump. I buried the top half of my rod underwater trying to keep her down but I couldn't. Again she came up and breached, practically in slow motion. Then, once more, she righted herself and ran another 50 feet towards and big snag. I put the iron to her, scared that this would be where the battle would be won or lost. She stopped short of the logs though and sulked deep again. Noah had quit fishing at this point and caught up with me to assist if I needed it. I had the fish close now but I was very much under her power, unable to do anything but try to pull her up to the surface. She remained close and just slowly and steadily pulled me further up the creek. Eventually she was whipped and rolled on the surface, her massive broom tail still swinging to and fro. I tried desperately, shaking like a leaf, to get my hand in her mouth. By that time, she had towed me more 375 feet up the creek from where I had hooked her. 

An epic battle of strength and wit.

When I finally did and really truly felt her weight I was awestruck. This was a massive, spectacular, gorgeous creature. I'm laughing quietly and almost tearing up right now thinking about this fish. To catch an animal like that in such an environment, and on the fly no less...

I feel so, so privileged for having been given that opportunity. 

As I let go of her caudal peduncle and let her swim back into that dark winter water, I was briefly speechless. Then I hollered to all that could hear. Not words. Just pure ecstasy. 

That was my first fish of 2019.

I caught a bunch more that day. 

But I don't think anybody needs to see those. 

This was our last day on the west side before heading back to our base camp near Jupiter. Where our last trip to this river had left both Noah and I wanting more, I was completely satisfied. And Noah will be living very close by soon.

Even though I feel fulfilled, I can't wait to go back myself. That is a very special place. It will hold a special place in my heart forever. 

This post is dedicated in memory of my great grandmother, Helen McGuire,

and my friend, Lester Groat.