Many years ago I was telling friends some of my fishing stories. I had just finished describing catching my first fish at 3-1/2 years old. My father owned a 17” plywood sloop he kept on a mooring in Mission bay San Diego California at the yacht club. I had caught a cup full of crabs with the anticipation of fishing off our little sloop. My dad baited up his boat rod which was a vintage bamboo one with a Penn baitcaster with green fishing line. I could barely hold it. As my dad puttered around the cabin in this very small sloop I felt the rod twitch. Something had taken my crab. Daaad ! Help. With my dad’s assistance I explained how we both were able to reel in a quite large shark up out of the water and over into the cockpit thrashing and causing all kinds of Chaos. We finally subdued the at least 5-6’ long shark. My first catch is still etched in my mind with the commotion it caused. My dad was there when i recalled this true story. He left and came back with this photo he had taken of the leviathan laying on the tiles in our homes porch.
I keep this photo near my drafting table to remind me that a good story is great but the details matter.
I’ll add another fish story to keep things going.
My dad had always promised that if I caught a largemouth bass over 8lbs he would have it mounted for me. Mind you this was before we had cellphones and cameras on our hips all the time. Well, he and I were out at a place in Collier county we called burnt bridge catching panfish, bull heads, and bass on live bait one morning and I caught my bass. Was just over 10#’s and a gorgeous specimen of the species! I was so excited when we got back to my grandparents I ran in and got grandpa to come out and look at the catch of the day. Grandpa came out and was just as excited as this 11 year old was and started pulling the fish from the cooler. I went back inside to get my dad and use the restroom and wouldn’t ya know it… My grandpa who grew up dirt poor during the depression had filleted every fish in that cooler, and had them all packed in bags and back on ice including my trophy fish! I cried a little but grandpa took me out the very next day and explained to me that God’s creatures are not trophies and if we take a life as we did it should be for food. I now understand what he was saying but as a child it took a long time to sink in. I just chuckle when I think back on that day,
Put a smile on my face. Thanks for the share!
Cool story!
Good stuff. Thanks for sharing.
love it. Thanks for the morning chuckle:+1:
Great stories, guys. Thanks for sharing. We need to be reminded from time to time of the magic this sport brings us.
I keep seeing comments and come back hoping someone shared another story! C’mon fella’s, let’s hear’em!
32 years ago I was delivering a 53’ sailing Catamaran across the Caribbean. Early morning before daylight I let out my trolling hand line as we coasted down the leeward side of the island of Dominica. I went off watch and it was my sisters watch next. I had hired her as cook and crew on this delivery. I barely fell asleep when she’s waking me saying that there’s a small sailfish jumping on the line. By the time I got on deck it had sounded, we slowed the boat down and it took about 45 minutes to hand line this little Blue Marlin up. It was spent. I slipped a looped line over the hand line and let it slip past its bill and then pulled the loop tight around its tail then drug it backwards drowning it quickly. We got underway and I diverted the course to get in closer to the coast in the hopes of finding some local fisherman to give the fish to. We spotted a drifting 20’ wood dugout canoe with 4 pairs of feet sticking up over the sheer line. We called out and the feet turned into 4 locals drift fishing with hand lines. We gave them the fish which they were very happy about. I had cut out 20 lbs of belly meat for us as we had a fridge aboard. In the Windward - Leeward islands the locals have fished out the coast line, the main fish in the fish markets is Spearfish, tuna, and very small immature reef fish. At the time Marlin sold for $9.00 EC lb which in US $ was about $3.25 lb. The average wage then was $15.00 a day. After killing this fish that I did not want to die I started using 20lb hooks that bend out if a bigger fish gets on. For food fish small fish are enough. That was the last big fish I caught trolling when on sailing passages.
July, 2020
While Covid was raging, I was fishing.
Took my (then) 8 year old son and 25 year old cousin fishing. My cousin wanted to catch a shark, so I brought a big rod to send out a large butterflied mullet.
Meanwhile, we were fishing finger mullet for reds, trout, flounder, jacks, ladyfish, etc.
A school of bluefish show up and start biting off the hooks on the 4000 size spinning rods w 15 pound test. To fix the bite offs, I albrighted a 5 inch piece of single strand wire onto the leaders and start boating bluefish.
After a bit, a big blacktip grabs the big mullet head and starts for Miami. My cousin who weighs 230 is getting his butt kicked so I have to hold onto him and coach him on how to turn this bruiser.
Suddenly, my son’s 4k starts screaming line. I tell him to break it off because my cousin is taking 100% of my time AND I know this is a shark which will spool the 4k.
Son refuses and starts fighting it. His shark took him to the knot… and then stopped. For a minute or two, he has ZERO line left, but then he gets a wrap, then another….
At some point, I pull my phone out and do a brief video of my two anglers fighting their sharks- me holding my cousin so he doesn’t fall out of the boat, my son on the back handling his shark solo.
Wife about divorced me when she saw my son standing on the back solo while I was holding my cousin in the boat.
He landed the shark- big Lemon shark.
When he heard me tell my wife I didn’t need to help him as he knew what he was doing, he began standing a little taller!
If you meet him and mention sharks or fishing, he will 100% tell you that story!
I was stalking trout on a little blue line creek high up in the North Ga hills. Stealth is important trying to catch these little gems. I was working my way upstream, and rounded a little bend and there was a young couple, probably early 20s, doing the horizontal hula on the banks of the creek at the foot of a little falls. They never knew I was there.
Haha- this reminds me of a couple stories from the same fishing spot.
I used to fish a spot that no-one not a local knew of. You had to walk a mile through a mosquito filled maritime forest to get to a nice secluded beach with this hard mud rock and fallen trees scattered over a few miles of beautiful white sandy beaches. The trail was about a foot wide through palmettos and thicket.
I took a buddy fishing there for flounder (probably around 1995-1996 time frame). It began to rain so we ran to a lean-to that someone had built months prior. About 30 minutes later- still raining- an old hairy dude shows up - naked as a jaybird with only a fillet knife (one of those old Rapala ones) tied around him with a rope. He tries to come into the lean to that is about 3 foot by 3 foot- we basically told him nope on threat of his life!
A few years later- GI Jane was filmed in the area and several of the scenes wound up taking place on that same beach. Word was out.
About a year after GI Jane- I took a different buddy fishing at that beach. He goes off to get mullet with the cast net while I was tossing jigs. About two hours later, he is still not back. Apparently, he went down the beach and found a Playboy shoot occurring and decided to camp out and watch. He was gone a LONG time.
It is now a well known beach and a state park. It is ruined. People leave trash everywhere. There are always swimwear shoots down there- not kid friendly at all… Not a good fishing spot anymore.