Fishronicity, Fishendipity & Harmonic Convergence

It is nearing the end of winter and the beginning of spring.  That hit-or-miss time of fishing when the water is either too warm or too cold, or too cold on top and too warm on the bottom, or the tide is in or the tide is out, the moon is full, or not.  And every now and then the tide, the temperature, the moon and the fisherman all come together at the same time, in the same place, with the same thought in mind; eat.

I fortuitously happened upon a lucky fishing hat while shopping at the oriental food store.  Fishermen are big on luck.  Hopefully it wouldn't cause flashbacks in the Vietnam vets who frequent the dock.




We set out on a beautiful, blue sky day, the tide so low the manatees were having trouble finding enough water.  Lively shrimp.  We got to our spot a couple of hundred yards from the marina and commenced fishing.  The tide was just before low.  

We got comfortable.  We had hot dogs ready to grill, drinks, snacks.  Our usual bonanza of fishing food.









And then the fish, the shrimp the fishermen all came together in a harmonic convergence of reel smokin', line stretchin', high fivin' glory.

 She Hooks!  














She Fights!

She Scores!!!!!!

 Ohhhhh yeah.   The bite was on.  Redfish and Sheepshead galore.  We tried to grill hot dogs but the fish just kept biting.  This is not a complaint.  We set out to "fill the cooler".

                                                                      And we did.


We kept fishing and catching until the tide came in and the (sea)cows came home.  On into the dark.  It took both of us to clean all the fish.

So, naturally, the boat didn't get cleaned so, naturally, we had to fish again on Saturday.  It's been a long, long time since we fished two days of a weekend, and it will be a long, long time before we do it again.  
First, two boats were in our special fishing spot (catching nothing).  We chugged up the river to our other special fishing spot.  Nothing catching.  Much biting and losing of shrimp but no catching.  

 Eventually we did catch a couple of nice Sheepshead.  But, the gnats were biting and the many, many, many people who apparently fish on Saturday were out in force.  







So, we motored back to the dock 

 taking in the sights









and leisurely washed the boat, cleaned the fish and, as a special bonus, I learned how to whip a loop in an anchor line.  

Clean boat tucked in, clean fish in the cooler.  Harmonic convergence, yes.

Whiff

Whiff : 1. a slight trace or indication.  2. quick puff or gust of air.  3.  strikeout.

1.  a slight trace or indication.

We set out on the second fishing trip of the year under a cold, overcast sky and calm winds.  No one at the marina except us and the staff.  No one fishing.  This should have been our first indication.  Our first whiff, if you will, of some reason why no one else was fishing.  The first bad news was;  no shrimp.  Dead, frozen shrimp, sure.  Who wants a dead, frozen shrimp?  This was soon to become more than an existential, rhetorical question.  

So we packed in a baggie of frozen, dead shrimp.  





And some potato chips because we just didn't get it together in time to make any food.  This was the second piece of bad news.  When have we ever gone fishing without having something to eat?  


2. a slight puff or gust of air.
The second indication of not-so-good-ness;  the forecast was for sunny skies with calm winds.  

We had overcast, cold, windy.

Let me emphasize the cold and windy aspect.  Oh, eventually it did get sunny.  The better to see the havoc the wind was playing on trees, water, us.  The sunnier it got, the colder it got.  Oh, and did I mention, not a single bite?  
 
It got, shall we say, dull.

The scenery was beautiful.




 





We watched an amazing display of birds creating ideograms in the sky.
 

 

We tried fishing from different places in the boat.  Nothing.






3. strikeout.
5 and a half hours of fishing, a bag of dead, frozen shrimp, freezing cold and windy conditions, not one single bite.  None.  Nada.  Zip.  Strikeout.  Okay, we each got one bite from some monster fish that felt like the bottom of the river was suddenly animated.  Something huge.  Something big enough to keep us freezing for hours.  So, two bites.  Didn't even lose a shrimp.  
Back to the dock to pack up and go home.  Catch of the day, well, the box scores don't look good on this one.  Lighthouse Seafood had no fish or crab.  But!  We finally did score some stone crabs at the Lynn Brothers dock.  They're s no crying in baseball or fishing.