In thirteen years of guiding I can honestly say that I've never had a customer that I didn't like. That's saying something given the different recognized personality types there are! But, there are admittedly some who I feel a special bond with, or who I'm crazy about from the moment we meet. This week was full of great people, and one couple who I just fell in love with. The fishing improved some, too, but the snook outside are still in a lockjaw pattern.

The first trip of the week was a trip I'd donated to I.G.F.A. last year. Harrison Wilder, of Gulf Breeze, Florida, had bid and won the trip. Harrison also booked a second day, as he had many family members down on vacation on Sanibel, and wanted those interested to get to go out. Monday, Harrison escorted Jack and his son Alex, and daughter Elizabeth to the ramp to meet me. Harrison would fish on Wednesday.

I'd heard a weather alert that morning warning of severe weather to build offshore and move onshore. I didn't want to take a chance of getting caught outside in a heavy storm, so I elected to tough it out inside. We headed straight to the bar that runs east/west a couple of miles north of Chino. It's been covered with bait, albeit small bait. I made one cast and had enough to fill the boat, but we culled trying instead to pick the biggest baits. It only took a few casts.

We worked at the fish steady and caught a few here and there. Jack got the best fish of the morning with a snook of about 6 pounds. The gang caught around a dozen snook, at least half of which were pretty small. It's actually good to see those small snook showing up, though. What it means is that we had a good spawn last summer, as many of these small fish are yearlings. That insures that we'll continue to have a good crop of fish coming up.

Jack and his kids were a good looking bunch, and a lot of fun.

Tuesday belonged to eighteen year-old Johnny Cahill, of Littleton, Colorado. His dad, John Cahill, recently bought a home in Cape Coral, and arranged for him to fish while he was home from college. Johnny said that after reading my "What to Expect" page he was worried that he would do something wrong and get into trouble with me, which I though was comical. In fact, Johnny was a very fine young man, and every time I meet young people like Johnny my faith in the future is restored.

I believe this was Johnny's first time to fish in the salt, and it was certainly his first snook fishing. The fish were mostly on the small side. We caught a handful of descent snook on the beach, and he wound up with a dozen or so snook for the morning. The fish on the beaches just don't want to eat, no matter what you throw at them. The fish on the inside won't eat pinfish, but will certainly go after the shiners. Problem is, all the shiners are small, and I believe the small bait is attracting the smaller, more aggressive males before we can get the bigger females interested in them. We're catching nice snook on the little baits, but they're the exception right now, rather than the rule.

I'm sure we could have caught more fish that we did, but we were forced to run from bad weather a couple of times. We finished the morning at the Waterfront Restaurant with great food and some bench fishing. Johnny assure me he'd had a great time. I hope to be fishing with his dad, soon.

Wednesday morning I met Harrison Wilder and his nephew Ryan, who was in from working on his graduate degree in California. We got plenty of pins and small shiners at the Keesel's flat. I felt sure that the snook on the outside would have to turn on sooner or later, but the snook had other ideas. Oh, Harrison and Ryan did better than anyone in a while with 9 snook in the boat, and Ryan missed another 6 or more, and Harrison 3. I was only willing to spend so much time on them waiting on a strong bite, and it was not forthcoming, so we headed inside. Along the way we ran across something that was raiding the schools of small bait and decided to see what it was. I had hoped it might be small tunneys, jack crevalle, or something, but it turned out to be ladyfish. We only managed to catch one lady before it was over. I would have given anything for a couple more. I told the boys that if anything would call in the redfish to eat on the flats it would be staked ladyfish. They were all for going to try for some reds.

I carefully cut the one ladyfish into as many steaks as I could get out of it. I used the least desirable pieces for chum. As it turned out, I think I had parked right on top of the fish because within a couple of minutes of throwing out the chum, we had our first redfish hits. The boys didn't find the reds any easier to catch on 100 + feet of light line out, but they did boat 4, and lost at least that many. I was thrilled to find redfish back on the flats. We'd had a beautiful, and fairly productive day, and Harrison and Ryan were good company. Harrison and I had a lot of common ground and good conversation.

I had to run way up to the north end of North Captiva Thursday morning to pick up Bruce Collins, of Cordova, Tennessee. I picked him up on the bay side of the pass right in front of the airstrip. I decided to head up to Cayo Costa to look for bait, since we were right there across the pass, anyway. Bait was thick, and a little bigger than what I've been seeing south, but not enough to make a difference.

At this point I was disgusted with the action on the beaches, but years of fishing the beaches keeps telling me that things are bound to heat back up. The tide on the inside wasn't right for fishing for a while, anyway, so I elected to head on down to the beach. We were the first boat there. I decided to start fishing out off the sticks and keep moving up until I hit fish. We did hit some nice fish as we got closer to the wood, but the bite is still very slow, considering the aggregation of snook in those waters.

The action was non-existent at first, and gave Bruce and I time to chat. I could tell right away that he was a great guy, and that we would have fun regardless of how it went. When we finally did start hitting snook, Bruce predictable had the same age-old problem that everyone does with getting tight on the fish before trying to set the hook. He certainly missed more than he caught. Bruce also got a beautiful snook of 10 to 12 pounds right to the boat, and the leader parted as I was leaning down to her to put her on the Boga Grip. I had been trying to get Bruce to pressure the fish harder and land her more quickly, but he didn't understand that the clock starts running on that 30 pound leader the minute the battle begins. To land the big fish on light tackle you have to have a sense of urgency like your life depended on it, and get them to the boat quickly. That means attacking the fish quickly, and pump and reeling like a mad man, which keeps that fish coming to you, and gives her no chance to get turned back around. Anyway, we had her to the boat and on the leader and count her as a catch. She had to go back, anyway, and Bruce got to get a good look at her. Immediately after that fish, he jumped another beauty as big as the last, but she spit the hook on the jump. I think Bruce wound up landing 4 or 5 snook, 2 trout, and 2 beautiful mangrove snappers. The snappers went into the cooler.

I had told Bruce that if we didn't have a serious bite by nine o'clock, we were heading inside to chase redfish. I was sure they would be right back where I had found them the day before, on the same stage of the tide. We stayed until 9:30 waiting on that raging bite, but it didn't come. I stopped near Redfish Pass to see if we could raise a couple of ladyfish. My confidence in catching them without ladyfish, there or not, was not high. While there, my buddy Capt. John Shearer called me on the cell and told me he was having no luck with the reds. No good news, as I had told him where to go the night before.

I felt sure I could find those reds, and gave up on the ladyfish. As I polled onto the flats less that a hundred yards from John, I saw the reds rise up right in front of me. It was a nice school. I quickly tossed a bat full of chum to try to hold them there until I could get anchored and get the boat situated, and hooks baited. The first two baits out were small shiners under popping corks, and it wasn't long before they were eaten. Once I got things settled and knew I had the fish held up, I cut some pinfish and tossed them as far as I could. They were eaten quickly. In fact, we caught all the fish after that on sliced and diced pinfish at the end of 150 ft. casts. Before it was over Bruce had boated 9 nice redfish, and lost another 6, which gave him a double West Coast Slam, and plenty of fish in the cooler.

Yes, when you're staying on North Captiva, you want some fish for the cooler, as groceries are hard to come by there. Bruce had a blast! From what he said the trip exceeded his expectations. We headed back to N.C. once the bite slowed. I left feeling pretty sure the fish would meet me there again the next day. I've heard reports from other areas saying that redfish were suddenly appearing on the flats. We don't usually see them in any number on the flats until after the August full moon. Maybe they're early this year.

After a wonderful four days with some great folks, Friday was the creme de la creme. My clients were Bobby and Della Dumont, of Sebring, Florida. Della had booked the trip for her new hubby as a Christmas present. She paid the deposit, and when it was time to settle up, Bobby found out he was on tap for the rest of it. Good trick, Della. Hey, it's the thought that counts, right. We got a good laugh over that!

Della first called me about the trip way back sometime in 1999, and since then Della, Bobby, and I have passed many emails back and forth. I felt like I already knew them. It just wasn't official. Well, Bobby and Della were staying at a friend's house in St. James City, so we agreed that it would be easiest to pick them up in St. James City. I had just heard the crack of dawn as I pulled into the docks, but even in the darkness I could tell that Bobby was a big ole boy like me, and Della was as pretty as a picture. You readers may call me corny, and that's OK. I don't know what it was, exactly. We had the common bond of all being native born Floridians, but we didn't know that starting out. It was just one of those things, but for me it was love at first sight with the Dumonts (yes, that includes you, Bobby!). I just felt a special bond with them that was really cool. I think it's a couples thing, for one thing. It's the same kind of special thing I felt with Scott and Colleen Gibney, and a number of other couples. You know who you are!

Anyway, I knew it would be a great day regardless of how the fishing went. I also knew Bobby wanted to learn some stuff, and wanted to introduce him to some new ideas. It took us a while to get bait. There were plenty of pinfish everywhere we went, but we didn't get into descent quantities of shiners (enough to cull) until I had gone all the way back to Cayo Costa. Well, at least I didn't have to go back later, so it wasn't so bad.

We had a west wind at 15 knots, so fishing the outside for snook was out of the question. I didn't have any confidence in it at this point, anyway. Finally baited up, we headed to a spot where I've been catching a lot of snook of all sizes on the inside. There were plenty of snook there, and the Dumonts caught 6 small fish. We elected to turn our attentions to redfish, although it was early on the tide.

I moved to the flat where I'd found the reds for the last two days and began my chumming handiwork. Nothing! Surely, they wouldn't double-cross me, today! After giving them plenty of time to come to my chum, I moved up on the flat until I saw a fish spook at about 100 yards. I knew I was on the fish, now. I began my chumming again. We put out small shiners under corks, and cut pinfish. In no time, Della had the first red of the day, a bruiser, and it was a handful for her. Oh, I love the way big redfish fight. It's the only way I can make another man's wife or girlfriend squeal without getting shot!!! Della got the fish all the way to the boat, and the hook pulled just as I was about to land it.

That kind of set the tone for the rest of the fish that hit. Bobby and Della had at least 10 reds on by my count, but we didn't get a one IN the boat. We had a good bite going, but the fish weren't in the mode where they were eating with reckless abandon, yet, when another guide pulled in next to us, about 50 ft. off my port side. He was very quiet, and knew he was welcome to join us, but I believe that because he came in just after I got things going the fish sensed his boat and scrammed. His boys caught one nice red, and it was over, just like that. Damn! I tried my best to get things going again, but it wasn't to be. We ended the day back at the Waterfront where we sat and talked for a couple of hours, and Della ran into an old friend from her home town of Everglades City.

It was a wonderful day. The reds had put a hex on us, and refused to be boated, but we had a great time, nonetheless. Della said she didn't think she could have landed more than a couple of those reds, anyway, and that I had certainly put them on the fish. Bob and Della were going to try their luck in the same area on Saturday morning from his Backcountry 20. Can't wait to hear how they did. I hope they spanked 'em!

So, that's how it went last week. It's long hours and hard work being a fishing guide. Never let anyone tell you any different. But, the rewards are many in terms of new friendships and wonderful memories. That's what makes guiding so great!

Note: Those of you who have trips booked in the future, or who may want to book, should note my new phone numbers. Home/office is 239-628-3522, and the new cell phone number is 239-633-5851.