The Lighter Side, by Dennis Kreutz

“You can lead a trout fisherman to saltwater, but….

… then you have to teach him how to fish all over again”, should be the warning that’s printed at the front of every saltwater fly fishing how-to book.

Every trout fly fisher spends hours, days, and even years honing the skills necessary to fool wary trout. We’ve all done the drill:

Stealthily move yourself into position so the trout doesn’t detect your presence, then gently present your fly upstream of the trout you’ve spotted parked in its feeding lane, then mend the line so there isn’t any drag on the fly as it approaches the trout’s position, watch for the trout to take your fly, then raise the rod to set the hook and the fight is on, with you being ready to move up or downstream to stay close to the trout as you fight it.

So I’m on the bow of a flats boat, with guide Capt. Nick Sassic, in Mosquito Lagoon near Titusville, FL and we are looking for Redfish, which I’ve been reading about in magazines. I’m confident that I’m going to see a fish about 10 lbs, with its distinctive tail sticking out of the water easy to spot because of the telltale black dot, and I’m going to throw a crab fly about a foot in front of its nose, twitch it a couple times and catch my first Redfish. I can’t wait.

After about an hour of Capt. Nick poling us through 18” deep water, he spots the first Red of the day. “Redfish, 2 o’clock, 50 feet,” he calls out. Now this is where everything starts falling apart for the trout fisherman.

There isn’t any tail sticking up out of the water. Instead, what I see is reddish brown shape moving through the water at a pretty fast clip from left to right, and I’m standing on the bow of a boat with my line piled around my feet. The boat is rocking, the wind is blowing straight at me, the guide is on a raised platform directly behind me, and I’m about to make a cast that is probably going to hook him, or me. I’m facing straight forward, or 12 o’clock, and the fish is rapidly moving from my 2 o’clock towards my 3 o’clock position.

I’ve not been that careful about where the extra line was placed on the bow of the boat and now I see that the wind has blown it all around my feet, so if I move my feet to position myself for a cast to my right, I’m going to stand on my fly line and not be able to cast very far. So I try to leave my feet in the same position but turn my body sideways and cast, which happens to be into the 10 mph wind. As I make several false casts, its obvious that I’m going to drop the fly behind the moving fish, so I try to adjust, which turns my body but not my feet even more to the right, and now I’m nearly cross-legged. The boat rocks back and forth as I false cast because I’m transferring weight from foot to foot which is a slight error on dry land but nearly disastrous on a tippy boat, so I just drop the fly into the water, landing it right on the Red’s back. All of my efforts are rewarded by a large swirl in the water, where the fish was 2 seconds before, but now it’s probably on the way to the other side of the lagoon, laughing at me.

Geez, this isn’t right. The fish is moving, the boat is moving, the extra line isn’t being handily moved downstream by the current. I can’t just cast to a spot upstream of a fish that is holding in one spot, then adjust the fly location with a mend or two, and I’m casting 50 feet with adrenaline pumping and into a 10mph wind, not nearly as easy as it was in the park near my house.

I turn and look at Capt. Nick, who is smiling and shaking his head as he says, “Welcome to the flats, Colorado Boy”. He starts poling again, and I retrieve my fly, much more carefully positioning the extra line on the bow of the boat, behind me this time.

Soon we see another Redfish (meaning Capt. Nick sees it and points it out to me), this time at 10 o’clock, 40 feet. This fish is barely moving, so I’m able to make a pretty decent cast that lands about 4 feet in front of the fish, and I start stripping in line slowly as the Red moves towards the fly. I’m tense and ready to get this one, and then suddenly I see the fish dart forward to where my fly is. I quickly raise my rod to set the hook and all of my efforts are rewarded by a large swirl in the water, where the fish was 2 seconds before, but now it’s probably on the way to the other side of the lagoon, laughing at me.

I turn and look at Capt. Nick, who is smiling and shaking his head as he says, “Remember when I said, 'Strip set the hook, this isn’t a trout that you can set with the rod?' You pulled it right out of his mouth as he was about to eat it.” He starts poling again, and I retrieve my fly, willing myself to remove all of my trout fishing knowledge from my brain.

Within a couple of minutes another Red shows up, 9 o’clock and 50 feet, but moving towards the boat. A quick cast, about 5 strips, the fish charges the fly. I’m about to squeeze finger grips into the cork handle because I’m concentrating so hard on not lifting the rod to set the hook, and I feel the line go solid on the next strip. Then I give it a hard set strip, and THEN lift the rod as line starts flying off the deck as the Red makes a hard run, probably to join his two buddies on the other side of the lagoon, but I’ve still got him. Soon the reel is screaming as line is stripped off of it.

We land the fish, take the photos, release the Red back into the Lagoon, do the high-fives, and then sit down to talk about what just happened. “Not bad,” says Capt. Nick, “you keep this up and we’ll try some fun stuff next trip”. He tells me about making a trip into the Florida Everglades, similar water, but the channels are much smaller so we’d need to use a canoe instead of the flats boat. Sure, I’m up for that I tell him.

"Ok, let’s do it," he says. "It’ll be fun, we just need to make sure you have your sea legs because the boat rocks quite a bit if you cast like you just did, and if you fall out of the boat there, the gators might get you."

Sheesh, this aint Colorado, Toto.

About the Author

Dennis Kreutz practices fly fishing in freshwater, saltwater, and the grassy park near his home. For photos of fish caught on fly, and more information about equipment and fishing strategies, visit the extremeflyfishing.com web site or contact him at dennis@extremeflyfishing.com