Fishing

As usual, we were awake by 5 am. We did a few language lessons on Babbel then went downstairs for breakfast. Mark had made egg bites and bagels for breakfast then he fed and kneaded the sourdough that he started yesterday evening. After breakfast we took the dogs on a short walk on Standish.

We were to meet Kenny at 8:30 so we came back to the house to prepare for fishing. We loaded life jackets, fishing rods and baits along with sunscreen and water for our morning on the water. Since the morning was damp, we dressed in layers with long pants and long-sleeved T-shirts. The three of us piled into Mark’s boat and went out of the canal into Mason Creek and the surrounding islands.

Redfish

We were casting Johnson  Silver Minnows, weedless spoons, into the oyster beds and near mangrove roots for redfish. The water was very shallow, making even the tunnel hull shallow water boat difficult to maneuver. After fishing for nearly an hour Kenny had caught a ladyfish, an undesirable species which he released, and I had hooked a small sea trout that got off the hook as it was at the boat. After another hour I caught a large 26-inch redfish that put up quite a fight, especially as it neared the boat. It didn’t tire easily and made an exciting time until Mark was able to net the fish. After removing the hook and measuring, we put the fish in the live well, but we were unable to get water to flow into the live well or bait well. We could hear the pump working but water wasn’t entering the tank. We manually emptied buckets of seawater into the live well until we could figure out the problem.

Sea trout

Mark caught a beautiful sea trout that was just under the 16-inch limit so he released the fish. Kenny caught another ladyfish then I hooked another large redfish. This fish fought even more than the previous fish, but we were able to net it more quickly. This fish measured 24 inches so was within the legal limit of 18-27 inches. We fished a little longer and caught no more fish. I had a strike that felt like a large redfish, but the fish didn’t stay on the hook. Because Kenny had promised to take his wife, Jodie, to the Homosassa mullet festival this afternoon, we came back to the dock behind Mark’s house by 1:30.

Redfish

Mark and I sprayed the gear with freshwater to clear the saltwater and cleaned the boat. Mark filleted one of the redfish as I assisted then I filleted the other fish with Mary assisting while Mark looked at the live wells. For some reason that we don’t know, the pumps to the live wells began working as they should. Mary bagged the fish fillets for freezing and we took our fishing clothes in to be washed.

Lunch was a garden salad with deli turkey and potato chips. The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing or napping since we were both very tired. I called Steve Minor to see if he had a good birthday on Wednesday. Mark did the final kneading of his first batch of sourdough bread and put the loaves into large bowls for baking.

Mark and I took the dogs on a quick evening walk the came in for a meal of smoked turkey that we brought from home, a garden salad and plenty of Mark’s sourdough bread. Everything was delicious.

After dinner, Kenny and Jodie stopped by for a short visit. Jodie will go to church with Mary and Cindy tomorrow. We plan to fish with Kenny tomorrow afternoon although Mark and I may go out fishing tomorrow morning.  I renewed my Florida saltwater fishing license for another year since we were hoping to come to Florida earlier next year.

After Kenny and Jodie left, we watched an episode of Clarkson’s Farm on Prime TV then an episode of Astrid on PBS. This season Astrid seems to have left the original format and become a bit far-fetched. We hope that the show hasn’t “jumped the shark”.