caloosa bug

Been back out on the big O the last couple weekends….mainly just bass fishing and enjoying the scenery. All catch and release. ps. The second pic is a sea cow submarine that was headed right for me.

Caught some neat pictures of a thunderstorm with my iPhone on “Live Photo”.

It was a great morning for bass fishing in the caloosahatchee river. Dad landed the 3 biggest and lost another big one. We weighed the two biggest at 6lbs 14oz and 5lb 2oz. We boated more than a dozen fat and healthy 2- 3 1/2 pounders too. My son, somehow, didn’t get to join in on the action. Maybe next time.

I worked a half day today, and threw the 3wt. in the truck planning to cast at a few canals for gills and cichlids on the way home. With all the rain this week, I went to check to see if a productive culvert was running close to the house instead. It was, and all I had was my 3wt. and one streamer in my gill-bug box. It took 5 casts to land these two 3+ lbers. Certainly was a good battle on the little 3.

Good stuff man! Glad to see you back. Looks like a lot of fun.

They do fight well on the the 3wt. However, with all of the aggressive exotics here now in okeechobee, the steady tug of a big gill is a welcoming feeling during an outing when targeting them. Compared to the finger burning, fly shredding, horse of a fish that Mayan cichlids and oscars are. Anymore, most outings consist of 5 or more cichlids to every 1 gill. They are tons of fun when you need a backup plan on a slow day and can be caught almost anytime, anywhere, pretty easily. That's why I consider a big, native gill to be a more respectable catch than a 2lb cichlid. Here's a few of those non-natives that like to put a strain on the 3wt. 😁 love the trout pics..it's been way too long since i caught any of those.

Very nice!

Me and dad took my son and his friend from down the street fishing this weekend... who apparently had never ridden in a boat before. You know they're having a good time when they are laughing out loud as they were reeling in fish . We brought home enough for a few meals.

Man, that little goliath was probably a handful on a 8wt. I had a blast sight casting to bedding bluegill this weekend.

With snook season now closed, I had to dust off the 3wt. Had a blast this morning tossing bugs to bedding gills. Brought home 17 bluegills and released about 5 Mayans to every 1 gill. Tugged on fish for 3 hours and headed in with a smile.

A couple weeks ago me and dad spent 5 days out of an 8 day stretch on Lake O. We had an absolute blast. Explored many areas and patterns to try to win a little money in our annual one fish, big bass tournament during our county fair. We caught a lot of nice bass and had a lot of fun. I caught some big ones the first couple days, then a mid week front came through. I guess I forgot how to fish after that, probably because I was over confident in my pattern of a senko and weightless trick worm. Dad proceeded to kick my but the rest of the week on into tournament day on a tiny shallow crank bait. I didn't weigh in squat, and dad finished in 9th out of over 70 participants. It was a week to remember and I'm glad I shared it with dad.