Florida: Gray Triggerfish Opens March 1
The recreational gray triggerfish season reopens to harvest in Gulf state and federal waters March 1, and will remain open through May 1, closing to harvest May 2, 2020. If you plan to fish for gray triggerfish in Gulf state or federal waters, excluding Monroe County,...
The Fish That Shook The Pier
In the summer of 1964, an average Joe revealed to the happy-go-lucky Myrtle Beach tourists where some large creatures roamed. Large is actually insulting when it comes to describing thousand-pound sharks. How about one that weighed almost a ton, caught with rod and...
Bay Of Pigs
Fishing the Bay, you can't help but feel you've been handed the keys to a private kingdom, where the smallmouth bass reigns supreme. I should have gone to her, should have been there in her hour of need. I should have let her collapse in my arms and told her...
The Plan
They had planned this trip for years. "If I get there before you do, look for me upstream." That was the plan, for they both knew that their chances of actually arriving there at the same time were extremely slim. You know how it is. And in the end, it turned out they...
Baltimore’s Burning But Big Rockfish
It was May 1, 2015, a Friday, and Baltimore seemed like the last place anyone would go for a peaceful getaway. But my wife, Kathy, and I had planned to visit her son Jay in Charm City that very weekend. We were determined to make it happen. Network news broadcasts...
Sharks vs. Catfish
When it comes to sharks vs. catfish, the cats win by a nose. Hollywood has been in love with sharks for far too long. It is high time the catfish finally gets some glory. Sure, sharks have an entire week devoted to them on the Discovery Channel, and then there is the...
New State Record Yellow Perch
The Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) recently recognized Tyler Halley of Maryville for catching a new state record yellow perch. Halley was fishing on a private pond in Nodaway County when he caught the 1-pound, 14-ounce fish using the pole-and-line method....
Sawfish: What To Do When You Accidentally Hook One
When I started graduate school at Florida State University, I had never seen a sawfish in the wild, but I was excited to be part of the recovery of a species I had been so awestruck by in aquariums. The smalltooth sawfish, the only sawfish found in Florida, has been...
Pride And Regret
Carl Lear loved hunting grouse and fishing for trout. So when the opportunity came for him to go north from Virginia to hunt grouse in classic autumn Michigan, he stashed his old fiberglass fly rod in the truck as well, on the off chance that he might come across a...
Sweet Soul of the Smokies
Maggie “Aunt Mag” Williams (1863-1961) In the halcyon days of childhood, most of us had the distinct privilege, although we might not have recognized it at the time, of being in close contact with older folks who merited the description of being “a genuine character.”...