On Thursday 3/17 I had to take the Mitziskiff out to do a sampling job at Turkey Point Nuclear Power Plant for my laboratory with my co-worker Doug. I got to put the boat in at their private boat ramp right behind the reactors in the cooling canal which leads right out into Biscayne. I arrived in the morning to find security a little tighter than usual due to the disaster in Japan and the impending arrival of the big wigs to inspect the plant. The day was perfect with clear skies, high of 81, light winds and the supermoon tides making it easy to get back in their private creeks which are usually tough to get into depending on the tide. The first spot we had to sample is in a creek only about 15ft wide and 2-3ft deep but the mangrove undercuts go back pretty far and there are some 20″ mangos hiding in there. We managed to pull out about 7 mangos up to 16″ but couldn’t entice the bigger ones to eat. I started to chum them up with frozen shrimp and the place turned into an aquarium with sheepshead, lookdowns, pinfish, snapper, needles, and what I thought were palometa’s. I wanted to show Doug one of these neat looking fish so when I finally hooked one and pulled it up I realized they were baby permit, a very welcome surprise. Doug caught one and I caught three along with two more snappas in the deep cut leading into the cooling pond for a total of 20 snapper, 9 keepers and 4 permit. I wish every workday could be more like this.
Capt. Steve
Must have missed the fish fry phone call!
I have to have a phone first in order to call anyone!