CATCHING A DREAM.... ON THE FLY

By: arnoldq Mood: FLY FISHING Date: 09/02/2007 02:11:32 Music: None

I was up really late the other night working on our website when an email about a trophy trout came in from a good friend. The email had a photo of an angler with a large and no doubt, trophy size spotted sea trout. It wouldn't take me long to get on the web and find out that a saltwater fly fisherman from Florida, Jay Wright, was the angler responsible for not only catching but also releasing the catch of a lifetime.

I was able to contact him a day later and we were able to talk about his trip that day and get some details about his catch and the release of his trophy trout.

Now you might be asking, why am I talking about a trophy trout being caught in Florida? Well the very fact that it’s a trophy trout is news worth in itself, and catching it on a fly makes it even that more special; however I will let you know that Mr. Wright is actually an experienced Texas trout angler.

In fact he and a good friend John Gill recently won the Baffin Bay Bash 2007 and is on his way back down to Baffin Bay this week to do some additional trout fishing with his tournament partner and friend.

I think it’s safe to say that Jay has a bit of experience when it comes to trophy trout; however a few weeks ago, even as experienced as he is in catching large trout, nothing prepared him for what he was about to land on his fly on a cold day this past February.

For Jay Wright February 24th, 2007 was supposed to be like any other regular Saturday of fishing in Florida waters.

He wasn't venturing out in search of his usual target; a trophy sized spotted sea trout. His sole purpose was to go out and do some pre-fishing and possibly locate a productive fishing spot for a good friend coming in from Texas, David Friddell. “I was simply trying to locate some fish because my friend was set to arrive so we could go fishing, I wasn’t searching for a trophy”, said Wright.

His location of choice that Saturday was in the Ft. Pierce area on the Eastern Coast near the Indian River Lagoon, which has a reputation of producing trophy size spotted sea trout among many other highly sought after game fish such as redfish, snook, and tarpon.

Although Jay knew he was heading out to pristine fishing grounds, he did have his doubts and was even a bit hesitant on venturing out and for good reason. One of the coldest fronts of the season had come barreling into Florida the night before and the water was very cold at 55 degrees in most of the lagoon; however at one of the inlets the water was considerably warmer at 67 degrees.

Considering the very cold conditions, Jay never intended it to be a very successful trip and surely not a trip that would potentially deliver the trophy trout he always dreamed of catching.

After being a bit hesitant Jay decided to stick with his original plan and headed out with the hope of locating some fish. With a new moon on hand and steam coming off the cold lagoon waters, Jay started the trip by wading the western shoreline with conventional tackle and fished for approximately two hours with a few small snook being the only takers.

With very little to no success Jay jumped back into his boat and decided to troll his boat along the shoreline and attempted to locate some fish.

While he carefully moved his boat along the shoreline he was able to spot many small snook congregated along the warmer water; however it wasn't long before something else quickly caught his attention.

As he trolled along the shoreline he was able to spot approximately ten to fifteen really large trout in several potholes. He quietly put the power pole down on his boat, quietly exited his boat and proceeded to wade the area.

After working the area thoroughly with no success Jay decided to hop back in the boat and move down the shoreline and it wasn’t long before he would spot another large trout. He proceeded to sight cast to the trout and carefully positioned the fly, and to his amazement she ate it. He carefully landed the large trout and quickly weighed her; she tipped the scale at a solid 7.5 pounds.

He then proceeded down the shoreline looking for more fish before returning to the area where he had seen the group of big trout and decided to wade a final time.

Jay decided to wade with his fly rod and tied on an EP style minnow that he tied himself and it wasn't long before he had a 4lb trout to show for his efforts. With temperatures being as cold as they were, this wasn't a complete surprise as he had already caught and released a 7 1/2 pound trout.

He continued to wade the area carefully and thoroughly by blind casting into several potholes. As he made a couple of casts off target he repositioned his cast to a specific pothole and at that instant he had hooked a fish. Jay knew immediately he had a substantial fish on the line and that was quickly confirmed when he got a glimpse of the fish when she came to the surface to try and spit the fly out. The fish was a solid one indeed as she made a couple of strong runs and several more attempts to throw the fly out.

After several failed attempts Jay was finally able to get the large trout close enough and land her with the Boga scale. Even though he had successfully land her, Jay didn't need the Boga to tell him he potentially had a record trout on his hands but when he finally lifted her out of the water, she weighed in at a solid 11.5 lbs on the Boga. Now the challenge was going be documenting her.

Jay quickly and carefully brought her back to his boat approximately 30 yards away and the only storage he had was a 120 qt cooler normally used for dry storage. He quickly removed all items from the cooler, filled it with enough water to get her to the dock, which was about a 5-minute ride away. The trip wasn’t very far; however he had a highly sensitive trophy trout on his hands and didn't want to put her in any distress so he quickly weighed his options and decided to keep a close eye on her; if she showed any signs of distress then he would quickly and carefully release her.

During the trip to the dock he was relieved that she wasn't showing any stress and as he arrived at the dock he got her quickly measured, weighed, took photos, and quickly raced her back to the spot he landed her. He placed her into the tide and carefully watched her to make sure she was ok and after a few minutes she finally swam off, truly a dream come true.

Jay Wright submitted photos, fly, and other required information to the IGFA and his catch is currently a pending IGFA 12LB tippet record. The current record is 9lb 8oz.

I have a lot of respect when an angler is able to release a fish of this quality back to fight another day. Hats off to Jay for the release of his dream catch.

Remember to to practice conservation and CPR (Catch Photo and Release) when you can and only keep what you're going to eat so we can have plenty of quality of fish for everyone to enjoy.