Before the storm

[fishfalcon]

Went down to the coast for the long weekend with low expectations given the weather forecast. Threw the castnet Friday afternoon and caught a bunch of finger mullet. Launched the kayak and went to hit a few oyster bars. Caught a couple of big sailcats, a few ladies and a nice Spanish that a shark grabbed on the way in. Caught a small blacktip and when the tide turned caught 5 white trout and 2 specks in about 10 casts. Got cut off by more sharks and Spanish and decided to head in. Saturday morning launched the boat in windy conditions. caught a few trout including 2 keepers and a legal red. Ran in for breakfast and recycyled the ladyfish on the shore rod. Later on got a slow run on the shore rod. My friend's wife went down to fight the fish and I came down to supervise while the rest of the crew watched from the deck. Weird fight with the fish not making any big runs but just bulldogging from side to side. I was a little worried it was a stingray until I saw the fish's tail. Decent sized shark. Got a good look at it later and realized it was a tiger! Got the fish close and it acted very tired. Not wanting to kill it, I did a quick wingspan measurement, clipped the leader, and reversed the fish sending it back out to the bay. It slowly swam away- awesome fish. Unfortunately, my wife quit videoing when the fish got in the grass because "it (the fish)looked bad". We have only killed one shark landing them in the last 8 years but she thought this one might die too. Fish was about 7 feet and a male. Caught a few trout that afternoon with my son including a 22" and 25" nice ones and then we were done fishing from the boat. Had one other big run on the shark rod, but got cut off. Saw 4 rattlesnakes dead in the road as the water came up and several big alligators cruising the canals. Interesting weekend. Water will be dirty for a while with all of this rain.

[Salty Gator]

Thanks for the report. Where were you fishing? Good on ya for trying to revive the tiger