"Real Florida Stories"
    Second of a Series for Florida Secrets

                 So Many Fish

By Leo Lovel

      This is a true story taken from the book "Spring Creek Chronicles" published in 2000. The book is 237 pages packed with short stories of " fishin', huntin', workin' and people along the North Florida Gulf Coast " It is illustrated with drawings by Clay Lovel.

     Have you ever struck a good bunch of fish?
     I mean get 'em just right, packed up tight in a ball from the cold, and in water the right depth where your net will stand up. A place where you can get 300 yards of monofilament all the way around em and have 300 more yards to wind 'em down with, in the circle.
    It fires me up every time, no matter how many times I've done it.
    Mullet so thick that a dozen jump over the staff when it hits the water. (continued below)

              
                                 Illustration by Clay Lovel

     Mullet so thick that they are beating the sides of the boat like a drum when your winding 'em down. The cork line's turning to foam from the fish hitting the net and there's a roar that you can
hear over that 40 horse outboard's whine of thousands of fish in the air, in a flurry like snow as they pile over the corks. Fish so thick that you can't help but chop up a few dozen with the propeller on your motor as you put the net overboard.
    Fish so thick that they jump in the boat.
    Fish so thick that they hit you in the back, the head, you have to dodge 'em to keep em out of your face.
    So many fish that some primordial instinct takes over and a sound, a whoop, a yell comes from somewhere deep inside; a sound you can't duplicate under controlled and civilied circumstance, a sensation of being wild and free and what it must have been like to challenge mother nature all day, every day with you and your family's and your villages well-being in the balance.
     So many fish that you can't help but wonder about who put this master plan together and provided us with so much.
     So many fish that you thank the Great Maker for being so generous.
     So many fish.
     I've struck that many fish, many times.


   

                 1/29/03

Read the first of the series. Click Below:

Florida: A Sense of Place

Sailing to Key West



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Click Here to find out about Spring Creek Restaurant, a Florida Secret

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