Stay Informed! - Subscribe to our FREE Newsletter
| 25 February 2010
photo credit: Norm Zeigler
Excerpt from Snook on a Fly
By Norm Zeigler
One of the favorite quarries of the old New England whalers was the right whale, so named because its physical and behavioral traits were ideally suited – “right” -- for their needs. For saltwater fly fishers, you could say the snook is the “right fish.”
Some fly anglers -- especially those who regard tarpon as mere flashy genetic giants -- consider snook the tropics’ and subtropics’ premier inshore game fish. They are extremely wary but aggressive feeders and fierce fighters. Sea trout are flashier to look at but weaker fighters. Redfish pack a wallop but lack snook’s spectacular aerialist antics. And, unlike tarpon, snook are delicious to eat.
The genus and species designation for the common snook, Centropomus undecimalis, was chosen by the eighteenth century German researcher Marcus Elieser Bloch in 1792. Centropomus is a combination of the Greek words for stinging cover and refers to the fish’s hard, sharp gill plate, or operculum. Undecimalis, derives from the Latin route word undecim, or eleven, and indicates the number of rays in the snook’s posterior dorsal fin. Genetically, snook are unique, the only member of their genus in the Atlantic Ocean. The name snook is a variation on the Dutch word “snoek,” meaning pike. Other common appellations include robalo, ravillia, linesides, linesider and sergeant fish.
But whatever they are called, especially for fly fishermen, snook are easy to love. They are beautiful, impulsive and elusive. They are wily, powerful quarry that fight as fiercely as striped bass and jump like rainbow trout on steroids. If redfish are the fullbacks of inshore saltwater fly fishing -- bull-necked and doggedly powerful – snook are the wide receivers – streamlined, muscular and leapingly fleet.
Fishing Report Capt Van Hubbard - W Coast
Combine magnificent weather, warmer waters, and we get great fishing.
We have enjoyed some warm sunny days and our inside waters have warmed up into the mid seventies. Snook are biting along with some nice redfish and trout. White bait is starting to drop in; it’s hard to find and catch but fish are looking for the minnows. Thirty years of cast netting minnows really helps in times like these. Captain Van’s Magic Chum distributed by Baitmasters of St. Pete. really calls em in for me. When minnows are had to find it helps to have a strong fishy attractant to pull bait with in cast net range. Take your time and let em gather; it means less throws of your net. The slimy “snot grass” it bad so we don’t want to pull these heavy nets any extra times, especially as I get older. Look close because some of the minnows are tiny and will gill in ¾ inch mesh.
Snook are scattered and not going crazy all day but we are getting some active bites. We had over twenty snook including a 29 inch dinner fish yesterday. Jamey Rutherford of Winter Haven landed our keeper. She and her family landed over twenty snook and a nice trout on one bite with minnows. Another angler next to us got a goose egg on shrimp. It is beginning to turn on.
Out side Gulf temps about to the magic sixty-eight degree mark. Kings have been spotted but not hot yet. We did enjoy hot Spanish action; last week. Some cobia, tripletail, and even a few permit are available if you have the patience to stalk em. We are catching a few pompano but it did slow down after the Full moon. I expect golden nuggets to crank up as we near the New moon on the twenty-sixth. Some sheepshead are still holding locally but it’s winding down now.
We saw a few tarpon last Tuesday but I hear reports that a few are being caught by dedicated captains. Fishing is fine and it looks like some windy cloudy conditions mid week but no cold weather in the forecasts. Let’s Go Fishin’ soon! Get your reservation now and don’t miss out of the Spring action!
Capt. Van Hubbard
Love at First Fight
My first snook hit a chartreuse-and-white Clouser one morning in May 1995. The day before, I had hooked and broken off several fish because of my own obtuseness in using a flawed leader. Now the longing to finally land one was approaching an obsession.
I got down to the beach, a five-minute walk from my house, about nine-thirty. The tide was coming in, creating a slight current from east to west (left to right) along the beach. A light northwest breeze was blowing offshore, leaving the water as calm and clear as an aquarium. Most of the snook were moving with the tide.
Under these conditions the sight fishing is excellent but the catching can be problematic; snook are extremely wary and, unlike redfish, have excellent vision. I could spot the fish coming a long way off and stayed back up the slope of the beach out of their line of vision as I false cast, trying to put the Clouser a couple of feet in front of them. Many of them spooked.
I changed tactics, casting six or eight feet ahead of them so they would not be alarmed by the splash of the weighted fly. Finally I hooked and lost an eighteen-incher that threw the fly back at me. A few casts later another fish socked the Clouser and I knew it was hooked solid. That twenty-two-incher jumped four times before I landed it. Since then I have been as hooked as that first snook.
A lot of fly fishermen who have never fished for them know a little bit about snook. They may have read about them, heard tales of friends and acquaintances who have fished for them, or watched one of television’s celebrity fly fishers pursue them. But as is the case with anything experienced vicariously through another person’s words or camera images, this is a dry and detached knowledge, maybe not inaccurate but certainly incomplete. Like love, the only way to truly understand it is to experience it.
It is difficult to exaggerate the passion sparked by these “mere” fish. Captain Ray Van Horn, originally from South Carolina but who now lives and guides out of Tarpon Springs, Florida, is a nationally ranked tournament bass, tarpon and redfish angler. He has fished for most of the saltwater and freshwater game fish in the United States and is not exactly a touchy feely type. But when it comes to snook Van Horn is not shy about showing his sentimental side.
“I could never live anywhere where there aren’t any snook,” Van Horn says. It is a common outlook.
My philosophy on target species and regions tends to run along the lines of a verse from a 1970s song: “If you can’t be with the one you love, then love the one you’re with.” In tiny mountain streams I love six-inch brook trout. In farm ponds I love sunfish. On Cape Cod I love striped bass. But there are some angling love affairs that are worth a bit of extra effort to foster and sustain. So it is with my consuming passion for snook.
There are many reasons for fly rodders to love snook. One of the most compelling is their morphology; specifically, their size and body structure.
In my experience, the majority of snook caught are between twenty and twenty-eight inches. These are not stylishly svelte, capriciously swift, but low-endurance creatures like Spanish mackerel or shad. They are high-stamina, muscular, thick shouldered, piscine torpedoes that put a bend in any outfit lighter than a 10 weight and keep battling relentlessly to the shore (or boat) and beyond.
Closely linked to their physiology, of course, is snook’s fighting ability. And what fighters they are! On tackle suited to their size, multiple long runs and jumps are common.
Go fishing with Orlando Kayak Fishing Club
We will be meeting at 1,000 Islands in Cocoa Beach on Saturday, March 21st. Directions and more information are on OrlandoKayakFishingClub.com, and please make sure to check on Friday, March 20th in the evening to ensure that the event is not postponed due to rough weather.
Mark your calendar now for our next meeting which will be at Mosquito Creek in Apopka on Tuesday, April 7th from 7 – 9 pm. In the meantime visit our website and our forum for updates, tips, and to find a fishing partner
More Events
It is their aerial antics that really set snook apart from other first-rate game fish. I have never had a redfish jump. The same goes for bonefish. Sea trout jump occasionally but weakly, and Spanish mackerel, striped bass, bluefish, jack crevalle and other saltwater species become partially airborne on rare occasions. But when they are hooked, snook, as basketball players say, like to “get some air.” Their jumps vary from thrashing, gill-rattling tarpon impersonations to cartwheels, rocket-like vertical explosions and greyhounding forward leaps.
On more than a few occasions a sore arm or shoulder, not a halt in the action, has put an end to my snook fishing. This is the kind of discomfort and fatigue all fly fishers long to experience more of.
Read more of Snook on a Fly Order your copy here!
