Stuart, Florida—When members of Florida Sportsman Magazine’s online fishing forum decided to hold an informal fund raiser/tournament/back patting to help the daughter of a member on the website, Costa was quick to get involved. They put together prize packages that helped many of the participants blow the dust off their wallets, while at the same time calling on their professional fishing team (The Costa Nostras) to participate in the event.

Known by the nickname “Bash,” these informal fishing tournament/get togethers of geek-based Internet forum anglers are designed to put a face (and boat) to a name, while affording the opportunity to hide a dozen shrimp in the vehicle of any members who might have hot spotted, spot jumped or blown the bite when it was hot by inviting the entire cast of south Florida computer owners. Included in the draw to the bash were the music of Fresh Catch, a rocking Astro/Reggaskapunrock band and enough beer, meat and freebies to pull several hundred local anglers away from their Saturday couch baseball games.

Word quickly got out that Rob (Pancho) Sabin and Amanda (Call me Mandy and I’ll close your eyes for good) Perryman were hooked up with the local hotshot guide/blog writer so pre-tournament smack was skipping off the docks like a skunky beer on a summer day. Any time Costa brings in their heavy guns you can bet they’re serious, with cooler rations for tournament day limited to a sixer of Dead Guy Ale, five Heinken’s and two bottles of Bud Lite Lime that had been in the cooler so long the caps had rusted. Needless to say, the team was parched by 11 a.m.

Known for its world class saltwater inshore fishing, the 193 mile long Indian River reaches its southern terminus in Stuart near an area known as “The Crossroads” because of the intersection with the St. Lucie River, Intracoastal Waterway, St. Lucie Inlet and Eric Clapton’s beach house. Adjacent to The Crossroads are the Sailfish Point Flats, a six square mile expanse of pristine snook, spotted seatrout and G-string bikini habitat. It was there that Pancho Sabin launched a live pilchard into a distant pothole with a stellar cast.

Unfortunately, the hook didn’t join the pilchard on that cast, and when bait got blown up the fish took the early lead in the event 1 to 0, bringing Poncho’s hook-setting streak to 0-for-May.  Perryman’s cast resulted in a 30.25 inch spotted seatrout, proof that if you cast your bait off and something eats it, she’s going to snake your bite with a quick pilchard pitch to the exhaust stream of that feeding fish.

As the morning wore on the team burned through roughly 200 baits, several of which actually led to captured snook and seatrout, with Pancho owning the kindergarteners while Perryman stacked the deck in her favor with a 28.5 inch slot snook. Thirteen beers, a sushi break and 40 dirty jokes later, team Costa Nostra pulled into the dock at Sandsprit Park looking like a trio of wet dogs in a feather factory.

With over 200 people in attendance, Perryman in her Costa “Girl Power” shirt emasculated the field with her trophy seatrout, taking top honors in the category as manservant Pancho stood in the background holding up the “Applause” sign and occasionally answering questions at the Costa Promotions Trailer.

The event raised over $5,000 for Ryleigh Nicole Hunter, a young lady who lost her hearing as a newborn, but has regained it through a hearing implant. Funds raised during the event will only pay a portion of the bill, to learn more about how you can help, visit  Ryleigh’s Facebook Foundation Page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-He…wall&filter=12

February 21, 2012

Since embarking on this expedition on the southern tip of the Florida peninsula we’ve kayaked, biked, hiked, waded and meandered our way up through the middle of the state, side-stepping our way west of Lake Okeechobee up to Highlands County, in south central Florida.

After leaving the Caloosahatchee River ten days ago, we’ve cut our path across properties with existing conservation easements, and it’s good to know the land owners have this commitment to the natural environment. From the protection of water in the Fisheating Creek watershed to habitat mitigation banks for the gopher tortoise, these often voluntary agreements between a private land owner and a government agency are designed to conserve open space, water recharge areas, environmentally sensitive lands, wildlife habitat or historic features on a specific parcel of land, essentially offsetting the environmental impacts of development. In short, they are small parcels of often undevelopable land that when combined create a massive niche for nature.

Our trek through the opportunity area for the Babcock to Fisheating Creek corridor was not easy as we humped our backpacks down old firebreaks that were more ankle-trap than dirt road. It’s been unseasonably hot for February, even in Florida, with temperatures hinging in the 80s every day and most of the group reeking of bug spray and BO.

We spent the better part of a day in Glades County doing our imitation of trail foraging which is how I know where the term “bushwhacked” originated and ultimately found our way east from Babcock Ranch through intact habitat all the way to south Highlands County. Multiple black bears that the University of Kentucky (myself included) tracked with GPS collars during a five year period made this same trek, making long movements west before ultimately turning around and heading back to Glades and Highlands Counties. We’ve seen no bears so far, unless you count Elam, who while sleeping does a pretty good Yogi imitation.

As we entered bear project stomping grounds at the Smoak Ranch near Venus, I realized that with the exception of a short stroll through Palmdale, I have been walking on conservation land for three days, yet still see nothing but trees on the horizon. Despite the years I’ve spent studying this landscape, until I physically trudged my way over it, I did not fully appreciate the volume of these connections to nature that remain intact. Certainly more can be done to ensure viable corridors for large animals exist in perpetuity, but what we experienced suggested that the habitat in Charlotte, Glades and south Highlands County is still suitable for traveling wildlife.

The gathered bear data from Highlands County supports this belief. Through cooperative efforts between ranchers and agencies this part of the Florida Wildlife Corridor stands a good chance of remaining in existence, which equates to the wildlife remaining true to their habitats and instincts as natural members of the Florida landscape.

My appreciation for the role of the private landowner in conservation began to take shape after coming to know one family in particular, onto whose land we finally crossed at midday Saturday. The Smoak family helped get the bear project started, through a relationship the family had with my former boss, Dave Maehr. Dave was an outspoken proponent of the idea that private landowners were key to the conservation of the Florida panther.

As we walked across the Smoak cattle pasture I stepped over the entrance to the home of a burrowing owl, a tiny, long-legged owl that owns the local lizard, frog and insect population. Along the way we found the remains of two unfortunate June beetles, skewered on the barbed wire fence by loggerhead shrike, a small bird that takes out its lack of talons on insects and lizards by crucifying them on thorns or barbed wire before eating them. As we made our way west toward the Smoak camphouse, we passed by a tall pine tree, the location where went from theoretical scientist to experienced bear researcher after catching the first bear of my career.

Tracee Smoak, the wife of Mason Smoak, the pilot who died with Dave Maehr in 2008 while conducting aerial surveys of the black bears in the area, met us at the camphouse. Their three children ran among the pines and clumps of palmetto, chasing each other and squealing.

Even with the tragedy still in the back of my mind, the full circle way of things began to push itself into my thoughts. This is a territory I know and love, and I, like Mason and Dave, take great satisfaction from knowing that it is and will likely always be in good hands. One door may have shut, but another one is opened as the children build their memories of the natural environment that is the Smoak cattle pasture.

The Black Marlin bite is not what I expected it to be. Last December we were getting multiple opportunities per day, while this year we’re cruising the liquid desert and watching the porpoise play dodge-ball with our hard-earned baits. Something needs to change, or a couple of big tuna are going to need to die.

Renowned marine artist Carey Chen arrived yesterday, and will be fishing with us for the next few days. His big game art can now be found all over the world, but more relevantly on the back of Costa del Mar t-shirts.

Carey is a fun guy with a great attitude, as if the conversation on the boat had not deteriorated enough. We threw Carey into the mix right away, and had everyone rub his head for luck. My mate Juan even joined in delivering his verbal blows in his amusing Spanglish take on humor. It’s a good thing we are all friends, because the smack talk helped pass the time as we waited for the bite.

One of the more difficult things to do when you’re batting 1-for December is listen to some of the other boats on the radio talking about chasing the huge schools of yellowfin tuna nearby.  We’re here for black marlin and we will stick it out, but it’s hard to listen the the excited captain rambling about the bite with the sounds of screaming drags in the background while we rifle through our pockets throwing loose change overboard in an attempt to buy a bite. If one of those tuna schools passes close by, we will get our share of sushi .

We get Marlin bit on all tides in this area, but If I had to pick a tide range to fish, it would be the last two hours of the flowing tide and first two of the falling tide—basically the highest water pull. We are coming up on the last two hours of the flowing tide, so I remain optimistic even while watching Carey answer e-mails on his iphone. One of the baits keeps snapping out of the rigger, diving deep and then racing across the surface like it’s on a mission to get crushed. This goes on for 10-15 minutes, and it’s starting to piss me off.

There’s not a doubt in my mind that something is shadowing the bait and causing it to chicken dance like a drunk aunt at a polish wedding, but is it a Black Marlin, dorado or sailfish, or just another goofball porpoise. I’m about to ask Juan to change the bait out when the music starts back up…da-da-da-da-da-da-da…da-da-da-da-da-da-da…da-da-da-da-da-da-duh-duh-duh-duh…

The bait starts to freak like a circus geek, jumping out of the water and spinning turbo-boosted circles. There is no doubt a bite is eminent. An ebony fungo breaks the surface as a 400 pound black starts to slash at the bait. The bonito is talk walking to get away as the music plays on… da-da-da-da-da-da-da…da-da-da-da-da-da-da…da-da-da-da-da-da-duh-duh-duh-duh…

An upwelling the size of an SUV rises to the surface as the billfish makes its move. Juan is in freespool, the boat is in neutral and line starts to fly off the reel. The speed of the spool spining starts to slow and Juan and I work to set the hook in unison, he stabbing with the rod as I punch the throttles to keep the line tight. This sends the fish airborne in a series of spiracular leaps. Even with the fish going ballistic and dinging the ocean to the horizon, I can see that something is wrong.

The bait is swinging around the fish’s bill like a cowboy with a lasso. The fish is bill wrapped. We know this won’t last long. A couple of more jumps and the hook is in the air and she is gone.

The first five feet of the leader is chafed like a cattle-driving cowboy in shorts. You see, the concept behind using circle hooks with live bait for marlin is so that when the fish eats the bait and you come tight, the hook will rotate to the corner of the fish’s. It works every time, except when it doesn’t, and this was one of those times it didn’t. It’s bad joss, and we opt to slice Carey’s Achilles tendon and throw him over to the sharks as a means of improving our luck. Only kidding.

When marlin feed, they slash at the baitfish with their bill in an attempt to stun it so they can seal the deal with an engulfment. Sometimes when the fish is slashing the bait the leader gets wrapped around the bill once or twice, and if that happens and the fish wolf’s the bait,  when you come tight the bill wrapped in the leader pulls the hook forward and straight out the fish’s mouth with zero chance of getting the hook to sting the sweet spot.

We are obviously snake bit. Carey hides the knives and everything else sharp on the boat.

There are fish in the area, I like the tide, the water looks good, we’re marking bait schools on the pinnacles and best of all, there’s not a porpoise in Panama today. We have been harassed for five days by porpoises and now they are stealing someone else’s baits making it much easier for us to fish. Our baits are in the water happily swimming in the boat wake while we wait to watch them die.

After seeing that first fish explode out of the water Carey is ready. Although he has caught hundreds of Billfish, he has yet to land the Man in Black. Another hour goes by. We’ve seen a few sailfish make drive-byes on our bonita.  They want to eat, but the five pound bait comes with too much potential for projectile ejection. The guys in the cockpit want to turn their focus to sailfish, but I tell them we are here to tag blacks and we need to stick it out.

We make a pass on the South side of the high spot working toward a school of bait that is feeding on the surface and it looks like a bathtub fell out of the sky behind the boat as the line is ripped out of the rigger clip. There is a huge hole in the water where the bait once was. I’m thinking to myself “this is the bite we need.”

Juan is feeding the fish, but within seconds the big black is greyhounding towards the boat. In the next jump or two she will be in the cockpit and as much as I like an easy catch and release, I still throttle up hard and at the same time make a sharp turn to the port side. The fish continues to jump, cutting a path through our exhaust.

I am expecting the line to come tight. It never does. I yell a couple profanities, try to compose myself and ask Juan to get a fresh bait back in the water. We missed another one. I don’t want to talk to anybody. That’s two opportunities in the past hour and we have missed the last three fish. The frustration is mounting.

I spent so much time putting all of this together with NOAA fisheries, The Billfish Foundation, Adopt a Billfish, JMOutdoors and everyone here at Islas Secas. In my mind, this was going to be a no-brainer, we go and do what we do every day, catch black marlin. In reality it’s a hair-brained plan to build a schedule around the movements of a wild animal in the open Pacific. I spend the rest of the day doing my best imitation of Captain Ahab cursing the white whale.

Today we were able to avoid the ever increasing problem of the porpoises, we had two bites and miss them both. Things on the boat are kind of quiet. I go up top to be alone and try to sort through the options but come up with no answers. I have been whipped by the Man in Black.

Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge

Created in 1989, the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge is 26,400 acres of prime wildlife chilling zone about 20 miles east of Naples and just north of the Fakahatchee Strand State Preserve. Very little of the refuge is open to public access, allowing the animals to interact in a natural environment free from ringing cell phones, clicking cameras and speeding stegosaurus-sized SUV’s.

Our access to the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge was through an I-75 underpass designed to facilitate the movement of wildlife and water. We began at Picayune Strand State Forest and hiked north to the highway, beyond which lies the Panther Refuge. We’d spent the previous afternoon meeting with Florida Department of Forestry officials discussing a large-scale water restoration project underway at that property.

Alligator Alley is one of the major south Florida east/west expressways. Originating on the east coast just north of Hollywood, it runs first through the Everglades Conservation areas, then through the Big Cypress National Park, across the state to Naples, before jogging north through Charlotte Harbor and Tampa before becoming the main north/south route through the heart of America and into eastern Michigan. At one time, this high-speed asphalt passage across the state had no barriers to keep the wildlife from entering the roadway and veering off the road meant a quick dip in the shoulder-side canal. The wildlife underpasses were integrated into Alligator Alley during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and by the end of construction there were 36 wildlife underpasses, 8 feet tall, 70 feet wide and 100 feet long. Ten foot chain link fences now bracket the roadside canals, funneling wildlife toward the passages and catching errant drivers like a metallic spider web. The $77 million project accomplished its goal of increasing the safety of wildlife and vehicles.

In 1990, state biologists estimated that there were roughly 30 panthers left in the wild, but since the underpass construction, panther roadkill numbers on the Alley have dropped dramatically. In the same span of time, through focused habitat conservation efforts by the state of Florida and federal government, panther population estimates have increased. There is also good evidence that the introduction of Texas cougars in the mid-1990s provided a genetic jump-start that benefited panther demographics. Today the panther estimate ranges between 100 and 160 cats.

There are other factors that have contributed to the improvement in the Florida panther population. The reduction of panther roadkills may also have to do with increased awareness by motorists and better signage and speed limit enforcement. Just this year the FDOT began placing Roadside Animal Detection Systems–solar powered signs that use flashing LED lights to alert drivers when large animals approach the road. Even with these preventative measures, 43 cats have been killed on Florida roads since 2009, not including the two cats that have already died in 2012.

Although the protection of Florida panthers was the primary focus for designing the underpasses, many other species have been documented using them, including Florida black bear, bobcats, alligators, turkey, deer and the occasional wayward party of conservationists. One of the most important roles of the underpasses is to facilitate the flow of water southward to the Picayune and Fakahatchee strands, assuring the natural cleansing sheet flow through the rivers of grass. Continuity with adjoining properties seems to be a theme in this landscape with multiple agencies working together to meet these challenges.

For me, the I-75 underpasses are a symbol of the conservation biology movement in the early days. Using what data there were available back in the late 1980s on the panther, scientists and policy makers helped engineer an effective solution. It was not an easy or inexpensive process, but appears to have worked well.

I remember one of the first lectures I heard my late graduate school advisor and committed conservation scientist Dr. Dave Maehr give. In it he showed a slide of one of the underpasses and talked about the difficulty of getting the structures paid for, a process he was involved in as the leader of the Florida Game and Freshwater Fish Commission’s (which is now the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission or FWC) panther research team. Maehr matriculated at the University of Florida under Dr. Larry Harris, one of the central figures in the field of conservation biology in the 1980s and 1990s, when it became recognized as a scholarly discipline. Both Dr. Maehr and Dr. Harris were shrewd negotiators capable of compromising in order to achieve meaningful conservation goals.

Dr. Harris oversaw the work of many other students who went on to become influential figures in Florida and across the globe, the most prominent of which is Dr. Reed Noss, who in the late 1980s was the first to propose a network of connected conservation land in Florida, and has since written many articles and chapters on wildlife corridors and designing conservation land networks to conserve biodiversity. In the last 20 years, other students of Dr. Harris including Dr. Tom Hoctor and Dr. Dan Smith have worked on projects like the Florida Ecological Greenways Network and the prioritization of roadways for future wildlife underpasses to continue the work towards protecting a statewide network of functionally connected public and private conservation lands, aided by a future comprehensive system of wildlife crossing structures across Florida’s large network of highways.

Another of Dr. Harris’ former students was waiting to meet us at the underpass. Darrell Land of FWC eventually replaced Dave Maehr as the panther recovery team leader after Maehr left the agency to pursue a Ph.D. in conservation biology, and has been in the position now for nearly 20 years. As we approached the underpass in the bright morning we saw Land walking toward us, along with Kevin Godsea, the refuge manager for USFWS, and Laurie MacDonald of Defenders of Wildlife. Together the group represented many years of experience in panther biology and policy decisions. As if to remind us of the need to maintain our effort and our focus despite the challenge and high cost of protecting the species and its landscape, a perfectly preserved pair of panther tracks, one male, one female, were waiting in the dried out mud of the underpass.

What a long, crazy journey the 2012 Fly Fishing Film Tour has been! It was like riding a water slide in the dark, head first, during a thunderstorm…naked!

The E-Ticket ride began in January and we pinballed our way around the country evaluating microbrews, cheap motels and small, inexpensive, out of the way eateries (think truck stop joints) under the guise of promoting and running a bunch of fly fishing movie trailers. We officially screened our last hosted show in Logan, UT on April 24^th so now we have to figure out another scam for subsidized fishing, drinking and telling lies.

The best part was that everyone bought into it, as this year’s tour goes down in history as the biggest and most attended show in our six years of Road Warrior cinema. That translates into three or four more rounds every evening and considerably less sleeping in the truck at 24 hour supermarket parking lots. On special occasions, Thad would even let us turn the heater on in the truck, which for the guys riding in the bed of the pick-up only made it harder to see those inside through the fogged-up windows.

Eleven films from the best independent fly fishing film makers from around the globe debuted on this year’s program, proof that we’re not the only ones who have found a way to get someone to sponsor/pay for our fishing/travel Jones.’ Among this year’s line-up was some of the most dramatic cinematography and sophomoric fishhead humor to ever hit the big screen, complete with booger jokes, bear costumes and a low-speed, down-wind airplane beer drop. Among the films on the Film Tour were:

Waterline Media – Riding High

Sharptail Media – Sipping Dry

MOTIV Fishing – GEOFISH, a Mayan Prophecy

Gin Clear Media – HATCH

Todd Moen – Fall Bullies

3^rd Year Fly Fisher – Reverb, A Punk Rock Love Story

Brian Huskey – Doc of the Drakes

Beattie Outdoor Productions – The Arctic

Get Lost Films – Right On It

Ronnie Goodwin – Fly: A Legacy

LDR Media – The Kodiak Project

As part of our ongoing support of independent filmmakers The 2012 Fly Fishing Film Tour will be delving out over $30,000 in cash to this year’s filmmakers (Thad forgot to carry the zeros in the checkbook or we would have had a lot more fun and delved out $3,000) who were selected for this years program.  Obviously someone else needs to hold the checkbook next time, because that is an unprecedented number to share among the filmmakers, even for some of the larger film festivals!

Aside from watching crew members humiliate themselves trying to hit on the local talent (think females fly fishermen) some of the better highlights from this year’s tour included the largest crowd of the year at the Wilma Theatre in Missoula, MT where 1,100 fish-crazed Montanans and a pair of misled sheep enjoyed the show and mopped the floor with gallons of beer. It was really a special evening, that was, until someone mentioned that they used sheep fur to tie a #18 caddis and spent the night in jail with Dana Carvey and a pair of naked sheep.

We broke attendance records in Bend, Portland, Seattle, Spokane, Missoula, Billings, Boise, Salt Lake City, Ft Collins, Minneapolis, St Louis, Fayetteville and Boulder all of which were sold out venues and proof that hobo marketing actually works. Who’d have thunk that in exchange for a sandwich we’d be able to talk the homeless in each host city to allow us to adhere FT3 posters to their jackets, providing us free publicity at all the local parks, coffee houses and AA meetings. We also put stickers on stray dogs, and on occasion would hang out in parking lots waiting for pretty girls to park their cars, and then put a sticker on their bumper saying, “Want Love? Follow Me To The Fly Fishing Film Tour.”

The F3T crew traveled to 19 states across the country and rolled over 14,000 miles on the pavement on our way to one of the greatest pull-off and park fishing expeditions ever attempted. Someone needs to make a film of it!

Of the 42 shows we hosted, 28 of those shows sold out, 33 offered free taxi’s home to those too loope’d to drive and 41 had the smoke alarms go off, leaving everyone in Boise wondering what would happen if there was an actual fire and not just residual contact smoke filtering about. Those that decided to wait till the last minute to get their ticket at the door we’re rolling a set of 65% SOL dice.

Along with the 42 sanctioned FT3 showings of the films were 61 Independent Promoter shows screened across the globe, including a pair of shows in Belize and 14 shows in Canadia. The Fly Fishing Film Tour developed the Independent Promoter program two years ago, (a licensed program we offer to conservation groups, charites and fly shops) after requests for freebies and swag from fishing-related conservation groups ate all our profits of that tour (or so Chris says, even though he bought a new truck the same week). We set records this year as well with our Independent partners, proving that if you film it, and provide the beer and nachos, they will come.

The best aspect of the Independent Promotor Program was that hundreds of thousands of dollars were raised this year for local conservation groups and charities, hopefully providing summer jobs to college graduates with a weak resume but a visible FT3 tattoo.

Trout Unlimited was at the forefront of the conservation effort, inspiring local TU chapters to host Fly Fishing Film Tour shows as fundraising opportunities for their local communities and organizations such as Rivers of Recovery were able to use the event as a charity fund raising opportunity where the event raised over $70,000 and will be able to sponsor 35 local combat disabled veterans to participate in the Rivers of Recovery experience.

The 2012 Fly Fishing Film Tour gave away over $300,000 in swag which included  100 pairs of COSTA sunglasses, 40 Sage ONE rods, 200 Scientific Anglers Fly Lines, 40 pairs of Patagonia Aluminum Bar Stock Boots, 10,000 F3T Hats, thousands of COSTA keepers and YETI Koozies, 40 Hardy fly reels, countless numbers of T-shirts, 20,000 Stonefly Magazines and a used Denver Broncos Hoodie. This years tour definitely goes down in the history books as a testament that with $200 editing software, a GoPro Hero 2 and enough suction cups, tape and clamps to regularly change camera angles, you can increase viewer attendance from the prior year by 34%. Offering free beer to the first 12 people in line (there were 12 people in our crew) probably helped as well.

There’s no question that the Fly Fishing Film Tour, the first and biggest event of its kind, is making an impact on the sport by inspiring and bringing fresh fly anglers into the fold and entertaining people across the globe with the most exciting fly fishing footage and story lines in the industry. The tour is already screening submissions for 2013 and all we can say is WOW, you might want to invest in some goggles, rain gear and psychotherapy beforehand. Or, you could get your tickets early and block the gate so Thad has to be the 13^th person in line.

From the city of Cancun, Mexico the coastline curves inward in the shape of a “J”  along fairly nondescript beachfront as it passes the island of Cozumel and hooks east to a point of land called Punta Allen. From there, the coast takes a sexy curve inland and the shoreline forms a bay of azure that sets men’s hearts on fire.

Called Ascension Bay, it is over 100 miles of pristine saltwater flats where bonefish tail and permit avail, and a day on the water is like a walk with God. There is a belief among some religions that on rare occasions people have ascended to Heaven directly without dying first. Five minutes on Ascension Bay can make you one of those individuals. Particularly if catching a permit is in your repotoire.

Permit are a peculiar fish to begin with, with an attitude like a French chef line at McDonald’s and the consistency of the price of a gallon of gas. For a long time, fishing guides on Ascension Bay have believed they were seeing the same fish on a regular basis, not necessarily on the same flat, but in the same general area. But so little is known about permit movements and migrations that no one could really be sure if that fish with the dark ding on its back was the same fish as the one with the light back around a dark ding. That’s where the efforts of Project Permit are paying off.

As of this date, 134 permit have been tagged in Mexico waters as part of the Project Permit Mexico program, a joint effort to learn more about the species. The Boca Paila Lodge, Pesca Maya Lodge, Palometa Club Lodge, Ascencion Bay Bonefish Club Lodge (ABBC), Casa Viejo Chac Lodge, Casa Blanca Lodge, Playa Blanca Lodge (Espiritu Santo Bay), Paradise Lodge, Costa de Cocos Lodge, several freelance guides on Cozumel Island and a handful of local fishing clubs have all put in the time to catch, measure and release the fish with a little additional shoulder jewelry in this tagging operation.

Now, the Costa sponsored project to tag permit throughout their range is starting to see some data return, as the first recapture of a tagged permit in Mexico was recorded on March 25, 2012. The 15-pound fish was originally captured and tagged in Ascension Bay on January 31, 2012, by fishing guide Alejandro Velazquez who fishes out of the Palometa Club Lodge. The fish was caught by one of his clients.

Mexico Permit Recapture #1 spent 54 days roaming the forest of azure before it felt the sting of a hook once again and was recaptured by Aqustin Beiceno about a mile from its original tagging point. While two months of freedom don’t show much in the way of long-term movements and growth patterns, it does show that the spring fish tend to remain in the bay area, evidence in the value of releasing fish back into the general population as opposed to inviting it home for a fish taco dinner.

As time goes on and more permit are tagged and recaptured, scientists hope to get a better feel for growth and migration patterns of the population and an idea of the health of the fishery and the survival rate of released fish. For now, that little walk with God that two anglers took has produced concrete data that Bonefish and Tarpon Trust scientists can build on as they await the information from the next Ascension in Mexico waters.

In roughly the same amount of time it takes to watch The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo you can take a helicopter ride from Murmansk to Ryabaga and wet your feet in the single best Atlantic salmon river in the world. While Iceland, Scotland, Ireland and Canada tout their historic spawning runs of Atlantic salmon, it’s a small peninsula east of Finland where the Ponoi River meets the Barents Sea that boasts the best Atlantic salmon fishing in the world.

The Ponoi River on the Kola Penninsula sits just above the Arctic Circle, and from a valley lake to the Barents Sea it flows west to east through 250 miles of Russian wilderness that ranges from arctic tundra to mountainous wilderness. Civilization on the Ponoi is limited to you, your fishing guide and a jet drive driven jon boat. Oh, and a luxury tent, masseuse and pastry chef.

At the Ponoi River Company guest start arriving in Ryabaga the last week in May and it’s a full-on salmonfest through the first week of October. Beats are measured in miles, daylight is perpetual and a bad week is less than 20 fish per angler. Where most Atlantic salmon anglers shoot for hooking one fish in a day, on the worst day of the year on the Ponoi you get that action in triplicate and explosive surface strikes come gratis. On a good day, one angler standing in the river in front of camp can catch more fish than are hooked in the United States in an entire year.

The fish aren’t huge by Atlantic salmon standards, but they’re thick as a weightlifter’s thigh, average 20 pounds and enter the river with an insolence borne of terminally frigid water and the belief that anything small and insecty needs to die.

Costa sponsored Gin Clean Media spent a season on the Ponoi filming the Atlantic salmon run, and we’ve just gotten our grubby hands on this trailer from Director Nick Reygaert (AKA Ted Nuget lite) which gives a little perspective on the river, the lodge and the fish that Boston Red Sox center fielder Ted Williams called the “toughest sons of bitches that swim.”

Check out the film trailer here: The Incomparable Ponoi

Those whose lives were touched by Jose were invited to attend The Celebration of Life, Sunday April 15^th, at 1:30 p.m., at the International Game Fish Association (IGFA) Museum in Dania Beach, Fla. A long-time member of Team Costa, we are shocked and saddened by the passing of the free spirit, adventurer, and all-around groovy person that was our friend, colleague and an instrumental part of the overall Costa vibe. You can find Costa’s tribute to Jose on their Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/#!/costasunglasses While you’re there, be sure to like the page.

I first met Jose back in the late 1990’s while running the pro staff and advertising budget for a major boat manufacturer. Jose came to the factory to discuss his sponsorship contract, changes in his new boat order and to check out the new ad mock-up that featured his presence. He arrived ahead of time, on a spring day, dressed in black sneakers, disco jeans and a black nondescript collared short-sleeve shirt.

From the minute I first met him, Jose Wejebe was not what I expected. At the time, I was used to dealing with television show hosts whose personality was morphed by a mom who kicked their dog in front of them and a dad who wouldn’t let them sit on top of the money pile, so I expected a cross between Napoleon and Veruca Salt. What I met was someone who lived life how they wanted to, a philosophy many cater to but few can pull off.

I’d seen Jose’s show Spanish Fly, and even dug the laid back, Yo-Dude attitude, but I also knew that popularity tends to breed contempt and self-importance, and when you line up fishing show hosts it’s the line of humility that’s always the shortest. After all, television personalities are usually just that, a persona built from good fiction writing and far removed from any husk of real dermis. But Jose surprised me.

I have to admit that when he walked into the meeting to discuss his sponsorship contract the first thing I thought was, “Oh, his mother still dresses him.” It was several years later that I realized that he dressed for comfort and left style to the fashionistas, that he lived his life how he wanted to live and that he left judgment to others while he went fishing.

Over time, I realized that Jose was the real deal, one of the best anglers I’ve ever fished with. I filmed a television show with him where we chased jumbo jack crevalle on fly. Jacks are a powerful fish, and these averaged 12- to 20-pounds. The average angler can catch five or six before wearing down, exceptional anglers are good for a dozen or so. Jose caught over 20 that day, often unhooking a fish, stepping back onto the deck, casting and hooking another. It was assembly line tendonitis angling, and he enjoyed every minute of it.

After catching enough fish that we were certain we had a show, he jumped in the water with a camera to get the fish’s perspective, swimming among the 1,000 or so daisy-chaining jack crevalles, an act comparable to shark fishing with a human lure. The point being that he wanted more than just the view from above and what the angler sees, he wanted the natural experience in multiples, and damn the bull sharks that dog those schools.

Years later, his production team filmed a show where I was fishing in a tournament with Stu Apte, another legendary Florida Keys guide and a fisherman, and he and the production crew managed to forget their lunches for the long day on the water. At one point I picked up a fly rod and started casting. The commentary started immediately with, “When we get back to the dock, I’m going to start my truck and drive it through that loop.” Later, he offered to edit out the bad casts in exchange for three pieces of fried chicken (one for each crew member).

The thing is, Jose Wejebe was more than a television show host, he was an ambassador for the sport, a personality that took fishing personal, who genuinely wanted to exchange fishing experiences with others and had the time to talk fishing with everyone. Everywhere. For as long as you’d stand there.

I’ve lined up my share of fishing personalities for shows, seminars and expos, and Jose was the anti-prima donna. If a personality was expected to be in the booth from 1-3, most would show at five minutes to 1, and be on the way back to the hotel or in the air by 3:15. Jose would be there when the show opened, and leave when we told him we wanted to go home. And he genuinely enjoyed the interaction with other fishermen.

Every fisherman has a story, and Jose wanted to hear them all. There was never a kid, a fan, a fisherman who he didn’t have time for. He would talk fishing, share tips and techniques and laugh right along with them at their bonehead moves. And then he’d tell you his. Like when he was eating a chicken wing while talking on the phone during a break in filming and put the bones in his pocket and threw the phone overboard.

So what is the measure of a man? Is it his success in the business world? The amount of money he makes or the toys he acquires? Is it worldliness, knowledge, education, recognition, fame? I say the measure of a man is based on the lives he touches, the people he influences and guides and the people he befriends along the way. I’ll take that even further to say that in the end there are two basic desires we all search for in life: we want someone to love and someone to love us. Based on the public response to Jose’s passing, he had them both…in spades. We should all be so fortunate.

FAKAHATCHEE STRAND PRESERVE

By Joe Guthrie

It was well after dark when we arrived at our destination, a small private inholding in Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park. A carload of friends from Tampa arrived and met us near the end of the route. We traveled on bikes, following a little road north from Jane’s Scenic Trail about 2.5 miles before it opened into a tiny clearing.

I could see the silhouettes of wild-growing royal palms towering in the dark. Cypress knees stood in dark water off the road on both sides. On the edge of a two acre lake was a tin shack with a porch and swing, a classic swamp hunting cabin. On the door was a plaque that read “Welcome to the Fakahatchee Hilton.”

We bathed on the porch under frigid water drawn from a well through an old green hand pump then put on warm clean clothes as someone lit a campfire. Dinner was steaks and collard greens.

Our camphouse was simple, weather-beaten, swampy. It smelled of peat. It had a big porch on the front with a swing, and a balky screen door into a single room. The corrugated tin siding was streaked with rust.

There were big wild animals moving around somewhere near. The Florida black bear is common here. The night was still as we settled in to sleep. Somewhere in the night I woke and heard a pair of barred owls calling back and forth from a tree above the camphouse clearing, slipping into their bizarre laughter, their silhouettes bobbing rhythmically toward each other in the branches. In the night it felt like a far corner of the world.

On Sunday, we had another day of no traveling, but we had a busy dance card. First, our friends Clyde and Niki Butcher arrived at our cabin. Elam and the Butchers have been very close for many years and have spent years of their lives together photographing Florida’s swamps. We spent the late morning and early afternoon wading through the swamp north of the cabin, on a mission to find the Guzmania, a rare genus of bromeliad. We stepped into the cool swamp where the walking was easy, though we moved slowly to avoid tripping on tree roots beneath the surface.

Eventually we gathered in a small area where the cypress knees and pop ash were adorned with light green bromeliads. They clung to every surface. Carlton and Clyde worked through several sequences of photographs.

In the afternoon our party expanded to include Renee Rau, Mike Owen, and Donna Glann Smyth from Florida State Parks, and Tom Maish from Friends of Fakahatchee. They tracked us into the swamp where we all stood knee deep in the stained water. I was intent to talk to Mike Owen, a man whose personality is matched by an expansive natural history knowledge. Mike has worked at Fakahatchee since 1992, leading interpretive swamp walks, monitoring air plants and orchids as well as other species, and guiding management activity like prescribed fire and the removal of invasive species. He knows the Fakahatchee Strand like no one else.

It was in his first 6 months on the job that the infamous John Laroche was caught taking rare orchids from the swamp. At the time, Mike Owen was new to the swamp and its hidden gems. He told me that Laroche was so cavalier about his exploits that as he stood surrounded by garbage bags full of the poached flowers that day and gave an impromptu field lesson, teaching the young biologist several species of orchid. The Laroche story was eventually made into a book by Susan Orleans called “The Orchid Thief,” and subsequently, the movie “Adaptation.”

After lunch we trekked into an area called the Western Slough. It was more open than the thick, jungle-like growth we found among the Guzmania, and the water snaked through tall cypress and entered a stand of pond apple. Mike told us that Fakahatchee’s unique airplants are supported by slow moving water flowing through a trench in the limestone substrate of south Florida. Beneath the protective canopy of bald cypress, the water remains cooler than the ambient temperature in the warm months and warmer during the cold months. The effect of this shielding from extreme cold is that the forest is able to support species that do not occur elsewhere on the North American continent.

He’d taken us here to show us the orchids. Ghost orchid, dingy orchid (Mike is known to spit dramatically at the ground when repeating this unfortunate name), clamshell orchid…they are all there, including one dingy orchid that John Laroche had taken, and Mike had returned, lashing it to a tree two feet above the water. It’s the only one of 84 that survived. Many of the plants we saw have been alive in the swamp since before Mike Owen began working here.

The Fakahatchee Strand is a geologic feature, extending roughly 20 miles north and south, and roughly 5 miles wide. The northern extent is on Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, which we’d be visiting later in the week. It was easy to think about the landscape connection as we stood knee deep in the swamp with our naturalist friends. From where we stood the water fed south into the Ten Thousand Islands, one of the most important commercial fisheries in the United States near Everglades City. Around our legs the dark water slipped past us with an almost imperceptible slowness.

For more information on the Fakahatchee and Florida’s State Parks @ http://www.floridastateparks.org/fakahatcheestrand/

From native plants and wildlife, to ranch animals and townsfolk, everyone wants their piece of basic sustenance that comes from flowing Yellowstone love, yet the river remains an unaltered tribute to the wilderness and wildness of the Continental Divide. The river has survived Indian Wars, the discovery of gold and all efforts of mankind to taint its glacial flow with the term “progress.”

An ExxonMobil oil spill in 2011couldn’t paint it, whirling disease couldn’t strain it and diversion dams can’t restrain the voluminous flow as it meanders and rages through Wyoming, Montana and North Dakota. Like the spirit of the natives who have lived along the river and depended on its waters for nourishment, the Yellowstone remains etched in the facial features of the landscape and forever flowing…north.