Tuesday, December 9, 2014

An Average Glades Adventure


Always an advocate of everyday adventures, I was excited when Glen Pla, the Host of Average Angler Adventures, asked me about fishing in the Everglades. It’s “no secret” that I love the Everglades and I wouldn’t miss a chance to share it with anyone, so plans were made to meet up and film an episode of Glen’s popular fishing show.

We met up at Port of the Islands Adventure Resort and didn’t have to go far for our first stop. Adjacent to the Resort is a small landlocked pond that houses some respectable fish. Through the early morning fog we could see tarpon feeding just out of casting range. We launched our kayaks and began our hunt. It was a cool morning and the action was a little slow. I didn’t have any luck with topwater lures so I switched to live bait. Glen was using a soft plastic mullet. I managed a gar on a shiner while Glen jumped two tarpon on artificial. Lesson learned, I switched to a Vudu mullet and landed a nice largemouth on my first cast.

Morning action
 
 
Just before leaving the pond, Glen was working the edge on the way back to the launch when his lure was slammed by a sizable fish. Our excitement grew when the bucket sized head of a giant snook broke the surface. In such a small landlocked body of water, we expect a few small snook, but this was the king of the pond! After Glen skillfully landed the beast the fish posed for a few photos before swimming off to fight another day.
Glen's morning monster
 
The fog began to dissipate and we began the long drive into the Everglades for exotic fish. I have wrote about and filmed my favorite spot for exotics in the Everglades for many years, always just stopping short of saying exactly where it is. I always thought people could figure it out, it’s not that big of a secret. While talking to Glen on camera, I finally let the cat out of the bag as to the exact location. We drove to the Collier-Dade Training Airport just off of US 41. Just south of the airport there are large borrow pits created while digging fill dirt. These lakes are very deep and are full of largemouth and peacock bass as well as other exotics.
 
Looking for exotics
 
We walked back to the lakes carrying only the essentials. We opted for live shiners because the peacock bass seem to be a little harder to entice with artificial bait when the temperatures are lower. We immediately began catching fish. They were smaller, average sized peacocks and largemouth. Glen caught and landed his first oscar and had a shot at a few more. We moved on to hit a few other hot spots where we caught varying sized peacocks and largemouth bass. By the late afternoon, the bite shut down and we made our way out of the back area. We caught many fish but the cooler weather kept the largest of the peacocks away.
 
1st oscar
 
Back at the resort we finished up with an ending interview sequence. Glen and Producer Grant were quick and professional and we were done in short order. We had a great time, caught lots of fish and hopefully got enough video for a compelling episode of Average Angler Adventures, exclusively seen on Bright House Sports Network. The latest episode can be seen every Sunday at 7:00 p.m.
 
Filming

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