While a productive, safe, and enjoyable day on the water is my main goal for you and your party, I also hope to amaze you not only with the fishing, but also with some serious lagniappe: we see a lot of crazy things on, in, and out of the water that are not directly related to putting fish in the box.

The mysteries of the deep Gulf waters surrounding the lower Mississippi River delta are part of the draw for this rich and intriguing area.

WHALES

Seeing whales in the Gulf of Mexico always seems to surprise people, but they’re there, sure enough. We see very few baleen whales, but we see plenty toothed whales. The biggest are the sperm whales that we see fairly often during mid- and late summer. We usually see them while running between fihsing spots and the sperm whales are typically in loose groups of 3-5 animals, which are made up of females with half-grown pups. Every now and then we’ll see a big male up to about 50′. I don’t know how else to describe them than by saying that they look like a huge purple dill pickle. This is what you usually see of them lying on the surface.

Though much rarer a sight than the sperm whales, big groups of pilot whales sometimes move accross the northen Gulf. These guys are spooky, always staying far away from the boat and looking pretty imposing with their big hooked dorsal fins.

SHARKS AND RAYS

We see manta rays throughout the year. They’re not always up close like this one that swam right up to the back of our boat while we were fishing at the Lump. More often we see these big rays jumping in the distance when we’re crossing the shelf.

The biggest fish in the world, the whale shark, is another uncommon sight on our fishing trips. Most of our whale shark sightings come in the late fall when we might even be lucky enough to catch tunas feeding around them. When we see them in the fall, the water is usually dirty green, which makes taking good pictures difficult. The picture is of a big whale shark we found cruising around by one of the floaters during the summer.

CRAZY FISHES

Crazy deepwater fish like this myctophid or lantern fish are another rare find. We picked this guy up off the surface after a near-by dive boat had washed off their ROV. My guess is that the lantern fish was stuck somewhere on the ROV and washed off during the cleaning. This is the only one I’ve even seen out of Venice.

Look at this scary freak. It’s a type of deep-water snake mackerel or gempylid that got picked off a piece of drifting, abandoned longline gear. It’s certainly the most sea-monsterish fish I’ve ever seen.

Cusk eels, or bearded brotulas, are a species often caught as bycatch when bottom fishing in deep water. Here’s a trophy cusker we found floating on the surface during the day near the Cognac rig. Always keep your eyes open for crazy floating stuff!

You don’t want to see this guy. Commonly referred to as “yuk” and “pooh” eels because of the expletive you yell after reeling them up 100-150 feet (thinking it’s a giant grouper the whole way), these big conger eels are common around some of our best grouper and snapper holes. Since they get up to 6′ long and almost 100#, cutting the line is typically the standard procedure.

This man-o-war fish definitely goes on the list of fish I don’t need to try to catch anymore. You can see them hanging out under the man-o-war jellyfish that float in the blue water and are know for having long tentacle and fierce stinks.The man-o-war fish hang out among the tentacles just like clownfish do with anemones. A word of advice: not all the tentacles are blue! One of the clear ones got me while I was scooping the fish out of the dip net after scooping him up from under the jellyfish. Duh.

Catching fish is our priority, but we also want to make you wonder.

Contact

Call (504) 430-9851 or e-mail Capt. Brett Falterman