Orlando in March

My cousin finally emailed me the pics from my weeklong stay at her house.  Orlando is pretty cool.  Practically every house is lakefront.  My cousin house is across the lake from Johnny Damon's summer estate.  JD's place has two boat houses, servants' quarters and the main residence is a spanish style villa.  Looks ridiculously lavish from the outside.

On to the fishing.  I fished off of my cousin's boathouse.  I threw poppers, crankbaits, buzzbaits, and and spinnerbaits - all with only limited success.  On the last day there, I wanted some faster action so I finally caved in and busted out an ultralight rig hooked with a bit of nightcrawler.  Target:  bull florida bluegill (they call 'em "bream" in the south). 

I was hooking these bluegill left and right and then got the notion that I should try using one for live bait.  I finally picked up a really tiny 3" 'gill that was a perfect bait size.  Leaving the 'gill hooked on the line and in the water, I laid the ultralight rig down on the floor of the boat house, and reached for the bass rod to rig up a sliding live bait rig.  As I'm working the last knot on my live bait rig, I see the ultra light take a jump.  I reached to grab it, look down in the water and see that a pike had my little 'gill in its gnarly mouth! 

Surprised, I try to set the hook on the pike.  We play tug of war for a moment and the pike lets go.  My bait is now pretty thrashed but I figure it might still serve its purpose for catfish, gar, or whatever.  So...I lay the ultralight back down on the floor, the 'gill dangling/floating/swimming in the water below.  I rigged up the bass rod, and put what's left of my blugill on.  I dropped down, thinking that the pike might want another dance.  Whaddaya know? 

This time, I let the little bastard chew that thing good.  I could see him swim off with the bait and head under the boathouse.  After what seem like an eternity, I set the hook and the fight is on.  Of course cuz I was practicallly right on top of him, and I had heavy gear, I horsed him out from under the boat house lickity split. 

I'd never seen a pike before.  It's quite a good looking fish don't you think?

I hate to tell you this, but you still haven't seen a pike.   Well sort of... that's actually a nice chain pickerel which is a close cousin of the Northern Pike.  I guess it's kind of like catching a steelhead and calling it a salmon.  Anyway, I've caught Nothern Pike, but I've never actually caught a pickeral, so I'm a bit jealous I love catching new types of fish.

Brian

I only called it a pike b/c my cousin called it a pike...  But I could see that the name of the fish would be called a chain pickerel-it's pretty descriptive of the coloration.  Aggressive bastards aren't they?  No wonder Pike are a problem in lake davis!