Fishing Excursion: Key Biscayne

So, I went fishing in Key Biscayne a couple days ago.

The day started out as usual. 9am wake up. Coffee, breakfast and internet. Then it was off to Key Biscayne, where I hoped to slay the mighty Snapper.

On my ride there, I passed through a wildlife refuge, and wildlife there was! Tons of Ibis and an Alligator in a pond. Then, as I was cruising along the bike path, I thought I was coming upon a large, obtuse, stick...turns out it was an Iguana, just sunning itself on the pathway. It ran for cover, along with the rest of his harem. I say HIS, because all the other Iguanas, maybe five in total, ran into a storm drain pipe, and he stood his ground outside the pipe, protecting, so I assume it was a male. No joke, he was a good two feet long including his tail. I guess there is actually an over population of Iguanas in South Florida from people letting their pet iguanas into the wild once they get too big to be pets anymore.

I love me some Mangrove trees

I finally got to my fishing pier and started casting. Not too much luck, just a ton of seaweed getting caught on my line. The view wasn't bad though. As they say, a bad day of fishing is still better than a good day of working.

Views from my pier

My tools of the trade

So about catching those Snapper...Well, that didn't happen. I did catch two fish though, both being the Scrawled Cowfish. It's definitely a reef-fish, based on its color. It had the hardest body I'd ever seen in a fish. It was like its body was made of hard plastic, because it kind of clacked on the pier when it was flopping around.

I most certainly wasn't going to try to eat such a fish, so I happily let them go. It had the smallest little side fins I'd ever seen. Very much like Nemo's handicapped fin from Finding Nemo, the Disney Original Film. Due to these baby fins, it wasn't much of a game fish, but it was fun catching my first real fish in Florida.

And as always, no better way to end the day than a Key Biscayne sunset