This is my post for #freewriters Thursday prompt catch that thing hosted by @daily.prompt
My husband tried trout fishing once again today. He had bait traps near the Big Flat but only had 3 pigfish from the 11 traps he put there, luckily he put 8 traps west of the Sebastian Islands, he caught 65 pigfish out of them.
Neither of us had tried fishing by Melvas Island this year, in years past we have caught a lot of trout there. He never got a bite so he went to Pauls Island, this is where he caught his catch for the day, he had 4 trout that weighed 13 pounds.
He said he also had a big snook but it got off before he could catch that thing. It did not matter because it was too big to keep and they are out of season, meaning we can not keep them. Snook do not open until September.
I grew up hearing stories from my Dad about down south, Biscayne Bay, how it used to have beautiful grass flats and there were trout there, too. But after the State dug canals and stopped most of the freshwater from entering the river the same thing happened that has now happened here. The seagrass died and there was no more trout to be caught.
Last year we could still catch enough to keep us going each day but this year we can not do it, they never came back to Biscayne Bay so I do not see them coming back here.
The State knew what was going to happen when they shut the freshwater off from the river, they knew how to SPIN it to keep the blame away from them doing it, blame it on pollution. I do know of one biologist who tried to tell them what was going to happen when they detoured the freshwater, he lost his job. I pray for the day that the truth is told but I do not think that I will be alive to see it, but then again, they did it to Biscayne Bay in the 30s or 40s and the truth has never come out. Biscayne Bay is not the only place that trout are gone from, everywhere they stopped the freshwater the seagrass died, and no more trout.
Brackish water is what the type of seagrass we had needed to survive, it is also what trout need for their eggs to survive. We no longer have brackish water, sometimes the salinity in the river gets higher than the salinity in the ocean. Our river is not a river, it is or was a brackish water lagoon, you can not have brackish water without freshwater.
What is the one thing all of these new sub-divisions need? The answer is FRESHWATER. I blame the Governor, maybe one day they will catch that thing with all of his lies. It is scary to think of him becoming President, if there is a developer that will fill his pockets, he will try to turn our State Parks into new Towns. This is making me irate so I will stop here.
photo was taken by the woman who works at the fish house