Crocodile Bay Fishing Report, April 2016 by Todd Staley – Fishing Director

Dr. Pratt Takes 150th Sailfish on Fly

Dr. Bruce Pratt fell one short of his goal last year fishing here of catching 150 sailfish on a flyrod.
Everyone was disappointed for him. A man whose life passion is fly fishing and has taken almost all creatures that swim on fly tackle has become part of the Crocodile Bay Family. After a bout with health issues recently, he finally felt good enough to make the trek to Costa Rica to see if he could close the deal. He rounded up a group of close friends and arrived with a big smile and a “get er done,” attitude. I think too many people, us at Crocodile included were worried whether he could take a day in the tropical heat for over 8 hours on a boat, or the strain of hooking into a ballerina of the cobalt sea on light equipment would be too much for the good doctor. The fish gods smiled down on us all when on his first day on the water a sail charged in on the teaser, Dr. Pratt lobbed the perfect cast and the fish inhaled the offering like there was no tomorrow. As fly guys who fish sails know, that was the easy part. The more difficult part is the hook-set and Dr. Pratt hadn’t lost his touch. A few seconds later, a hundred yards of line had burned off the reel.

Like riding a bicycle one doesn’t forget and the fish was played to the side of the boat for release. Ole “get er done, got er done.” First day out of the box, the pressure was off, the rest are just gravy. Congratulations Bruce.

Another Big Water Adventure
Mark Davis just finished filming another episode of his popular TV show Big Water Advertures here at Crocodile Bay Resort, Costa Rica. He has captured just about everything available here on film, marlin, sails, tuna, dorado, roosters, big cubera snapper and more. Last year he played on the bottom for a little while and bagged a huge 50 lb Gulf grouper.This year he decided he wanted to dedicate his whole show to bottom fishing here as it has not been done a lot because most people are interested in other prizes like billfish and roosters when they visit. We started in 600 foot of water and produced one nice grouper and only taps from little fish. Then we moved our way inside trying 400 feet and then 200 feet and could not buy a bite. Turned out it was slow all around inshore that day.

So we gave it a shot the next day stopping at some of the known productive areas without burning up space on the video camera. Moving to an area in 220 feet we began with the same results. Then Mark decided to drop a prototype jig down and wham. I continued to fish bait to see if the fish had finally turned on and while I didn’t get a bite on either live or cut bait, Mark got a hit from nice snapper on almost every drop. Tune into the show when it airs to see tons of action.

Watch Mark Davis Talk About His Fishing Experience at Crocodile Bay Resort, Costa Rica

I also want to thank the Boomer Esiason and Redbone@Large folks who hold a tournament here to help “Catch the Cure” to cystic fibrosis every year. A picture is worth 1000 words……enjoy!

 

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