God, Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change...

...the courage to change the things I can... and the wisdom to find fish, figure out how to make them eat, and put them in the boat for my clients. No matter how tough the conditions.

I sit here tonight, checking on the weather on the internet. The world wide web says things are going to be tough this week. This week is turning out to be one of the windiest weeks of the year. I get two senses of emotion when the weather isn't perfect for fishing. I feel a little bit of anxiety because I want things to be perfect for my clients. On the other hand, I get a little excited by the challenge of putting my clients on fish despite conditions that are less than ideal.

There are some things I just can't control in my life (work wise). One being the weather, and two being the appetite of fish. I've got two choices; I can either drop my boat in the water, already defeated by the conditions that I'm dealt, or I can charge into the day excited by the challenge that lies ahead. I choose the latter. If fishing was easy, then nobody would ever hire a guide. I do this because I love the pictures of smiling faces on the clients that I help catch fish. No matter how hard it is to find the fish, no matter how hard it is to make the fish eat, no matter how tough the conditions of the day.

God, continue to grant me the desire you instilled in me. Bless those that step upon my boat. And help us enjoy the pursuit of the game fish you created for us to chase after.

Amen.

(side note... I don't know Bill W. and I hope I haven't offended anyone who does. In fact I just learned that he isn't a local fishing guide this morning. lol But, I thought you guys might find it interesting/funny how I came up with this topic.... The idea for this blog entry came from a movie I watched the other night. The movie was called Mr. Brooks. The main character was a high profile business owner who had a split personality. His split personality made him want to kill people for fun. Now I know that sounds horrible and how could I relate that to fishing? Well, he kept saying the "Serenity" prayer in an attempt to stem of his desire to kill. I couldn't help just thinking about the prayer he kept saying though. I kept thinking about how frustrated I had been of late with the weather and how I had no control over it. I had heard that prayer somewhere before and the movie just reminded me of it. I think it’s an awesome prayer and to hear it again reminded me that I shouldn't get frustrated about things I can't control.)

The Phone

There are three major logistical tools needed to be a successful fishing guide (this doesn't cover the basics like catching fish, being personable, and having a great boat... ect.). I believe the top three tools are the internet, a great boat, and a cell phone. The first two are useless if you don't manage the last one properly. The number one key to managing the cell phone properly is to ANSWER IT. I try my very best to answer every call. I never leave home without it and I sleep with it next to me on the night stand. The second key to managing the cell phone properly is to return phone calls as soon as possible, should that rare occasion come up that you miss a call.

Well, things kind of slowed down last month around here but for the past two weeks the phone has been ringing off the hook. Here's where a prerequisite to proper cell phone management comes in... You must have a good calendar. It makes scheduling a trip so much easier for me as well as the client. It also makes keeping my schedule strait much easier. It keeps the important things like, who, when, where, and special notes regarding the trip straight.

So, I've been giving my cell phone and calendar a work out lately. That's good news for you guys. That means I'll be on the water more and more. And, the more I'm on the water, the more I'm in tune with the fish. That equals bigger and better catches for you.

A Very Red Day

I had a great game plan set out for my Clearwater fishing charter with John Sr., John Jr., and Gabe today. But, just like many of my plans as of late this one had to be changed midstream. First off we had a lot of rain yesterday and I was afraid that bait would be hard to come by. I even talked with another well known guide at the ramp and he too was lamenting the hunt for bait prior to his charter today. Luckily, I pulled out of the boat ramp and hadn't made it 1/2mile down the ICW before I saw a ton of pelicans diving. I know that could only mean one thing, bait! I guess the rain hadn't messed up the bait situation after all. So I pulled over and in less than 10 minutes I had blacked out the well.

Well, I went back to the dock to find that my clients were already there waiting for me, early. Which is MUCH better than them being late. They let me take a few minutes to clean the boat off a little and then off we went to pursue the plan that would not be. On the agenda was to hit up three barrier islands on the west side of the intercoastal waterway, working our way from North to South back towards the boat ramp. The first spot has been my most productive in the area for the past month or so but when we got there, things just didn't look right to me. The mullet weren't as thick as they had been when we were doing well on redfish there. We did catch a few trout and a ton of small grouper but that was it. This is when we switched gears. Instead of hitting the other two barrier islands in succession, I decided to go hit a spot near the mainland. Good decision (pat myself on back, lol).

After about 5 minutes on the trolling motor we started seeing the unmistakable wakes of redfish.

I put the Power Pole down and began throwing some greenbacks out as chummers. It wasn't long before the chummers were getting crushed, and then shortly after, the rods were getting bent. The bite lasted just a little over an hour and we managed 15-20 redfish in that time. One thing we all noticed was that the redfish seemed to really key in on the small pinfish over the greenbacks. Though we got bites on both baits the pinfish were much more successful.

After the bite died down we decided to catch the tail end of the original plan and hit the last of the three barrier islands. It was slow at this last spot but we did hook two big snook that got away and landed two more redfish to finish of the trip.

Maintenance Day

After 12 days out of town fishing th Wal-Mart FLW Redfish Tour Championship, I needed to attend to some of the minor repairs needed on the boat. So, I headed to Land O' Lakes Marine (the only place I would buy a boat from) to file some warranty claims. Ranger makes the best boats on the planet, but even they aren't impervious to the regular problems that plague boats that spend most of their lives in saltwater. Saltwater and the sun are the two most damaging agents to a boat here in Florida. And mine gets plenty of exposure to both. So, today was the day to get some of the minor repairs underway so that when you hire me to take you fishing that you can rest assured that you have a sea worthy vessel under your feet.

I have three problems right now. The most important of which is that the breaks on the trailer aren't working. I need them to help me stop. Capt. James Pelham (left) and Jason King (top right), are the head saltwater mechanics at Land O' Lakes Marine and they are experts at trailer brake repair. So that problem is sure to be fixed for sure in short order.

My next problem is that my trailer winch is cracking at the base. this could be bad but it will be replaced with a stronger base.

Then the least important. yet still important to me, is that all of the wheels are corroding. Hopefully Ranger will replace them.

So today, I didn't have any charters but I did have some work to do getting ready to take you fishing. I hope the next time we go out that you'll appreciate that even the days I'm not on the water I am preparing my equipment to be in top shape so that you and I both have an exceptional experience catching fish instead of worrying about whether the equipment will perform as it should.

Something I Hate Doing

I did something yesterday that I hate doing. But I had to tell someone that fishing may not be too great on the following day and give them an opportunity to back out of asking me to take them on a fishing charter. Ouch... that hurts the wallet.

I had someone call me yesterday afternoon wanting to go on a fishing charter today. I'm sure I didn't sound too enthusiastic on the phone because all I could think about was that I hadn't been on the water here in in almost two weeks because of being out of town for FLW Redfish Championship. I really don't like to pump someone up about a fishing trip and accept their money unless I know I'm on fish. So yesterday I asked the guy if I could call him back. I told him that I would like to check the tides and call a few other capt. buddies and see how things looked. The tides didn't look too hot and the captains I called had been fishing all weekend with horrible luck.

So I called the guy back and told him that I wanted to be honest with him and let him know that my expectations for the trip (today) wouldn't be very high. But, if he wanted to go fishing, I wanted to take him. I just wanted him to be aware that there's a possibility that the fishing might be less than stellar. I left the decision on whether or not to go, knowing what I had just told him, up to him. He passed.

I know this might not sound like a good business decision but hear me out. If I had told him that the fishing would be good (knowing that it probably wouldn't be), took him on a charter, and didn't catch a lot of fish... What is he going to say about me to his friends when he gets back home? That's right. He'll bad mouth me. I would rather him go home and tell his friends that he called a guide that was honest about the situation. Or even go home and not mention anything about me. Anything is better than having someone go home and give you a bad rep. Reputation is all we have as guides.

Hey, I could have made $450-$525 today regardless of the fishing. But is that what I really want? Well, yes and no. I need the money but I need my good reputation more. I believe in the Biblical principle that says, "It's better to have a good name than great riches." I better have a good name because I sure don't have great riches... yet. lol

Murphy's Law

I don't really believe in Murphy's Law but we didn't have a whole lot go right for us this past week at the Wal-Mart FLW Redfish Tour Championship in Orange Beach AL. We did have one very important thing go right for us however; we got there and back safely. In fact, that's the most important thing. But it is also just about the only thing that went right for us.

When my tournament partner and I first started practicing for this tournament about a week ago, it was very windy. The wind is not a tournament anglers friend. It creates choppy water that muddy the water up as well as make long runs dangerous or even impossible. So we decided to pre-fish close to the start of the tournament the first few days and just deal with the milky water. We caught a few fish a day but nothing that would provide us with a tournament win. The last two days before the tournament we decided to trailer the boat to places that would be 60-90 miles from the start of the tournament. We found a few more fish there but the wind was predicted to get worse, not better. So the game plan the night before the tournament was that we would stick close by and hope that our fish got bigger for the tournament.

We woke up on tournament morning to find out that we had absolute quagmire conditions. Heavy downpours, lighting, and high winds. As if not catching a lot of fish in practice wasn't enough, now we had to deal with mother nature as well. At the start of the tournament we took off running to our first spot in the southern end of Moblile Bay. It was a torturous run in a ridiculous amount of rain. I wore shooting glasses that were hi-vis yellow just so the raindrops wouldn't hurt my eyes while running.

When we got to our first spot we found that we were fortunate that the wind was in a direction that left our stretch of shoreline calm. We quickly boated two smallish fish and decided on moving onto a spot that we had heard held larger fish. While idling off the flat, we notice that another team (by chance they were real good friends of ours) was waiving at us to come over and talk to them. When we got within ear shot they told us that they were broke down. I checked the radar on my GPS and it was obvious that another huge rain squall was coming and that we all needed to get out of there. So we tied them off to the back of the boat and towed them back to the tournament headquarters. The storm squall chased us there the whole way and we arrived just in time to take cover. Wind, rain, lightning all came down around us for about an hour. By this time we had only been able to fish for a grand total of an hour and it was almost noon.

When the weather lifted to a point where we felt somewhat safe fishing we left the dock in search of bigger fish in places we had never fished before. We scooted under a little bridge on the East side of Mobile bay and began pitching Gulp Shrimp under shrimp boat docks. We caught a few flounder and a trout and were sure that this was a good sign that there is at least life in this little bay. About an hour later I hooked a nice redfish that quickly entangled me in a crab trap buoy. We rushed over to the trap and scooped up the fish, buoy and all. After swapping a smaller fish out of the live well for this 4lb fish we were almost out of time. So we headed back with our 7lbs 6oz stringer. It was good enough to put us in 37th place for day one. Not what we had hoped for but good enough for us considering what we'd been through that day.

The next morning we were awakened by the loud, house shaking, roar of thunder. We didn't believe that the tournament would start on time. So we called the director and asked about the status of the start. He just said, "come on, we working with a green light. We're starting on time." In disbelief, we threw on our fowl weather gear, dropped the boat in water at the flooded boat ramp, and headed to the start of the tournament while ducking lighting bolts during the whole 6 mile trip.

The 2nd day started much the same way as the first day of the tournament. We had to run the boat in blinding rain to our first spot. But the wind had switched directions and our once calm flat was now a washing machine of muddy water. We knew this wouldn't work so after about 20 minutes of fishing we decided to just "wing it". We headed to the closest protected water we could find and just began fishing. Sadly, the only bite of the day came from one of the biggest jack crevelles I had ever caught. Oh well, it brought a smile to our rain soaked faces and we had to take a picture.

Time ran out and we had to make that depressing run back to the weigh-in with no fish in tow. It's not the only time I've had to come to the weigh-in of a tournament empty handed but it doesn't happen often, and when it does, is stinks.

Sometimes things just don't work out like you plan. Sometimes it hurts you and sometimes it helps you. Some of the teams in the top 5 for the tournament had their plans change because of the weather as well and they just happened to be fortunate that their change of plans helped them. It's frustrating but hey, I can't let it get me down. I have charters to do and I'm excited to get back home and fish with my clients. "Murphy" may have gotten me last week but the fish at home had better watch out. I've got a score to settle. I need to see some fishing rods doubled over this week and the redfish and snook at home better be ready.

Upcoming Tournament

10-10-2007

I've been spending the last couple of afternoons trying to get ready for the FLW Redfish Championship in Orange Beach, AL. Getting ready to leave for an out of town fishing tournament can be fun and miserable at the same time. I get to shop for new lures, tune up my fishing tackle, and reorganize my tackle bags. That kind of stuff is fun to me. But, I also get to go change the oil in my truck, pack clothes, and get a haircut. Those things rank right next to getting my teeth pulled on my "things that aggravate me to death" list. Oh well, fishing tournaments do motivate me to do things that I normally would keep putting off. So that's good.

This particular tournament is really exciting for me. It's the richest redfish tournament in the country and not just anyone can sign up and fish it. I believe there is over $250,000 up for grabs and only teams that finished the regular season in the top 50 spots in their division are invited. My tournament partner, Capt. Frank Jackson, and I qualified for it by finishing the year in 17th place overall in the Eastern division of the FLW Refish Series. Not too shabby, if I must say so myself. There were 175 teams vying for those top 50 spots that would put them in the championship and we finished in the top 10% of the field against teams that included such well known teams as the Watts brothers, C.A. Richardson and Ray Van Horn, Greg and Bill Devault, Rick Murphy and Scott Guthrie, and Mark Sepe and Andrew Bostick. These guys are some of the best redfishermen in the country and we have our work cut out for us.

There's been a lot of logistical preparation going on for the last few days and you've already heard me mention some of it. But to be successful (and I hope we will be) we've been doing some research about the area to get prepared for the actually fishing we'll be doing when we get there. Looking at Google maps, reading online fishing reports, and discussing options with other teams that we're working with are all things that we can do to help us form a game plan. That type of stuff has been going on for months. Once we get there for practice, we'll put our preliminary game plan to the test for a couple of days. We'll check the areas that we predetermined to fish based on maps and reports we've read and we'll try baits that we think will work. After those couple of days we'll sit down and re-evaluate. We may find that what we've been doing is working and already have an established pattern. In that case during the rest of practice we will look for other areas that match the profile of the pattern we have. Or if things don't look good the first couple of days we may have to scrap the original approach and rewrite the game plan. It's a process of elimination. It's just as important to us to know what doesn't work as it is to know what does work.

Right now I'm going to go to work on a whole separate process of elimination. I am going to try to figure what I need to get done before I leave and what I can put off until I get back. Figuring out what will make my wife the least upset with me will help ensure my fishing success (and marital bliss) in the future.

Money Talks... should I listen?

I've recently had a few opportunities to save a good deal of money through a few different fishing reel companies. Naturally, my first reaction to finding out about these opportunities is to be excited and inclined jump all over them. However, none of the companies I have a chance at getting deals from are from reel companies that I currently use. The more I thought about it the more I realized that if I did go after these opportunities, I would be making a decision based on money and not on the merits of the equipment itself. Not that those companies make poor reels, it's just that if I really wanted to provide those reels for my customers (or to use them myself), they would already be on my rods on my boats.

If you look around on my website, www.captainclay.com , you won't see any links to "Sponsors". There's a couple of reasons for this. Long before I started guiding, I used to run fishing tournaments. Part of running a good tournament was having good prizes to supplement the cash awards. That meant I spent a lot of time on the phone calling reel companies, motor companies, and lure companies asking for sponsorships. The phone conversations always seemed to go the same way. I would introduce myself and tell the voice on the other end of the line what I did and asked if they could help. Almost on cue with almost every conversation the tone of the voice on the other end of the line would drop. Even those that helped never really seemed excited to send product for me to give away. The reason is that the fishing industry hits these guys up all day long, every day, for free product. They kind of get tired of hearing people ask for hand outs. I quickly got tired of asking for them myself. So ever since I started guiding I never really felt much of a desire to get back into making those phone calls. Another reason I've never really pursued is that there are a very select few products that I trust and like using. If I'm going to be sponsored by someone I want it to be by those companies, not just any Tom, Dick or Harry rod, reel, or lure company just because they'll give me a nice little discount.

When someone hires me for a day of fishing, I always strive to give them my best in every aspect of what I do and provide. If it means paying full retail for tackle and boats then that's what I'm going to do. You pay a full price for a charter and you deserve a full service fishing experience, complete with the best boats, rods, reels, and lures I can afford to provide you.

Now, just because I don't list any official sponsors for my charter business doesn't mean that some companies haven't recognized my loyalty to them and how I sing their praises every opportunity I get. Because of their appreciation for me as a customer, a few companies have offered me some discounts without asking me for sponsorship recognition in return. They do this because they know that I shop at their store because I value the service they provide or I buy their boats because of the craftsmanship and personal attention they give to each and every customer, not because of a discount.

Now after rambling on about the "whys", I feel obliged to mention the "whos"... I get a few discounts from a FEW of these companies, but nothing that the every day weekend warrior couldn't swing if they asked for it. These are the companies I use because I trust them, believe in them, and have had great experiences with.

I use G.Loomis, Shimano, and Kistler rods. Simply because they build superior products and their customer service has never let me down.

I almost exclusively use Daiwa reels because I am convinced that there isn't any better reel on the market today. Of all of all of the Diawa reels I have ever owned (and there are a lot) only two have ever needed service and all are still with me working flawlessly today. I cannot say the same for other reels made by other companies. I've never had to give up on a Daiwa but I bet I've laid over 50 other reels, by other brands, to rest in the last 10 years.

I use Yamaha motors on both of my boats. Simply because I've never had one fail. In fairness, I've only ever owned one of it's competitors... but it blew a power head.

I use both Berkley Gulps as well as Exude lures. I believe they both have their place when one works better than the other but each are always in my tackle box.

I'm probably a Ranger boat owner for life. When I first bought a

Ranger it was second hand boat. I had a few problems with spider cracking in the floor and Ranger discovered I had a busted bulkhead. After they inspected it, their Florida rep just looked at me and said, "This isn't right, and we're gonna make it right." They did. They called me 3 weeks later and asked me what color I would like on my new hull. I had never given them a dime at that point but they made a long time customer of me with how they treated me like king.

Well, there you have it. These companies don't endorse me, I endorse them. What do I get out of it? Well, I get the satisfaction of knowing that when I take you fishing that I am giving you my best. Not just the best of what I get discounts on. A true endorsement is when you speak highly of someone because you believe in what you're saying, not because you're getting a discount for saying it. Should one of these companies approach me one day for a sponsorship, you can bet I won't turn it down. But, you'll be able to come back to this article and say, "See, he doesn't use company 'xyz' because of a discount, he's been using them all along."