Day three here at St. Brandon’s Atoll I had the pleasure of fishing with Dave Moeller. Dave has been going on my Yellow Dog trips for years now. He’s been on several of my Seychelles adventures and was on my Gabon trip last year. He’s accomplished many saltwater fly fishing goals from landing big GTs to permit to triggerfish. However, Dave has never caught a 10lb bonefish and it’s something he really wants to achieve. So off we went with another FlyCastaway guide whom I had not met till this trip, Matthew Carmichael.
Matthew is a South African of 22 years with a ton of fishing experience. Matt’s not only a veteran St. Brandon’s guide but he also has a season of guiding in Alaska. What’s really neat is that we found out through our day chatting together that when he was in his teens, he reached out to me for advice on how to get into the fly fishing guiding scene. Tonight he read me his message from back in 2023. I simply suggested fish hard, work hard and always help other anglers. Well, here he is guiding at one of the most elite destinations in the world.
Like our first two days, the bonefishing was phenomenal in the morning. Tides were a bit low early but Matt had a few lesser known flats with water where we picked up a few bonefish. I got some casts to a permit but no luck.
By 11 am the tides were primo for a return to Julies. I’ve been on Julies three mornings in a row now but being its miles long, I won’t get sick of it. Dave and I both caught a half dozen nice bonefish. Dave didn’t get his 10lber but he’ll keep trying over the next ten days.
By mid afternoon Dave and I were ready for some adventure. We poked around drifting for GTs. I gave Dave the bow and relaxed and enjoyed my after bonefishing Phoenix. Dave stuck a really nice bonefish from a big school that put up such a fight Matt and I weren’t 100% sure that’s what he had. But it was a bone. And after we released the sleek fish, I requested trying to find some Picasso triggerfish.
Matt was quick to admit, no one ever asked him to guide for a Picasso. He in fact clarified a bit further and said, he’s never caught one. In 2018 I caught my first here and have since gained an liking to them. I showed Matt the kind of coral type water they lived in and he said, “Ah. Ok. I know just the place. We can wade from an island and cast to corals”, and off we went.
It turns out, Dave has never caught a Picasso either and was super excited to try. I asked him to lead the way and believe it or not, Dave caught this one on his FIRST cast! An absolute riot. Dave would go on to catch two of these spectacularly colored triggers. I reckon Matt is a natural when it comes to guiding for Picassos!
For our last hour Matt was keen to take us back to another bonefish flat. He said it was one of his favorites for skinny water bonefish. The kind of fishing where its so shallow often the bonefish isn’t tailing but rather his dorsal fin sticks out as he prowls along for crabs and shrimps. Matt didn’t have to twist our arms. It ended up being a challenge but I managed to land this beauty.
We packed it in around 4:30 and had a nice ride back to camp. Today actually started with a threat of rain. But as you can see from our end of the day pic, it turned into a beautiful day.
There was some big news when we got back to the lodge. First of all, Bob landed his first ever Indo-Pacific permit. And it’s a nice one and he caught it on his first cast of the day!
The other most mention worthy catch was Heath landed his first ever GT. These are just a couple of many great fish. There were heaps of bonefish and two fish just under 10lbs!
This trip is off to a magnificent start. I’m so happy. All my hosted trips require a ton of planning but this one took more work than any due to the incredibly difficult logistics involved. Three years of work to be exact. Hopefully we can keep rolling along with numerous more fish of a lifetime for everyone!