Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Big Year for the Lizardfish King

Several years ago, I read a book entitled The Big Year, by Mark Obmascik, which was later made into a mediocre-looking movie that I didn't see. The book was a true story about three birders obsessively pursuing the big year -- birding parlance for checking more species off your list than any other birder in the course of one calendar year. Even for a non-birder like myself, it made for interesting reading and briefly (very briefly) tempted me to start writing down the birds I saw.

Fast-forward to 2014, and The Drake is organizing a big year contest for fly fishing that involves catching as many species of fish as you can, on fly, between April 26, 2014, and April 25, 2015. I was a little disappointed when I read that only IGFA-recognized fish will count, but then I looked up Florida IGFA records, just to see what might be locally available that I hadn't already thought of, and found that even the lowly inshore lizardfish would count toward my total. This is a good thing for me, for (to paraphrase Jim Morrison) I am the lizardfish king; I can do anything.

Finally, catches like this will count.

2 comments:

  1. First time to your blog, found you on OBN. Looking forward to reading more. I didn't know about this Drake contest, but it seems like someone in the southeast would have the best chance to win that. We have a lot more fish diversity in this region than places like Colorado.

    By the way, I think you might want give that "mediocre-looking" movie a chance... I actually thought it was pretty decent (despite some of the birding inaccuracies), although I didn't read the book. I admit being a fan of both Jack Black and Owen Wilson... so if either one of them bothers you, I could see where you might not enjoy it. Even with those two guys and Steve Martin as the stars, there really isn't any slapstick silliness. It ends up being a lot more serious and real than I would have ever guessed from the previews.

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  2. I agree about the diversity down here. Just having easy access to the salt is a big advantage. I actually like all of those actors. I guess the trailer didn't do the movie justice. I'll have to check it out. Thanks for taking the time to read.

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