Great Day for a Boat Ride! And a Sea Life Encounter..adventure!

Folks from Rhode Island, Michigan, and Florida were with us. The air was a bit cool (about 71 degrees with a slight breeze out of the SW), water temp is about 65 degrees. The air was clear with a beautiful deep Blue Sky. Passing by Connie Mack Island we observed quite a few water birds: Cormorants, a Yellow Crown Night Heron, an Anhinga, Brown Pelicans, and took a look at the nesting Osprey at the end of our Channel (we'll get a picture next time). Not long after turning on to the Gulf ICW (Intra Coastal Waterway), we encountered several of our wild Atlantic Bottlenose Dolphin. Always a joy to see. We stopped at Picnic Island to fish with Dip Nets in the shallows.

A nice variety of creatures: Shrimp, crabs, Pipe fish, several variety of small fish and several small sea horses and interestingly a scorpion fish (haven't seen them for years). Our big net drag in the deeper grass bed turned up some fascinating creatures as well: A Southern Puffer, a small Striped Burr Fish (puffer)and a small fish we we could not identify and several other fish and crabs.

Capt. Bob