There's no place like home

Last week, I was fly fishing in Montana. The fishing was fantastic. On the trip, I released my personal best brown, rainbow and cut-throat trout. Montana is beautiful, and I found myself thinking “why don’t I live here?”

On the first fishing trip upon returning home, the answer became quite clear. There was a cool northeasterly breeze that held the promise of near perfect weather for the next several months. As I ran the skiff up the Wando, I noticed the Spartina was fading from the verdant green of summer to the yellow and brown of fall. Montana has mountains, but we have the marsh. Pulling back on the throttle, I approached a likely fishing spot on the trolling motor. The falling tide was draining over a submerged oyster bar and a strong current seam was collecting a bunch of finger mullet and shrimp. I cast a Z-Man 4-inch Jerk ShadZ on a 1/8-ounce finesse jig into the current seam. Bam! Instant hook up with a good size trout. For the next hour, it was non-stop action. On pretty much every cast, I caught a trout, ladyfish or redfish.

When the tide slowed down, the current seam weakened, and the hot bite stopped. A few yards down the bank, there was a small creek that was still draining water. So, I positioned the skiff where I could cast into the creek mouth. After a few casts, a flounder decided to eat my lure. The next cast produced a large redfish. It was as if the fish were saying “we missed you.”

On the ride back to the boat landing, I came to the conclusion that Montana is nice, but this is home.

Contact Captain Greg Peralta at captgregp@gmail.com or call (843) 224-0099.