While in Oklahoma for the Bassmaster Classic we took advantage of the opportunity to knock another species off the bucket list. It’s a bizarre one from the bucket list but it was there for me, The Spoonbill or Paddlefish.
Spoonbill are filter feeders. They swim around all day with their mouths open filtering plankton for food. Their mouth opens to an enormous size for its body to enable more surface area to trap as much food as possible. Interesting creature without a doubt.
When looking into the possibility of getting on the water to give them a go, it wasn’t long before it became apparent how these fish were “caught”. Oklahoma calls it primitive fishing. Primitive Fishing in OK translates to snagging in Ontario. Ah well, when in Rome you do as the Romans! Large barbless hooks above heavy weights trolled around until a rod suddenly bucks over like crazy and it’s a battle!
Fresh off his Bassmaster Classic appearance Charles was all over this trip and found the guide to get us out for 2 hours before we hit the road on Monday morning. Joining us was our buddy Paul and his girlfriend Gen. We had a blast!
A 2 hour window for each of us to get a fish? OK. Here’s hoping.
Charles was up first because without him none of us would even be in Oklahoma!
When his surfaced we all had a chuckle. Seems like this fella bumped into a concrete wall as a young fish, or something like that!
Gen was up next and hers gave her all she could handle…
No shortage of ‘bills around…
Paul was next up and his we had to back down on. It was a stalemate for awhile!
Running out of time we had 2 passes to go and I was lucky enough to get a shot at a fish in the fleeting moments of the trip.
In 2 hours we all had scratched the Bucket List and started to make the trek home. What a crazy book end on an amazing trip to Oklahoma.
