Words & Photos by Pat Ford (originally published in the March 2017 issue of Tail)
There are a number of great flats destinations in the Bahamas, but very few with the advantages of Bimini. Bimini is only 50 miles east of Miami, the flight time from Fort Lauderdale is only 25 minutes, and there is even an inexpensive ferry service aimed primarily at clientele of the new casinos but perfect for flats anglers. No matter how you get to Bimini, it is well worth the trip. Historically it has attracted the likes of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Ernest Hemingway, and Jimmy Buffett, in addition to Dr. Samuel Gruber and the college interns that presently staff the Bimini Sharklab. Bimini consists of two main islands (North and South) along with numerous Cays – all surrounded by miles of amazing flats.
My trips to Bimini always start at the Bimini Big Game Club in Alice Town, North Bimini. The two most prolific guides in Bimini are Fred “Eagle Eyes” Rolle and Tommy Sewell. Both like to pick up customers at the Bimini Big Game Club dock. A typical day starts at 8 am, and at times you’ll be fishing ten minutes later. Bonefish are pretty much everywhere and permit can be found inside the harbor area as well as on the huge flat that extends from South Bimini north to the Cays that are sometimes referred to as East Bimini. In my opinion, there is no better place on the planet to catch a permit on fly than Bimini.
Few know that three IGFA world record bonefish were caught in Bimini’s waters. If you’re fishing with Fred or Tommy, you will get shots at double digit bonefish almost every day. The average fish is around five pounds, which is exceptional for the Bahamas and pretty much everywhere else. I caught my first Bimini bonefish in 1960 with legendary Captain Ansil Saunders. Ansil is still guiding a bit these days even though he’s well into his eighties, and he is the first to proclaim that Bimini’s fishing is still as good as it was back then.
My fascination with Bimini was revived six years ago when I was there fishing with Vaughn Cochran. The Bimini Big Game Club had just reopened after a major remodel and we were anxious to see if the rumors about their flats fishing were true. We fished several days and caught more than our share of bones, and our last day started out with a big surprise. We had just left the dock and run across the harbor onto the flats heading toward the cluster of islands where we had been seeing schools of bonefish when “Eagle Eyes” Fred stopped the skiff. My first reaction was that we’d run out of gas, but when I turned to see what was happening, Fred just said “big permit”. He’d spotted a huge permit following a ray and as he grabbed the push pole, I beat Vaughn to a fly rod and jumped to the bow.
I’ve seen some big permit in fishing Key West for 45 years, but what I saw that day was the biggest permit of my life. The fish was well over 40 pounds and was following a stingray along the edge of the flat. I had a small crab fly designed for bonefish on an eight weight rod, but made a cast anyway. The permit spotted the fly, turned on it and I’m pretty sure he ate it, but I never felt a thing. He ignored my next several presentations so I switched to a real permit crab tied by Chris Dean in Miami. I put the crab right on top of the ray and Mr. Monster Permit sucked it in like it was the tastiest thing he’d seen all week. That was the good part.
We hadn’t expected to be fishing that suddenly, so we hadn’t cleared the cockpit of the mooring lines, anchor, bags and a half dozen other things that could snag a fly line. I knew I was in trouble, and as the permit took off I jumped and jiggled the line around every obstacle until the last few feet had cleared the deck. In a moment of glee, I let go of the fly line just a moment too soon. The last foot of fly line did a half hitch around the first guide and popped the 10 lb tippet. I think they heard my screams all the way back in Miami. The rest of the day produced plenty of bonefish, but I just couldn’t get over losing that huge permit.
Several weeks later I was back in Bimini, standing on the bow of Fred’s skiff. Fred and I had a plan. Fred knew that on a high tide, lots of rays moved onto the huge flat due west of the harbor. It was not unusual for permit to follow the rays, but few of his anglers ever targeted permit on fly. There are no bait shops in Bimini, so most everything is caught on fly rods or jigs. I was intent on seeing whether that first failed incident was a fluke, so this day I was ready with a 10 weight rod, a 20 lb fluorocarbon leader, a clear deck and my favorite crab fly.
We ran through a channel that weaves its way through the East Bimini cays, passing a memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and entering the massive white sand flat from the east. Fred didn’t get the nickname “Eagle Eyes” for no reason. He is a master at spotting fish. He would spot a ray a quarter of a mile away and apologize because he couldn’t tell me whether there was a permit following it until it was closer to 200 yards away. Apology accepted. It didn’t take us long to find a ray with a permit on it. Conditions were perfect…clear skies and 15 knots of wind. I always like wind when I’m after permit. It makes them far less spooky, and a downwind shot helps with my casting. If the wind is calm, even the ray-following permit will spook when the fly is still in the air.
The first fish we spotted wasn’t big, but it was a permit and was happily darting in and out around the stingray, chasing down whatever tidbits fled up from beneath the ray. I put my crab fly right on the back of the ray when the permit was probably a dozen feet behind it. The permit charged up and inhaled the fly at a right angle to me. I set the hook and it was game on! That fish was under 15 pounds, but it was a permit on a fly, and that was all that mattered. I caught two more permit on fly that day and lost a fourth, all before lunch. It was one of the best days of my fly fishing career and a first for Fred. I think he was more excited than I was.
Since that time, I’ve tried to get back to Bimini as often as I can, which is not nearly often enough, and I’ve learned a lot. I use an eight or nine-weight rod for the bonefish and a ten for permit. I don’t like losing fish so I stick with the 20 lb leader for permit and 10 lb fluorocarbon for the bonefish. I’ve fished with both Fred and Tommy and both are excellent, but Fred and I have really got this permit thing wired. If you’re after permit, you’ll be fishing water too deep for bonefish, so it’s all or nothing…you can move on to bonefish when the tide is almost low. When a permit is following a ray, it is feeding. When it’s just cruising along, it is more likely to act like a classic permit and ignore everything you throw at it. Stick with the rays. Fred can spot them and some days, every one of them will have a permit. One time we found a ray with six permit on it…
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Great article. Thanks for sharing.