Eleven Angling: Spotting Bonefish with Brian O'Keefe

We have all the right gear; top of the line rods, reels, lines and flies. We have cool looking and functional clothing, hats and polarized fishing glasses. We are concentrating in the bow of a flats skiff. Then you hear, “Bonefish 40 feet, eleven o’clock, moving left to right.” Followed by, “You see it Mon?” Then, followed by, “You are looking right at it…” Ouch, that hurts. Why is it so hard for traveling anglers to spot bonefish and so easy for bonefish guides? Well, obviously they get a lot more practice, and most anglers will admit that their first day of a trip was kind of pathetic for spotting fish, but the last couple days were much better. In a perfect world, having all better days is what we want. Here are Brian O’Keefe’s top ten tips to help you spot more bonefish.

1. Establish your casting abilities. Before you start poling or wading a flat, show your guide a typical cast and a longer cast. If the guide knows your limits, they will make you aware of fish in your zone, or slightly before.
2. Establish distance with your guide. What you think is 50 feet may not be the same as your guide’s estimate. I like to point at a small mangrove shoot, or dark spot or something obvious and ask, “How far is that?” In Spanish speaking countries, this is very important.
3. I also like to have the guide throw in a landmark: “Bonefish, eleven o’clock, 40 feet, just right of those three dark spots, moving left to right.”
4. On nice sunny days, I look for the shadow of the bonefish. Often the shadow is more noticeable than the shiny, mirror-like bonefish.
5. Then, there are several telltale signs of bonefish on the surface of the water. Nervous water is the ripples or v-wakes from feeding or cruising bonefish. On a still day, nervous water can be seen from 200 yards away. But we have all been fooled by a ray, jacks, mullet, etc.
6. Keep your eyes moving/scanning. Look hard ‘in close’ when a cloud covers the sun, then move your vision out farther, when the light is better, left and right.
7. In glare and during overcast days, you may spot a bonefish at 45 feet, which is great. However, there might be ten more in the glare closer to you and they will spook if you cast at the distant fish. Check around the fish you see, for others.
8. If the guide spots a bonefish, feel free to point your rod in the general area and have him dial you in. Then, don’t take your eyes off of it.
9. On your presentation cast, try to keep your eyes on the fish at all times. If you are right-handed, make the cast, shoot some line, and guide your fly line to your stripping finger with your left hand. If you shoot line and don’t maintain contact with your line, you have to drop your vision to find the line, and that can result in losing the whereabouts of the fish.
10. Tailing bonefish are the ultimate. Actively feeding bonefish tip down to feed and in the process, they flash their tail, splash and make a ruckus. In the morning and evening, bonefish tails are glimmering, sparkling, golden diamonds in the distance, that is as good as it gets.