Seining Again

     Sunday my friend Charles kept a promise. He had told me all summer that we should go seining in August for tropical fish. The plan was to go seining when the water was the warmest to see what we could find. While this was going to be fun and exciting to me, I knew he was doing me a favor. He had spent the last six weeks seining everyday with kids at summer camp. His title at camp was Beach Naturalist so he was in the water everyday. I can't imagine he was nearly as excited to go as I was. It goes without saying that I am beyond grateful he kept his promise.

   Charles said I could invite a few people to go with us. The catch was there is only room for three cars. Being that we were seining on a weekend at a private beach we did have to keep the cars to that limit. So if you are reading this and you wished you could have went, I am very sorry I couldn't invite everyone I knew. I'm sure many birders would have been bored out of their mind, but I know many of you would have had as much fun playing in the water as I did. 

 

Windowpane Flounder

    Okay, now that I got my personal guilt out of the way...Laurie and I met Charles at the cabins at 8 am. To my surprise he had some tanks that had fish in them from seining with the camp kids. He had planned on letting them go the day before but decided to keep them overnight. Shortly after I got there Allison and the Bradleys pulled up followed by Jessica. We took photos of Charles's captive fish. I think the star of the show was a flounder I had never even heard of called a Windowpane Flounder.

   There were other fish in the tank including Sheepshead Minnow, Northern Pufferfish, Winter Flounder, and a couple of small Jacks. Charles had an observation tank where we could safely photograph fish without hurting them. The tank is in the shape of a slender V. The fish get stuck in the tank making photos easy. The fish can breathe because they are in water. Still, we all tried to take quick photos before getting the fish back into the bigger tanks. After we were done taking our photos we brought the fish down to the water to be released.

   Once at the water we started our own seine. Charles took the deep end and I the shallow end. We walked about twenty yards and Charles swung in like a hinge. We caught Silversides and Kingfish. I had never seen a Northern Kingfish and only heard of them when Charles told me they were catching a lot. We kept the largest Kingfish and Silverside for photos. Then we let the rest go. 

   The next sweep Marge took her turn. Same thing, Charles took the deep end and swung around. This went on five more times each of us getting a turn. Every time we caught the same fish  Silversides and Northern Kingfish. We did catch a couple hermit crabs and jellyfish but no other species of fish. Making it all that much more of a bonus Charles had kept his other finds.

 

Winter Flounder

   We brought the fish back up to the cabin and took photos of them. Allison tried to figure out the species of Hermit Crab. Luckily, Marge brought a small pad and wrote down the names of the fish we were taking photos of. We all took our turns taking photos of fish and when we were done we released our Silverside and Kingfish to the protection of Neptune.

   I'm quite sure Charles was disappointed by the lack of species we got. He said there was a good chance we could catch baby Barracuda and many other tropical fish. It just wasn't panning out that way this year for whatever reason. Still, for those of us that never seine, it was a fantastic morning. I thought the field trip would take us two hours but we didn't leave the beach until noon. I think all of the participants had a great time doing something we never get to do. I personally got many lifers. The Windowpane Flounder and Kingfish were lifers. I may have caught Winter Flounder as a child but I wouldn't have known the difference from them or Fluke so they it to was a lifer. Once I get positive IDs from Marge's post the similar Jack's will be added to my list.

 

Northern Pufferfish

  If there is one thing I have learned this summer it's this: I know a lot about the gamefish I catch but when it comes to little fish there is so much to learn. In both fresh and saltwater there are so many species I not only know nothing about but never even heard of. The other thing is there will be a seine on either my Christmas list or one bought before then!

Thank you again Charles!!

Many more photos below

Striped Sea Robin

a jack, maybe Pompano

Butterfish

Allison seining

Jessica doing the same

Our fearless leader, Charles

Northern Kingfish