Startled by a School of Enormous Flying Fish
I was reading in my room (The Power of One – great book!) just before
sunset when I heard a huge commotion coming from the sea below. It
sounded like a downpour but with raindrops the size of coconuts.
alive. Hundreds of massive fish were jumping in and out of the water,
traveling in an enormous school and creating quite the racket.
Pelicans circled overhead hunting for dinner. I just stood on the
dock, watching the performance, realizing I was witnessing something
quite special. In over a month, this is the first time I’ve seen
anything like this. The workers over at the caretaker house heard the commotion and came
rushing outside too. Ricardo grabbed some fishing line, jumped in his
boat, and drove right into the center of the chaos. A few minutes
later he was fighting to bring in a 15 pounder. Men passing by in
canoes recognized what was going on and stopped, throwing nets into
the water and pulling out their fishing lines. I’m pretty sure
everyone lucky enough to have come upon the traveling fish brigade had
a hefty pile of fresh catch by sunset. Later on, after delivering some fish to his mother, Ricardo brought
his remaining catch over to the dock. I watched as took one fish and
cut the throat, pulling out the gills and stomach. He cut open the
stomach to see what the fish had been eating. It was pretty gory but
also really neat. We discovered a jellyfish in the stomach! Less for
me to dodge the next time I go swimming.
Posted by Katelyn Baldwin
