Tucked in a shaded grove under some palm trees along side of US Route 1 (known locally as the Overseas Highway) in the Florida Keys is a place called Robbie's Marina. This is a tourist spot (some might call it a tourist trap) that offers the visitor the opportunity to feed the Tarpon!
These semi-tame fish eat a lot of food to support their 100+ pounds covering 4-5 feet lengths. Mullet, a small bait fish, is their most favorite food in the whole wide world and they eat them with much vigor - leaping high out of the water to grab a fish dangling from a small child's hand.
The squeals of fear and delight are as entertaining as the cute little smiles that nearly all the little ones have by the time they are done feeding the fishes.
When I'm in the Florida Key, I almost always go there to watch the BIG FISHES being fed.
There is a slight downside to all the fun - sometimes the mullet intended to feed the tarpon gets swiped by some very crafty, and rather fearless, Brown Pelicans. While them stealing the little fishes isn't really that much of a big deal, the mess they make a short while after eating is...
So the small 2-3 person white rental boats with the blue canvas tops need a good washing before you get in to go fishing or swimming for awhile!
7 comments:
ooh I see the Creative moose got out for a walk today... how wonderful!
Man, that makes me miss the sun!
Love the picture of the pelicans, but I was thinking I'd see a picture of a tarpon. Great story!
we're too far inland(center of texas) for them birds..dangit..sun.
that looks like sun...o my gosh..sun..sigh*
i forgot to do the random picture..drat..will do it now..
I love pelicans and now I wanna dig out the photos from when I took us all to Cyprus 3 years ago and met the friendly quayside Pelican and the very old photos of the quayside Pelican that we met when we was on the Greek islands.... ya just gotta love those birds....
x
I think I'll give feeding the fishes a miss.
As a pelican fan, sorry - I'm in heaven. What else can I say?
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