| “My childhood friends and I really didn’t know Titusville
was the redfish capital of the world as we grew up there. We took
it for granted that we could catch 40” redfish anytime we wanted.
It was a hell of a way to cut your teeth on flats fishing, especially
on fly. I’ve always wondered when my Lagoon lifestyle actually started. The answer didn’t truly hit me until I had my own son, Eli. As soon as I could, I would take Eli for walks along the Lagoon just as my father did with me. I’m sure just like I must have felt; Eli realized his father’s pure admiration and respect of the Lagoon waters. It seems it is almost instinctive for a child to want to throw something in the water. By the time Eli was two he was proficient at throwing little rocks and shells into the brackish depths. It was automatic for Eli to do so and I know I did the same at his age. Almost thirty years later I’m still throwing things in the water looking to fool game fish. The fun of it is, for the most part what I throw in comes back and sometimes in the mouth of a fish. So, I guess it started for me very young, my father must have known if he took me to the Lagoon’s edge the Lagoon itself would eventually come to me.” Jeremy got his first taste of the professional fishing industry in the mid 90’s as a boat rigger for the revolutionary boat manufacturer Hell’s Bay Boat Works. After college Jeremy began a teaching career which eventually led to a job as a Park Ranger with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. Work as a Park Ranger put him in the outdoors but it just wasn’t enough, the call of the lagoon was too great. It wasn’t long before Jeremy put his full attention into guiding on the Indian River estuary, the waters he calls home. In between charters Jeremy spends most days following the movements of the fish and the rhythm of the Lagoon. Jeremy is continually researching and developing new fishing patterns and techniques. Jeremy and his wife are also actively involved with the Redbone charitable fishing tournament series. The Redbone tournaments raise money to help find a cure for Cystic Fibrosis; a terminal disease their son Eli was diagnosed with at birth. “The search is what anyone would
undertake if he were not sunk in the everydayness of his own life….
To become aware of the possibility of the search is to be onto something.
Not to be onto something is to be in despair.” |
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