Hi Mel,

I wanted to share this photo and story with you and see if maybe his great catch can qualify him to receive your " Picture of the week " honor. His name is Austin Rutherford . He and his Family spend a lot of time on Little Gasparilla Island. They own a condo out there . They are from Polk county and Austin has spent a good part of his young life in the outdoors fishing and exploring the island.

His Father contacted Capt. Van Hubbard and me, setting up a tarpon charter so his 12 year old son Austin could catch a Tarpon for the first time .

We fished the beach near Gasparilla Pass and finally found a nice pod of tarpon that had no other boats on them. They were acting happier than most of the tarpon we have been working all last week. At that time we had to fight all day to get a bite or two -- but not this morning. Captain Van literally had to troll the live big threadfins in front of the schools and we got hooked up almost immediately on a thread fin.

Austin was having the time of his life fighting that tarpon and so were we watching him !

He did a super job working his fish back to the boat during his 1/2 hour battle. He listened to Van and was a trooper.

Van estimated the tarpon at a little over 100 pounds but I am sure by the time they got back home today that tarpon now weighs 180 or so :-)

I got them some fantastic photos and worked hard to do so so they were happy campers.

I am getting 3 of my Nephews from Atlanta Saturday and my only Niece too all from Atlanta . They come every summer to stay with us 10 days or so begging the entire time they are here to just move here and stay with me :-) They all love to fish so we will be staying busy busy I'm sure with that crew. But I would not trade it for the world. We usually only take 2 of them at a time but this year it worked out all 4 can come at one time ..... I better get all the rest I can between now and this Sat. I doubt Van and I will get much computer time in the evenings wither on our computers they take those over as well as the TV's ..... But during the day they want to only fish and be on the boat so that's fine with us.

Take Care,


Merry Beth Ryan and Capt. Van Hubbard