‘Peace and quiet turned into a slaughter’: The 2020 mullet run is on!

Since the pandemic arrived, I have pretty much hidden out on and in the water. With so many days out there, one thing stands out. No two days were alike. Most of you have heard the expression “if you caught fish every time you go they would call it catching instead of fishing.” It is indeed true.

I cannot count the number of times I have gone out and had days when I simply couldn’t miss. Almost before the bait hit the water, it was fish on. Then, because the bite was phenomenal, I head out the next day. The conditions are exactly the same. The wind is the same, the temperature is the same; the only exception is the tide is an hour later. I go back to the same areas, and I cannot buy a bite, much less catch a fish.

But whether the fish are biting or not, I am in hog heaven. The ocean has a different personality almost every day — week after week, month after month and year after year.

With that said, there are periods during the year when spectacular acts of nature occur. Exactly when is Mother Nature’s closely guarded secret. One of my favorites is the annual mullet run, which occurs at some point from September through November.

Our estuaries are breeding areas for mullet by the millions. These areas are part of nature’s grand plan because they are also where so many fish get their start. Mullet acts as their primary food source. Trout, redfish, flounder, cobia and many offshore species find our estuaries a safe haven from larger predators while having an all you-can-eat buffet of mullet and shrimp.

With so much food, their growth rate is quick. Come late fall, when water temperatures drop to a point that can prove fatal to some species, they require the muster to migrate to warmer climes.

As many of you know, I can go off on tangents, but this might help you appreciate something that happened to me on Tuesday. With my boat hooked up to my fish mobile, I headed to the Alljoy Boat Ramp just as the sun peeked over the horizon. My plan was to go to Daufuskie Island, pick up a friend and catch enough fish for that night’s dinner.

The May River was like a sheet of glass. It was so calm that the marsh and its reflection on the water were one and the same. I had run for about a half-mile when, in front of me, the glassy water suddenly stopped, and a straight line of choppy water stretched nearly the width of the river. As I neared the area, I slowed to a crawl and realized that I was seeing the first wave of the 2020 mullet run. They are massed to make a long migration to warmer waters, probably in Florida, before winter hits here.

If seeing so many fish packed so tightly isn’t jaw-dropping enough, the attention they draw from predators is beyond belief. To avoid scaring the mullet, I turned off my engine and drifted into the mass, and that is when the peace and quiet turned into a slaughter, the likes I have only witnessed one other time.

Huge jacks, blacktip sharks, trout and dozens of other species tore through the mullet, scattering fish high into the air. I even saw a handful of tarpon blasting up, along with huge blacktip sharks. The mayhem lasted maybe five minutes, but what a five minutes it was!

No two days are the same, but you can bet I’ll be out every day, hoping for a repeat performance.

Oh, did I mention I caught a manta ray in my net while shrimping on Wednesday?