The next morning was fairly standard fair for Floridian pier fishing.  There were plenty of scrawled filefish around for us to toy with.  They loved the chum bag!

Elijah found some grey triggerfish and I joined him for my new life list entry.

Grey triggerfish

Redtail parrotfish and dusky damsel also made it topside.

Pelicans abounded and I was almost taken out by another angler’s stray cast of a sinker that was terrifyingly massive.

Bartek and I again had way too much fun arranging incidentally snagged bits of the reef into metaphorical art.

We weren’t sure what it meant either.

Around lunch time we switched spots and were presented by a terrific mix of parrotfish.  Unfortunately, other annoying reef fish, such as the slippery dicks, were always first to our hooks.

I spotted a lionfish, but Ken bested me at presenting a bait to it.  Ken’s attention to detail is quite remarkable!

With not much else to catch, Ken had a blast constructing a Christmas tree with his sabiki rig by filling it with a smorgasbord of reef fish.

There’s always the consolation filefish…

We returned to the pier for the evening bite before Ken dropped Bartek and I off at our hotel.  Ken was spending some time with family so Elijah, Bartek, and I made plans to fish Christmas day.