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Schutt came and congratulated me upon landing a waahoo. The catching of this specimen interested me to inquire when I could, and find out for myself, more about this rare fish. Natives round Key West sometimes take it in nets and with the grains, and they call it "springer." It is well known in the West Indies, where it bears the name "queenfish."
Either the genial judge was obsessed or else this waahoo was a great fish. I was inclined to believe both, and then I forgot all about the matter. This year at Long Key I was trolling for sailfish out in the Gulf Stream, a mile or so southeast of Tennessee Buoy. It was a fine day for fishing, there being a slight breeze and a ripple on the water.
For that matter, neither had I. Later I heard the particulars of a hard and spectacular fight Judge Shields had had with a strange fish which the Smithsonian declared to be a waahoo. The name waahoo appears to be more familiarly associated with a shrub called burning-bush, also a Pacific coast berry, and again a small tree of the South called winged elm.
When this name is mentioned to a fisherman he is apt to think only fun is intended. To be sure, I thought so. In February, 1915, I met Judge Shields at Long Key, and, remembering his capture of this strange fish some years previous, I questioned him. He was singularly enthusiastic about the waahoo, and what he said excited my curiosity.
Shannon testified that he had once observed a school of waahoo leaping in the Gulf Stream all very large fish. And once, on a clear, still day, I drifted over a bunch of big, sharp-nosed, game-looking fish that I am sure belonged to this species. The waahoo seldom, almost never, is hooked by a fisherman. This fact makes me curious. All fish have to eat, and at least two waahoo have been caught.
From the saddle of the great ridge above pealed down R.C.'s: "Waahoo!" I saw him silhouetted dark against the sky line. He waved and I answered. Then he disappeared. Nielsen bellowed from the craggy cape above and behind us. From down the canyon Edd sent up his piercing: "Ki Yi!" Then Takahashi appeared opposite to us, like a goat on a promontory.
I tried hard to keep the line taut and was not always successful. Like the waahoo, he performed tricks new to me. One was an awkward diving leap that somehow jerked the line in a way to alarm me. When he quit his tumbling and rushing I led him close to the boat. This has always been to me one of the rewards of fishing.
In my case this is one of the secrets of the fascination of the game. Always there will be greater fish in the ocean than I have ever caught. Five or six years ago I heard the name "waahoo" mentioned at Long Key. The boatmen were using it in a way to make one see that they did not believe there was such a fish as a waahoo. The old conch fishermen had never heard the name.
After studying this waahoo there were boatmen and fishermen at Long Key who believed they had seen schools of them. Mr. Schutt had observed schools of them on the reef, low down near the coral fish that would run from forty to one hundred pounds. It made me thrill just to think of hooking a waahoo weighing anywhere near a hundred pounds. Mr.
I got him up eventually, and was surprised to see a great, broad, red-colored fish, which turned out to be a mutton-fish, much prized for food. I had now gotten six varieties of fish in the Gulf Stream and we were wondering what next. I was hoping it would be a dolphin or a waahoo.
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