Honeycomb Grouper

Honeycomb Grouper on Cosmoledo Island

Honeycomb Grouper: Epinephelus merra, Family Serranidae.

They are one of the most common and smaller groupers in the Indo-Pacific region. Its conservation status is of Least Concern.

Fun little guy caught on a crab. I saw some slight movement and made quick cast to what I thought was a Napolean Wrasse moving through and this little Honey-Tailed Grouper that went after the crab faster and grabbed it. The fish I targeted moved on past the crab and Honey-Tail. Frustrating for me but fun to watch.

Next trip, hopefully I will his catch a much larger brother of his or the intended target. The Napoleon Wrasse is still on my bucket list.

He was a small guy, but he didn’t want to come in, but my 10-weight made short work of it. Coral patches all around. Just a beautiful fish to catch on a perfect calm day.

Sometimes – it’s always good to cast to any movement you see. You won’t know what it is until you get your fly in the water and in the right place. A lot of great catches will be getting your line out in the water in front of some movement that you see. Don’t wait to caste unless your guide tells you not to. Especially in an area where you are fishing with lots of different habitats and species around.

You can see by the water, there was almost no wind, and it was not cloudy nor rainy at all. Perfect conditions.

For a description of the fish, and a good resource see:

https://www.snorkeling-report.com/species/epinephelus-merra/

They are a difficult species to see because of how well they blend into different surroundings. Here are two good examples showing how hard they can be to see and how their camouflage blends in.

It was a great day on the water (LIKE MOST even if you aren’t catching), but this day we had landed multiples species, so it was a particularly fun day.

Cosmo is such a beautiful place. It is a long journey there but worth every second.

At the end of this day, I wanted another short walk before dinner to see what I could find and to also work on part of my cast. The guide told me what he loved about my cast was the distance and the loop which hit the water well before the fly, and maybe 30 feet behind it. What he DIDN’T like was the same!

The reason is, for an aggressive fish like a GT, the sound really gets his attention, and he is already amped up when the fly hits. On the other hand, for a less aggressive fish, that first tap on the water can scare the fish away. You can see the problem at 1:28 of the video.

You Tube video below:

Cosmo should be on every fly fisherman’s bucket list.