A Reddit user said one of the most unnerving fishing days he ever had happened while wade fishing in Charlotte Harbor in southwest Florida. According to his comment in the thread, he had walked in about a mile and a half from the trail and spent the day in muddy water that stayed anywhere from waist deep to chest deep. He was out there by himself long enough that turning around was never going to be a quick, easy walk back to the truck.
He wrote that after a while he realized he was not alone in the water. A bull shark had started working around him in a way that did not feel random. He used the word “corralled” to describe it. The shark did not just pass through once and disappear. It stayed with him, hanging around and keeping close enough that he felt like it was tracking his movement rather than simply cruising the area. He said it only came in really close twice, but that was more than enough.
The second close pass was the one that turned the whole thing from creepy to physical. He said the shark came in close enough that he had to hit it on the back with his fishing rod. That means it was not just some dark shape off in the murk 20 yards away. It had closed the distance enough that he could actually reach it with the rod and make contact. In chest-deep muddy water, with a shark close enough to touch, there is not much room left for pretending you are just imagining things.
He said he did not think the shark was necessarily trying to attack him. In his own explanation, he guessed the fish was used to people fishing there and had learned that anglers often mean an easy meal, especially if fish are being released. Another commenter in the thread backed that up and said bull sharks absolutely associate fishermen with free food and will gladly hang around. But even with that explanation, the fisherman made it clear the situation still felt bad. He stayed out there in muddy water with a bull shark circling him, knowing it was close enough to come in twice and on the second pass close enough to get whacked with the rod.
He added that the whole encounter changed the way he handled fish the rest of the day. He said he was thankful he had 60-pound braid because it let him horse fish in quickly when the shark got too close for comfort. He also said it made the “nipple-high waters” feel a lot more gnarly and had him keeping his head on a swivel every time he was bringing a fish back in. That is a pretty clear picture of how the rest of the day went: not one dramatic bite or one explosive attack, but a long stretch of wade fishing with a bull shark hanging around close enough that every fish he hooked suddenly became part of the problem.
So the story he told was this: he hiked about a mile and a half into Charlotte Harbor and spent the day wade fishing in muddy water up to his waist and chest. At some point a bull shark started hanging with him, circling and “corralling” him instead of just passing through. It came in close twice, and the second time got near enough that he had to smack it across the back with his rod. He stayed out there, but the rest of the day turned into a careful game of landing fish fast and watching the water around him the whole time.
What do you think — if a bull shark stayed with you that long in chest-deep muddy water and came close enough to hit with your rod, would you finish the day, or start wading out immediately?
Original Reddit post: Got any “I almost died” fishing stories?
