I seem to be in the stingray mode lately, I noticed that I’ve painted several stingray paintings and they’re all different! The last painting that I did like this was “He’s on the Ray” and it sold almost immediately to a dedicated permit fisherman. As a permit fisherman myself, this scenario of a permit following a stingray is a common sight. A permit will follow a ray waiting for the ray to kick up crabs, shrimp or small fish and they rush over to eat whatever tries to escape from the powerful vacuum mouth of the ray. This is a fairly typical relationship as the permit is in exactly the right position to catch anything that tries to get away.
If you’re casting a fly to a fish in this position you would want to position the fly in front of the ray so as to look like the crab fly was trying to get away. Permit are very aware of their surroundings and very smart, even the best placed fly doesn’t always work. In that case, try to hit them in the head and maybe you’ll get lucky and they’ll just react and eat the damn thing. If that doesn’t work, and most times it doesn’t, you can keep casting until the ray gets pissed and swims away and takes the permit with him. Then you can say you had a great shot but he just wouldn’t eat….like it wasn’t your fault!
“Following the Restaurant” is depicted in the deep, clear cool waters of the Mexican Caribbean near Cozumel.