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BY BYRON STOUT
GANNETT NEWS SERVICE
CHARLOTTE HARBOR
- Don't let the tan legs and blond tresses fool
you.
Capt. Kristi
Dean is not a girly girl.
"I love
catching bait," Dean said as she shook sardines
and dead seagrass from her cast net on a recent
charter in Charlotte Harbor.
In fact, Dean
has been transforming amorphous wads of monofilament
into fish-corraling pancakes for 20 years, ever
since she learned to throw a net in the family pool
at age 5.
Catching bait,
of course, is only a preliminary event.
"I like
to redfish, because when you're fishing in the bushes
and you hook up on a big redfish, you need skills
to turn that fish out of the bushes. Turning a redfish
out of the bushes is fun, and I respect the hard
fight they put on," said Dean, an Orlando native.
Dean also has
been earning some respect for herself. Fishing with
Pine Island partner Laura Bryant, Dean won last
summer's Everglades Invitational fishing tournament.
But Dean doesn't
just like fishing. The Cape Coral angler wants to
live it.
She got her
U.S. Coast Guard captain's license two and one-half
years ago by attending Sea School with her father,
Capt. David Dean.
These days they
share their Family Traditions charter boat, a stylish
24-foot center console fisherman with a 300-horsepower
outboard they pilot anywhere from the back bays
of Charlotte Harbor to reefs 10 miles offshore.
"My favorite
part," Dean said, "would be watching a
customer catch fish. I've had people actually hooting
and hollering on the boat, they're having so much
fun."
So far, Dean
hasn't been able to quit her weekday job in a real
estate office, but she's working hard toward becoming
a full-time guide.
She gives seminars
on her specialty, catching bait, at fishing club
meetings and tackle stores. And she also pays her
dues in the fishing community.
St. James City
Capt. John Bunch said Dean was one of the first
guides to support the volunteer community service
he started, Operation Open Arms.
Dean took Iraq
war veteran Tony Vincent and his wife, Brandy, out
for a day of sheepshead fishing in February, before
he was reassigned to duty in Afghanistan.
"She took
the day off without pay," Bunch said. "I'm
quite proud of her for doing that."
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