Tarpon Rodeo to be historic event this year

The first Grand Isle Non-Fishing Tarpon Rodeo will be held Saturday. You read it right.

Can you imagine a tarpon rodeo at our nearby barrier island being non-fishing and lasting only one day? That was decided recently when the BP oil spill put sport fishing along the coast off-limits. Since then, the ban has been lifted, but the rodeo will  not award trophies and ribbons for the biggest fish in the many usual categories.

There will be music, dancing and plenty of  socializing at the rodeo to be held for some seven hours on the beach in front of the Grand Isle Community Center. The rodeo association decided to make the oldest fishing rodeo in the U.S. non-fishing this year to avoid interfering with the oil-leak stoppage and clean-up efforts under way in the Gulf.

This will be a historic event to say the least. A Grand Isle Tarpon Rodeo that is non-fishing. But expect a blast.

Fishing as good as ever along coast

Fishing along the coast has been terrific since the oil spill started. Louisiana Sportsman staffer Jack Fisher caught his limit of speckled trout in less than three hours out of Cocodrie Sunday night, and they averaged about 16 inches each.

One of the reasons for the plentiful fish available, we speculated, was the fact that all of the shrimp boats were docked and not out trawling, which usually cuts the number of fish available to sport fishermen. And also, most of the coast continues to be off-limits to commercial fishermen, cutting the competition.

Manning family passes it on

The Manning family has provided Southeast Louisiana with a unique opportunity not available any other place in the world. It is the Manning Family Passing Camp in which youngsters can show up and get classes on how to pass footballs from three of the best adult passers in the world.

Archie, the father, Peyton, and Eli Manning put the kids through training that could turn some of them into high school, college and professional stars. What an opportunity to the youth of this area.

The Mannings have done a lot for the New Orleans and Southeast Louisiana area. We certainly owe them our thanks for their contributions.

And we expect that sometime in the future we will see some of those youngsters on television, leading their teams to victory.