The Gulf of Mexico is home to emerald green waters filled with beautiful marine life. It’s a playground for anglers and sometimes its salty depths yield strange catches. One example?

A ginger tabby kitten!

Like any other day, Steve Crews, owner and captain of the Still Flyin Charters, motored his boat and passengers from its Orange Beach, AL, moorings and through the Perdido Pass for some fishing fun. But just clear of the Pass, in the open gulf waters, they made an unusual catch.

An orange kitten floundered in the water, stranded, meowing for help and quickly tiring.

Still Flyin Charters/Facebook

Still Flyin posted about the kitten on Facebook, sharing, “He was struggling to stay up.”

Fishermen to the Rescue

The crew and passengers leapt into action and caught the little cat-fish with a net. Once aboard, the scared kitten was happy to have paws on the boat’s solid deck. The cat-loving anglers dried the mermeow and offered much in the way of reassurances and snuggles. Hopefully, the tired tabby was offered a tasty treat of fish for his troubles!

The captain’s theories about how the kitten wound up in the Gulf of Mexico? “Poor little guy was sucked out by the tide.”

One can’t help but wonder if the kitten was trying to enjoy a fresh seafood supper when the tide turned for the poor boy. Whatever the reason the tabby kitten wound up in the Gulf of Mexico, he was Still Flyin’s “catch of the day.”

Still Flyin Charters/Facebook

Crew and passengers alike agreed, “Can’t say you see that everyday.”

Fresh Caught and Forever Home

By the time the kitten made it back to dry land, one of Still Flyin’s deckhands had already found a home for him. There, he could safely keep his paws dry forever!