Just saw this post and though I'd bite. Back when I was single and kidless, I used to pursue bonefish a lot, mostly in Mexico or Belize and once even in Christmas Island. I caught hundreds of them, although not many big ones, and developed some impressions.
They're very nervous and very curious. No water is too shallow for them if there's food on a flat. It's amazing to watch a 6 pound fish disappear in eight inches of water. Like a lot of fish, their coloration, at least as we see it above water, tends to match the bottom color. On white sand, they're a pale grey, like a washed-out silverside. Over olive-brown turtle grass, they show olive, turquoise and brown on their backs.
Not so much is known about their natural history. As a tide floods a flat, they chase onto the skinniest water (kinda like RLSs), but they often ghost back into the deep water at the edge of flats. I've heard that in the Pacific they can inhabit really deep water and I think they spawn in deep water as well, though I'm not sure.
They are an odd looking fish, in a way. They have an underslung mouth, like a carp, and like to feed by rooting in the bottom. Schools of smaller fish like to leave muds -- clouds of muddy water in an otherwise clear environment, caused by group rooting. They pick out crabs, shrimp, small bait and the like, often right out of the sand, which they somehow filter out of their gills. They're pretty long and sleek, but very solid. A five pound bonefish feels much "harder" than an equivalent bass or blue. They have a muscular feel to them.
My favorite thing about them is there curiosity. Despite their wariness, they seem to want to check out any noise, puff, whatever. On flats, I've witnessed different kinds of behavior. Usually, they cruise, smaller fish in schools, and bigger fish as singles or small groups (four or fewer). They also tail when they're rooting in the bottom -- nose in the sand, tail waving above and in the water like a shiny flag. Tailers are great to watch, because they seem to dig relentlessly for every speck of food, some of it tiny, that's in the sand or roots of the mangrove, turtle grass, whatever. I have on rare occasion seen them hold in current washing onto or off of a flat. They hold like a trout or a striper, face into the current, but when I've seen this they didn't seem to be feeding. Usually the currents on those tropical flats are much, much milder than a flooding or spilling tide in Cape Cod Bay, for instance. Another interesting feeding behavior is how they follow a ray around, snapping up the invertebrates that the ray stirs up as it scoots along the bottom. You often see bones following rays.
Lots of things eat bonefish, but sharks and barracuda top the list. It's usually a good sign to see a blacktip or two cruising a flat, because they're probably looking for bones. Blacktips are pretty fast, but not as fast as bones, so I think they tend to chase injured or wounded bones first. It's not unusual to have a blacktip start to chase a bonefish that you've hooked up, and sometimes you have to break the bonefish off if you want to save it's life. I'm sure you've all seen magazine pictures of severed flats fish (bones, tarpon, etc.). They're for real. By the way, small and medium sized blacktips take bonefish flies just fine and even jump when hooked!!!
Barracuda are another story. They don't cruise, but rather feed by ambushing. Their initial burst is almost too fast to see. One of the coolest wildlife events I've ever witnessed was a dense group of small bonefish milling around on a flat near some mangroves. All of a sudden, they was this incredible circular disturbance, almost like a cyclone or blender surround the school. All the bones flushed, but a medium sized barracuda glided away slowly with a small bonefish crossways in its jaws. The barracuda had actually circled the entire school and picked one off -- kind of a like a single fish blitz. It was one of the most brutal, amazing attacks I've ever seen.
Bonefish tend to stay down in the water column, hugging the bottom, at least when feeding. You do see them at mid-depth, and sometimes they skim under the surface, or just hover (permit do that too), but most typically, they're close to the bottom. Of course, these comments only apply to shallow water, say 6 inches to 6 feet. What they do in deeper water is a mystery to me, and, I'd wager, even to marine biologists.
The bones in Mexico and Belize (except for Turneffe Islands) tend to be smallish, 8 lbs and under, although some pigs are caught. The avg. fish in that area of the world is probably 2-4 lbs. In parts of the Bahamas, they're supposed to be much bigger -- Andros Island, for example -- and they tend to be really big in the Keys, I'm told. Miker picked the toughest spot in the world to catch them. Go to Mexico, get a guide for 1/3 the price and you might catch 20 in a day. Christmas Island has everything from the tiniest 10 inchers to plenty of double digit fish. I've heard credible reports of 18 lb. fish sighted. A 3 lb fish makes it to your backing no problem, so I was happy with any I'd fool.
I don't know about eating them. I saw Ken's post above, but every local person has told me that they are very bony and hard to eat for that reason. Some places in the Bahamas still treat them as a food fish. Permit, on the other hand, are supposed to be delicious.
Anyway, it's been about 6 years since I did the bonefish thing. It's gotten too expensive, but I'll find a way down to Central America one of these days. you guys should check it out. I think the affection for bones is less about the fish itself -- they fight hard, but that's not it -- and more about how they feed. Sight fishing in shallow water and teasing them into taking these little flies is really fun.
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