The Flora-Bama’s annual Interstate Mullet Toss got off to a picture-perfect start on Friday, with hundreds of patrons lining up for their turn to pluck a dead fish out of a cooler and hurl it down a course bisected, somewhere, by a state line.

The clear sky and gently rippling Gulf surf had certainly not been the case the day before, as storms made it a challenge to prepare the course and the related trappings of the “Gulf Coast’s Biggest Beach Party.”

“We had a heck of a time setting up, though,” said “Doc” Wallach, the longtime Master of Ceremonies for the event. “We got a lot of it done on Wednesday because the weather was bad yesterday. Yesterday it was in between the raindrops. Setup took a lot longer because of that.”

The fact that Saturday’s forecast also was a little iffy did not trouble him in the slightest. Organizers will pause for severe weather, he said, but they know they can count on patrons, particularly locals, to turn out even if it rains.

“Come rain, hurricane, or COVID, we’re throwin’ fish,” said Wallach.

Certainly they were on Friday, shortly after 10 a.m. The early hours of the Mullet Toss nominally are set aside for children, but like everything else, that guideline can be adjusted to suit the needs of the situation as interpreted by Wallach. (Indeed, the leaderboard schedule bore both a note that “All times are in ‘Flora-Bama’ Time!’ and a handwritten codicil “subject to Doc’s mood.”)

However, since children hadn’t lined up to sign up, the first competitors were Tyra Hargis, Sue Massengill and Lisa Derryberry, three ladies who said they’d traveled from Chattanooga specifically to take part in the “Mullet Festival.” Hargis made the first throw of the day, a respectable 39 feet, 3 inches.

She also became the first of countless competitors to be reminded by Wallach that they weren’t finished until they’d retrieved their fish, washed the sand off it and returned it to the cooler from whence it came. “Just so everybody knows, all our fish are registered Democrats,” said Wallach. “They’re going to sit there and wait for you to do all the work.”

Good-natured teasing, cornball humor and a tendency to council female competitors that they’d throw better if they removed any extraneous cover-ups are Wallach’s stock in trade. He also informed competitors that they had to register by their birth gender because “here at the Flora-Bama we support girls’ sports and the International Mullet Toss Federation makes us support Title IX.”

From there on, business was steady as a lineup ranging from toddlers to senior citizens stepped up to take their turns. Many threw far shorter than Hargis’ mark. A few showed themselves to be of championship caliber.

Wallach and other officials spotted a top-tier local Mullet Toss veteran in the line and told the audience to expect something special from “Johnny B.” True to advertising, John Barbato Jr. threw for 122 feet, 9 inches, the best throw of the first hour by a wide margin.

His personal best, Barbato said, was 178 feet. “I had a little wind that day,” he allowed.

Looking on with satisfaction was John McInnis III, one of the Flora-Bama’s co-owners.

“The party goes for the next three days, almost around the clock,” said McInnis. “And I would tell everybody, it’s really family friendly today, really family friendly on Sunday, talking about kids, and Saturday’s a very very busy day, mainly adults.”

“If I could say one thing to all the people who’ve never been here, the Flora-Bama is representative, and Mullet Toss in particular is representative, of America,” he said. “In a time in our country where people are divided by race, religion, politics, all these different things that cause division, when you come to this event, you’re looking at a hodgepodge of America. Everybody from every walk of life, all getting along and having a good time and leaving that junk behind.”

The cost to throw a mullet is $20, which includes a T-shirt, and the Mullet Toss annually raises about $40,000 for local charities, according to organizers. The event resumes at 10 a.m. Saturday and Sunday; full information can be found at www.florabama.com.