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Posted in Unspecified
I rarely get "mad," but today was a test. I passed it. We had about 15 divers on board the King Neptunetoday. While I was helping in the shop prior to departure, FOUR of the divers bought their very first spears or spear guns, intending to take fish during the dives. One said to his family, "I'm going to kill something today." Saturday was already starting off badly from my perspective. I dive with spearos and have no problem with my buddies that do. I know their skill level and judgment. They take only what is legal and only what they will eat. These are not barbarians willing to kill anything in sight!
Our first dive was at Italian Gardens. Captain Tony has been taking us to a different part of this site from where we went last year, and where I saw up to 13 giant sea bass at a time. This new spot is supposed to be better, but I'm not impressed... yet. I'll give it time, it's still a little early in the sea bass courting season.
Dropped down to about 90 and worked my way up. As I approached the 30' depth, a male GSB appeared out of the kelp, checked me out and swam to the north. I headed south and swam for 15 min without another sighting, so I turned around. Just past the spot I had seen the male, I encountered a courting pair of them. They were a bit skittish and I'm pretty sure I noted a fresh spear wound on the female's gill cover with blood on it. The gill cover is pretty hard so it was a superficial wound. These fish are totally protected. I couldn't help thinking the new spearos might have tried to take it. No proof. but it did look mighty fresh and there were no other boats in the area. If I knew it was done by one of the new spearos on board, I'd have no problem breaking their spears or spearguns. Grrr.
I got back after a 70 min dive. Hooked up my tank to refill it and was doffing my gear when one of the new spearops arrived at the swim step. I couldn't believe what I saw! He had a 6" sheephead on the end of his spear... a GD guppy! Legal size is twice that. When I mentioned to him the fish was illegal size, he answered... I didn't know what it was. I had pointed out sheephead and kelp bass (the two best tasting and most common local fish) in a book before he went in. He was not the guy who said "I'm going to kill something today," but his approach was almost as reprehensible in my view. You only shoot what you can ID and know the legal size and limits on in my book (and my dive buddies that spear).
The other group of spearos came back with several illegal fish as well. "We didn't know what they were." I responded... "if you don't KNOW what they are, and what the legal size is, don't shoot them!" Later I heard the group talking about one guy missing the same fish 5 times and then when he hit it how all the other fish swarmed around them and "attacked" (yeah, right... revenging their fallen buddy). They were also talking about the color of the blood spurting out of the wound. I stayed very clear of these morons except when I wanted to film them for the weekend's highlights on my local cable TV show.
Next dive was at Isthmus Reef. I dropped down to 100' to film sea pens and anything else I could find on the deep sandy bottom, then slowly worked my way up the reef to the shallow center deep within the kelp. Several bat rays "buzzed" me (not really, they freaked when they realized I was there and took off). A good long dive for a total of 80 min.
Last dive was at Goat Harbor. I covered a lot of ground dropping to over 100' to film an angel shark, then slowly worked my way up the graduaaly sloping sandy bottom to about 30'. I was going through the deep kelp forest when I saw one of the spearos nearby and approaching me through a hole in the kelp. I made sure he saw me, then spent a little time filming his antics. Later I ran into the other group of spearos and filmed them, too.
I did encounter a courting pair of GSB but they took off as soon as they saw me. I assume the other divers must have harassed them. I also found lots of other mating activity. Ran into several mating circles (orgies) of black sea hares (the largest snail in the world at up to 3' long). They may go "at it" for several days and produce large masses of eggs that look like day old spaghetti. Also came across a large (12" x 18") mass of whelk eggs (probably the gem murex) with nearly a dozen of the snails mating and laying eggs.
Did a 75 min dive and surfaced. Once more the spearos came to the boat with fish they had no clue of the ID or the legal size. We had to throw 4 of them back. I turned to the guy (in his 20's) who took three trash fish (opaleye) and undersized kelp bass and sheephead, and told him once more that if he didn't know what he was shooting at, not to shoot them. The first group will be on the boat tomorrow, the second group won't. Thank goodness half the idiots will be gone. These killers give spear fishing a bad name.
8:37 AM - 6/19/2006 -
GRRRR
You have WAY more patience than I do!!! I would've been livid and hit them with their spear guns. Of course I don't like spearfishing (hunting) in the first place...
Missy - 12:23 PM - 6/19/2006
can't you turn them in?
I know that where I live, if you break the law by taking fish over your limit or out of season, they can take all your equipment.
Spearos
I've been getting frustrated lately as well. Over the past month I've seen an increase in the number of divers taking spearguns into Marineland. THERE ARE NO FISH HERE! We have(had) two resident Lincod that are (were) both around 30". One was shot a few weeks ago. Other than that we have mostly small reef fish and a ton of invertebrates. I witnessed one diver get his nice new mahogony gun broken in two in 1991. If the guy who shot the Lingcod and left the carcass on the post at the trailhead had stayed longer he would have had his broken as well.
Not Patience, just respect
Missy, I had little patience with these bozos. However, as a guest of Scuba Luv on their boat, I have to leave policy decisions up to them. The last thing I want to do is irritate their customers. The crew also depends on passenger tips. The captain and both DM's spoke with the owner afterwards. In the future they will keel haul such morons!
DrBill - 10:13 PM - 6/19/2006
Spears generally = bad news
I like spearfishing. Not on scuba though. And only for silver fish. However I have witnessed lots of tossers wielding them like idiots. My personal favourites include:
Bob from California who speared a large male Napoleon Wrasse over Christmas.
Korean DM who I regularly observe taking buffalo parrotfish on his surface interval.
Bob from California spearing himself in the ankle over the Easter holidays.
rickydazla - 1:05 AM - 6/20/2006
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