spot your boat. We didn't take any pictures this weekend because quite honestly, lobsters make for boring pics and the spearfishing took a back seat to lobstering this weekend so it was only a few fish that were really the bycatch of decent hogs and...
in, so we headed to some of our spots to the west of the lighthouse. While I didn't get any video or good pics of the spearfishing, we did end up limiting out with my brother in law landing one monster mangrove (with only two left before limiting out)....
in later seasons participated as an underwater videographer. Mike is the USA distributor for FreeDivers (FreeDivers USA) spearfishing equipment. I came across his booth and after a great conversation about spearfishing, we started discussing the rising...
or how far you need to look to find that so-called lining. Usually, I will be the first to tell people that my worst day spearfishing is still a great day diving but unfortunately this weekend has stretched my belief to the limit. We went out Saturday...
reef. Unfortunately, as good as that sounds, it's not always the only determnining factor in having a good (or great) spearfishing weekend. Even though all the signs were pointing at another picture perfect weekend, we would be reminded that no matter...
that seeing that fish you've been hoping for has on your dive time. I tried my hand at the Aspetto (waiting) style of spearfishing too. Without all the stimulus of seeing fish I wanted to chase (much less shoot) I was able to consistently get my dive...
how much more money I need to spend in their stores) with my friends from Austin's Dive Center and Nautilus Spearfishing. In addition to the expo that lets you check out the latest products from manufacturers like Spetton, Omer, Riffe, DiveR and just...
and give me knowledge about freediving that I did not currently possess so that I can improve my freediving and spearfishing skills. We were fortunate to not only have our 2 instructors for our class, but to also have 2 of the students in our class be...
don't get a lot of Permit family fish because they are protected in state waters and we don't do a lot of federal water spearfishing, so at first glance I thought, "Who cares..." But after following the link and reading the article, I started to get...
or a video, simply put the camera in the correct mode, and press the shutter release... Voila! you're an underwater spearfishing videographer. Not too shabby if I do say so myself (so I will).
sometimes you get lucky, and you don't even know it until everything has happened. It was late in August, 1999. We were spearfishing a ledge that we visit from time to time. Usually we find a fair amount of grouper there. But we also know that this late...
water for and probably closer to the actual events than I would care to consider... It was the summer of 1997. We were spearfishing along the 7 Mile Bridge on the East side of Mosier channel. We had been in the water for a couple of hours already and it...
a try! I am also working on making my own flashers for use in blue water. I have been watching these being used on a few spearfishing shows and their reasoning seems sound for their success. They didn't seem too hard to make, so I decided to make my own...
Throughout my relatively short history in spearfishing (as of this writing), I have only used a few different spearguns. Now obviously, my opinion in this matter is not one of extreme trial and error. Mostly it consists of recommendations made to me by...
compete in any national or even local competitions. I really don't think I'm at that level (yet). I do, however, enjoy spearfishing immensely. I created this site and continue to maintain it in the hopes that someone who is thinking about picking up the...
for yourself and get acquainted because there were other changes too. I guess if I get to go out for some late winter spearfishing this year, I'll have to focus on some of the other dinner fare fish until May 1st. We can only hope that this change will...
huge catch, but I still wouldn't have missed it for anything. I've said it before and I'll say it again... my worst day spearfishing is still a great day of freediving and fun! So we'll just have to get 'em next time. And so, since this is my last entry...
{sigplus link=oculusr5 index=1} {/sigplus}Hot on the heels of my review of the GoPro Hero2, I felt I would be remiss if I didn't follow up with a review of the case that resolves the one (and only one in my opinion) flaw in the Hero2 design, it's underwater focus (or lack thereof) flaw. You see, as I wrote about in the Hero2 review the curved lens on the stock case creates a focus fallacy when shooting underwater. It's fairly common knowledge now, so if you want to read about it, you can check...
{sigplus link=goprohero2 index=1} {/sigplus}I finally jumped on the HD bandwagon and bought myself a Hero2 HD digital camera by GoPro. These little beauties have been around for quite a while now so hearing about them isn't exactly news. But since I finally got around to purchasing one for myself and it happens to be that the Hero2 is the biggest leap in performance that they've given these cameras since their launch, I figured I would put in my 2 cents worth.
Believe it or not my latest addition to my spearguns is not one for shooting fish (well at least not shooting to kill them). But it hopefully will help others watch online what I love to do underwater. I have made a camera mount for my Riffe Euro guns. This mount will fit on any Euro that has the reel inserts (basically all of them). It was terribly simple to make. The only fairly tricky part was putting together the actual mount screw for the camera tripod mount itself.
I finally bit the bullet and decided to sell my No-Ka-Oi. It had gotten next to no use in the time I had owned it and it seemed a shame to have it just sit there so I Ebay'd it. With the funds from that sale, I invested in a gun that is a little more multi-purpose (at least that is how I convinced myself to get it :). I was extremely torn among 3 choices. I was considering the Euro 120, 120x and 130. After a couple of weeks of deliberation and a lot of flip-flopping, I decided on the Euro 120....
This past weekend, I finally got to go to The Blue Wild dive expo. After 3 years of everybody telling me about it and not being around to get to go to it, the stars finally aligned and I was able to check it out. Unfortunately, it meant missing out on 5-10mph winds and less than 1' seas inside the reef, but there were other reasons I couldn't get out this weekend, so I figured I would take advantage to check it out and possibly win something from the raffle to boot (I won't keep you in...
This year at The Blue Wild I was fortunate enough to meet Mike Hickey. I know of Mike from his appearances on Speargun Hunter on the Outdoor Channel with Sheri Daye. Mike was orginally a guest on the show and in later seasons participated as an underwater videographer. Mike is the USA distributor for FreeDivers ( FreeDivers USA ) spearfishing equipment. I came across his booth and after a great conversation about spearfishing, we started discussing the rising cost of spearshafts specifically....
Winds: 0-5 Seas : Less than 1 foot Surf Temp : 87F Viz: 20-40 feet This was another very nice weekend for diving and spearfishing. The weather has been agreeable for a couple of weeks now, and now that I have some of my hearing returning (about 50%), I feel confident that I can begin to dive again. I didn't push it too hard this weekend, I just dove with my daughter piggyback and dove down a few times to get the feel of it and make sure I could easily equalize again. I was sorry I couldn't...
Winds: 5-10 east (morning) 15-20 east (afternoon) Seas: 2-3 (morning) 3-4 (afternoon) Surf Temp: 77F Viz: 35 feet Trying to take advantage of a lull in the spring winds, we headed out at about 8:00am. The day looked like it was going to shape up nicely. The forecast had predicted 5-10 in the morning with 15-20 in the afternoon. The winds had laid down for a couple of days and we decided to see if it had allowed the local waters to clear up some. We headed out of Key Biscayne from the Bay into...
Wind Seas Viz Temp 5-10 SSE 1-3' 25-55' 85F Many times I get asked the question, "How many fish have you lost to sharks?" and I always find it interesting how people that don't dive or spearfish frequently automatically associate what we do with sharks and attacks and how they typically believe that these are some kind of single threat. The truth is that although I have been buzzed by sharks and even surrrounded by sharks, historically, I have lost countless fish to barracuda while losses to...
Well, another year has come and gone. Some changes have been implemented for us spearfishermen this year, not the least of which is the closing of all shallow water grouper from Jan 19, 2010 through April 30, 2010. If you want to read more about the reasons behind the closing, check out this article . In future years, the closing is scheduled to begin Jan 1 (instead of 19th like this year). The closing includes pretty much every grouper species with the only exceptions being the Snowy, Warsaw...
Winds: (Saturday) 2-5 Variable Seas: (Saturday) 2-3 inside the reef, 2-3 outside the reef Surf Temp: +/- 84 F Viz: 25-30 feet Unfortunately, due to some mechanical difficulties, we were only able to dive Saturday morning, but the morning was very nice. High tide was at about 10:30am, and we were about an hour early. We fought the incoming tide for about 30 minutes before it started to slacken up. After that we got a good 45 minutes of slack tide, where we were really able to make up some...
Winds: 10-15 E Seas: 2-4 feet (sloppy) Surf Temp: +/- 80F Viz: 15-50 feet (depending on location) We decided to play the tide game today and actually won! The last couple of weeks we were either busting our humps because we got to our spots too early (running into strong tides), or missed the boat altogether and still end up busting our humps in order to catch some fish in spite of missing the slack tide (this of course precludes the fact that we would still run offshore to some of our patch...