Winter Diving is the best

Filed under Spearfishing Photos, Spearfishing Reports by on January 23, 2012 at 7:03 pm {no comments}

p1190533 Been some great diving this past week. Was able to make it out one day with Cat so I got some photos. My friend Julian is visiting and we have gotten a bunch of diving in this week. The conditions have been great , clear water , light current not a lot wind.  Really just fantastic.

One day we Julian, Cat and I dove the reef to the west. It wasn’t really that fishy but we had a great time. The lack of wind and light current allowed us all to drift with boat. We got a mixed bag of a bunch of different types of fish. We did not really get anything outstanding though.  Cat had fun taking photos and practicing diving.

The next day Stoner, Julian and I went out. The conditions were still awesome. We hunted the reef close to Key West for bit. We did alright, getting a few snappers and other fish. We then went out deep and setup a chum slick. For like 3 hours we spent chumming and hanging out in the blue. We shot barracuda , amberjack and cero mackerel while we waited. Then while I was actually in the boat adjusting some stuff a school of wahoo came through. Stoner shot one but the shaft pulled free on it’s first run, and Julian shot his and broke its back.

I didn’t even get to see the school because they were gone once I got in the water. Pretty fantastic day either way. I stuck a photo in of a wahoo I got a little bit ago, just for the hell of it.

More Clear Water

Filed under Spearfishing Photos, Spearfishing Reports by on January 15, 2012 at 1:50 pm {2 comments}

p1130285 Well the weather and Cat’s day off collided again and we were able to go diving together again.  Stoner joined us as well and when we got out to the reef the water was blue all the way into hawk’s channel. We dove hawks channel for a bit but all the only thing I saw were grouper and little bitty snapper. So After a bit we left.

When we got out to the drop off the vis was even better. I should have probably gone for wahoo but we really wanted to actually shoot some fish and not get stuck drifting all day. this in hind site was probably a mistake. I have to check for wahoo every time I go out it seems if the conditions are decent, they are only here for a very , limited time in any real numbers.

Anyways we dove the reef, we got a bunch of fish but nothing that exciting. Stoner got a 9# margate, other then that nothing that stood out. Cat was able to take some photos in the clear vis which was great. The wind picked up to 20 knots by 3 o’clock so we called it early.

Cat and I

Filed under Spearfishing Photos, Spearfishing Reports by on January 9, 2012 at 1:36 pm {3 comments}

p1060144 Finally got a day when the weather wasn’t terrible and Cat had the day off.  Cat and I headed out early in hopes of wahoo but when we got out there the wind that was supposed to be 5-10 was actually blowing around 15 out of the east. That coupled with the ripping gulfstream current to the east made for not that great conditions. After a little bit we headed for the reef.

On the reef the current and seas were way less and we were able to drop anchor and swim together for the first time in forever. The reef was pretty, not a lot of fish but the vis was fantastic. I shot a barracuda for chum and it promptly bent my shaft. I have pretty much ditched all my south African style shafts. The rust is just too much of a pain in the ass to deal with. I just straighten the bends out usually. I haven’t bent one bad enough to have to scrap it in a while.

After a bit we moved to another ledge and started cutting up the cuda. Immediately there was three legal black behind the boat. Of course the season closed last week so they were out. I shot some big mangroves and swam around for awhile. A big jewfish came out and and was eating the pieces of cuda. He was kind of spooky and would not let Cat get a really good photo of him. After a bit we were going to leave but then a big hammerhead showed up. The hammerhead and jewfish were swimming together pushing each other away from the cuda pieces. I dove on the hammer and he swam up to my fins and then spooked and left.

Then we went out deep and I dove for awhile and ran the boat.  I got a couple yellow jacks and triggers. I also had a jewfish grab one of the jacks and bend my shaft. There were huge whirling balls of bait in the deep water. Hundreds of chubs on the surface, under them hundreds of bar jacks, under them thousands of yellow tail and tropicals. Amberjack, Yellow jacks and Crevelle jacks cruised the bottom of the bait balls. It was pretty tremendous diving. Personally the winter diving when the jacks are schooled up is the best diving in Key West in my opinion.

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