Hello all Seahunters,
What a weekend! Three days of calm weather and warm clean water. I told Tony to stay up here and learn his home waters, but he made a trip to the Florida Keys in search of lobster. I was teaching scuba classes Saturday and Sunday, but a good friend of mine asked me to hunt with him on Monday. What a blessing to have Andy come along with us, now the two original Seahunters were able to hunt together again finally. We did not dive together, but just having experience on the boat is a comfort.
My first dive was in 110ft, on a 1ft tall ledge that I have not visited in two years. As I descended, the reef came into view at 50ft on my depth gauge. I could see big snapper, and they looked agitated by my presence. There is only one cave on this ledge big enough to hold fish of any size, and I landed about 30ft from it. The snapper dispersed in two directions, and I noted the compass headings. I looked around to see if any grouper had come to check me out, but the reef was devoid of life. I pulled my light and began to swim to the cave. I went to the top of the reef so that I could be ready to shoot if anything came out, but there were no signs of life. I looked into the cave with my light and could not believe my eyes. There were four scamp grouper close to 10lbs each hiding in the back of the cave. As I peered deeper, I saw the biggest gag grouper I have ever seen. The scamps were blocking my shot so I had to bump them out of the way. A perfect head shot, and the big gag fell prey to The Moose. I stuffed him into my lobster bag, and his tail hung out about a foot. I worked the ledge east and west to map it out, and found another cave worthy of looking. My air was getting low, so I never peered into it. As I neared the surface, a shadow passed over so I figured it was the boat. I looked up to see a shark nearly 15ft in length well off in the distance. I couldn't tell what kind it was, but it had the shape of a bull shark. I looked at my fish and there was a steady trail of blood so I knew the shark would be coming back around. I hovered at 15ft for two minutes with adrenalin racing through my blood. As I hit the surface, Andy could see the fear in my eyes and made haste to get me into the boat. As I look back, he seemed more interested in getting the fish before getting me. After a few minutes of silence, we took a few photos and iced down the fish.
My second dive was on a small ledge in 98ft of water, two miles inshore from the other ledge. It was swarming with gray snapper, but I had more fish than I needed. There were a few lobster, but most of them had eggs. I managed four keepers for the grill. I did notice there was a large amount of stony coral, and some of the coolest tropical fish I have ever seen.
I didn't make a third dive, so we headed home. The other guys on the boat had a great outing also, and nobody went home empty. Please don't forget to sign up for the Seahunters.com newsletter.
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