Capers Reef - 8/30

Took a friend that hasn’t been down in years. He wanted to do a shallow water dive to get his gills back…Good thing, because he had regulator problems about halfway down on the first dive and inhaled some seawater. After making sure he was alright, I decided to go solo. 1st drop was on a 150’ barge. Vis was surprisingly good. Lots of baitfish, small reefish, a few respectable blackfish and sheepshead. Nothing really spearworthy. However, a doormat flounder, bigger than any I’ve ever seen, made the dive memorable. As soon as I shot him, 3 or 4 cudas appeared from nowhere and zeroed in on the flounder…thought I was gonna have to wack 'em with my speargun to get 'em to leave my dinner alone.

Second drop was on a 90’ tug that turned out to be much more interesting than the barge. The wreck was loaded with big spadefish. I swam all over, around, and inside the barge looking for grouper, but didn’t see one over 12". Picked off a few of the biggest spades for the cooler before heading topside.

Liquid Pleasure,
Congrats on your dive. I don’t dive, but have a question regarding the cudas. I know how very aggressive they are when we are fishing, and I can’t imagine swimming up from the bottom with a stringer full of fish. Do they not bother you? Just curious

Knock on wood…I’ve never had a problem with them. As I came up the rope, there were several cruising around within 15’ of the surface. They like to hang out around the boat for some reason. Shade, curiosity, invasion of territory, handout, I don’t know. I try to be aware of them, but other than that I don’t really worry about them coming too close. I ususally keep my speargun loaded til I reach topside, just in case.

Larry Hanford