Thats what Realfish tells his wife from Oct into Dec. She’s a good woman. Made one last trip to kill some grouper before closure. Stopped in 70’ were we killed them last Dec. Viz about 15’ a good current no grouper.Braved the 4/5 footers and headed out deep. Capt Newman, Joe and Jordan did well on one of our best #s sending up some nice groupers, Scamps and Gags and 2, 7/8lb lobster. We didn’t want to hammer the same spot again so Eric and I did our second dive in another area. we hit the bottom and never left our knees sending up lift bag after lift bag with Hogs, scamps and gags, awesome dive with 63 bottom temp, no current and 30/40’ viz!
Next team went down and did it again,nice hogs and gags on that dive, awesome day!
another great year with some great team players and may get out one more time weather permitting!
If it got any better I couldn’t stand it.
Nice job! Y’alls are definitely bigger than mine getting out with the forecast I looked at!
26’ Glacier Bay
Mistress
Viz is definitely better this week than last. That was some funky viz for this time of year. Nice work Ed.
Stephen Goldfinch
“Sleep When You’re Dead!”
It was a fun trip despite the very challenging sea conditions. The waves felt much closer together than the 8s at the buoy. We passed on plenty of lobster because the grouper and hogfish kept so close by that we were usually busy shooting and reloading and messing with lift bags. One nice thing was that I saw a good number of juvenile lobster (still monsters in FL) mixed in with our usual 8 to 12 pounders. We’ll let them soak a few more years and have a chance to spawn a couple of times.
That cooler full of hot water really felt good in the wet suit after a cold dive. I could manage another December dive with that on board.
The water was real blue even in 70’ on the top . Down around 20’ off the bottom you would pass through a layer of yellow water and the bottom was very hazy. Out deep the water wAs the color of the stream but still had that hazy layer off the bottom but the viz was around 40’. The fish were curious and very easy targets ! One of those days you won’t forget. We hit the bottom and never left our knees, shoot and string, shoot and string. Once we got on the #s we went no farther ten 10sqyd and left fish for next year !Yellowbird we wanted to run out of GT one more time after the help we got from you and s4g but the weather forecast was bad enough, didn’t want to drive two hrs the not get out! The 4 to 5s we had all day showed how bad we wanted to go!
If it got any better I couldn’t stand it.
Hot water makes all the difference in the world this time of year. We’ve piped it in through the outboards, put it in coolers, rigged up half-witted hot water heaters, and the list goes on. Right now, working on the big boat we have a hot water shower on the back deck, but we’re considering a portable one-man hot tub. That’s diving in style! Anything you can do to keep hot water in your suit will make you more successful. That, combined with a quality suit keeps you in business all year long. Check-out the Waterproof Swedish Suits. They’re awesome. Especially if you hate dry-suits!
Stephen Goldfinch
“Sleep When You’re Dead!”
Sweet bag man!
My advice is my opinion only. I may have gotten that opinion from something I read while sitting on the toilet. Please keep that in mind when reading my posts, the information may not be correct.
Really tired last night, hope this is a little better!
I was a hard hat diver for 21 years at the Shipyard here in Chas. We dove every night for 13 years while working the swing shift (16:15 to 00:45)we come up with all kind of ways to stay warm in the winter months. Sometimes a full pot of coffee was all you had to fill your wet suit with piss during SCUBA opps. A hot water hose down your back tied into your umbilical when diving surface supplied worked well untill the system farted and sent 150deg water down your back and down to your butt cheeks, hard to pull the hose out in that situation!
we took some 5gal Igloo water coolers with us full of hot water and a few solo cups down the wet suit before the dive made the 63deg bottom temp very nice!
the few pics I took don’t really do justice, the lobster are about 8lbs ea. and the gags weighed around 15/20 each!
If it got any better I couldn’t stand it.
Awesome day Ed!! Appreciate the trips you and Eric have had me out on! Hope to get out there with you next year.
Wish I didn’t leave my good camera on the other boat. There were fish everywhere on the dives and some of those grouper were huge; especially the one with a whole porgy in its mouth. One of the female hogsnapper came up with a neat brown and grey camo pattern but that quickly faded.