July 6, 2023 - Key Largo Offshore - PB 25# Mahi I wasn't really prepared to do or record this when it happened, but while offshore doing some Mahi fishing off of Key Largo in July '23, we had a bull mahi that would not leave and would not take a bait...
mylar balloons, the conversation turned to things that we've see on crossings. Everyone was mentioning how they had seen dolphins and other types of mammals as well as a number of other interesting sights. With my having the least experience in making...
immediately started talks about how to best take advantage of the time and we decide we will take the bay boat out for some dolphin and then work some spots on the way back home. So we head out early and this morning with a somewhat unique...
"Boys Weekend" as all the girls and kids decided to stay home and we were hoping to get out for some offshore trolling for dolphin and maybe even get a chance to jump in and shoot a couple. So we woke up bright and early Saturday morning to see who else...
seas were supposed to pick up on Sunday so we put in the big boat Saturday night in preparation to try for a run at some dolphin (Mahi, not flipper) the next morning. Unfortunately, the seas were much worse than forecast, as we were in 6-8' seas in only...
couldn't stay bad for yet another week. So we decide to forego the diving Saturday morning and head offshore for some dolphin fishing. We figured if we ran into some decent numbers, we could jump in the water out there and shoot some as well as hook and...
The winds called for were minimal so the plan was to head offshore in the bay boat and see if we could pick up some dolphin. My brother in law and some friends that had stayed the week had some success so we were hopeful we would at least be able to...
for us since we were getting there so late. I still had to chip in and cook my famous (at the campground anyway) blackened dolphin but dinner was great even in spite of the carrier class mosquitoes that kept trying to carry us off into the night (a...
feet Winds: 5-15 S/SW Viz: 45 feet Temp: 83 F This past weekend the forecast was once again looking abysmal. The campground dolphin fishing tournament was even postponed because the outlook was not very good at all. The forecast was calling for 2-4'...
are not without their (frequent) fallacies. What we awoke to Saturday morning (very early because we had decided to go dolphin fishing again) was more akin to Sunday's forecast (and then some). Yes, there were no mosquitoes, but that was mostly because...
all fishermen). We heard from every rod-n-reeler in the park about how they had gone out that morning and everyone had hit dolphin inside 20 miles. As the sun started to dip, our veritable caravan of boats made way back to the campground to make plans...
for interesting sights and would slow down or stop so us tourists could get shots of everything from whales to a pod of dolphins speeding along side of the boat. He had expressed some concern about finding fish since the summer had been less than...
end of the trip we had very little fish to show for our efforts. So little fish that I actually had to defrost some frozen dolphin to make sure there would be enough for everyone that night as at least 5 families were going to be feasting. Luckily for...
Type:
Article
Author:
Bob Diaz
Category:
SpearBlog 2010
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July 4-12, 2014 - Wonderful holiday weather and greedy Goliaths
The summer had been busier than I would have liked this year and I honestly hadn't had as many opportunities to post much less given much thought to writing a new SpearView, but after having time to really reconsider, I realized that I had actually had multiple opportunities to try out new equipment this year (not all of it successfully). Further to that point, when I took the PFI Freediver course back in March I had decided to invest in a new mask and ended up deciding on the Omer Zero Cubed...
Over the 4th of July holiday I was able to break in my hawaiian sling made by HawaiianSling.net (Ray Uppstrom). I had purchased this quite some time ago in preparation for a trip to the Bahamas and I finally got to try it out in the waters around Cat Cay, South Bimini. This isn't your normal hawaiian sling. The design is completely unique and interesting in its approach compared to traditional slings. This sling is much more akin to a bow and arrow than it is to a regular sling and it looks...
It didn't take me long to finish rigging up the 120 with a new reel and 2.2mm dyneema line. Unfortunately as of now (Apr 2009), I haven't had an opportunity to get into the blue water to put this new toy through its paces. I am definitely jones'ing to give 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...
{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.
This review is actually long overdue as I've had this mask for well over a year now and I honestly don't know why I hadn't done it before now. After trying multiple masks over several years (and several hundred dollars), some were good (Mystic, Star, Nano), and some were bad (Zero Cubed). Before this, I had actually decided upon the Cressi Nano as "the one". I thoroughly enjoyed the fit and volume of the Nano, but there were a couple of VERY minor issues with the fit. I'm convinced that the...
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 those I spearfish with along with some of my own common sense. In the beginning (early 1990's), I used one of my brother-in-law's extra guns. Specifically, a 38" Arbalette. Now this gun had already seen finer days by the time I started using it....
Winds: 5-20 South Seas: 3-5 feet Surf Temp: 83 F Viz: 5-10 feet The weather pattern was almost identical to last weekend! Saturday was turbulent and dirty with winds picking up the seas to a steady 3-5 feet on Saturday. But Sunday was even cleaner than last week. Not only that, but the winds laid down and the seas were flat. Even my son was able to hang with us in the water for most of the day without taking in any water through his snorkel. All in all, Sunday was a beautiful day of both...
Seas: 1-3' Winds: 5-15 SSE Viz: 15-20' Temp: 86F So this was supposed to be the weekend I get back to spearfishing after lobster season started last Monday. Since we had gotten bad viz reports from some friends that had spent the last week down in the keys and it's the last weekend before the kids' first day of school (meaning Sunday is a very short day), we figured time was short and we wouldn't waste it for wanting. After a quick decision to stay close in search of some hogfish, mangroves...
Wind Seas Viz Temp NW 12-18mph 2-4' 25-45' 79F This week was a "Boys Weekend" as all the girls and kids decided to stay home and we were hoping to get out for some offshore trolling for dolphin and maybe even get a chance to jump in and shoot a couple. So we woke up bright and early Saturday morning to see who else in the campground was ready and willing to head out into the deep blue yonder. Much to our surprise, we were the only mice stirring that morning so we decided to drop in the big...
Seas: 1-2 feet Winds: 5-10 E/SE Viz: 35 feet Temp: 85 F So I head down a day early this weekend to take advantage of the opening day of lobster season (August 6 for those that don't know). The forecast called for 1-2' seas all weekend so we were hoping for some smooth sailing and clean water. Since the craze is usually so out of hand in the keys, our plan was to be on the water before sunrise so we could be on our first spot by the time there was enough light to see. The forecast didn't...
Winds were 2-5 out of the East. Seas were for all intents and purposes flat. Unfortunately, in the area of Marathon and Big Pine Keys, the water was extremely dirty. Actually, it looked to me like an algae bloom. The temperatures have been inordinately high lately and with a little bit of rain, these things can happen. In depths as shallow as 25 feet, the bottom was nearly unidentifiable. You could still spearfish, you just had to use a lot more bottom time just in the hunt. You also had to...
For the past 20+ years my family and I have been heading down to Marathon during the Summer months for the purposes of spearfishing and family weekends. Over the past 15+ years since owning my web site, these Summers have offered me the opportunity to load up my site with blogs and pictures that have entertained me (and hopefully some of you) tremendously along the way. I have looked forward to my Summer escapades chasing mahi, snapper, grouper, hogfish and facing sharks and goliaths every...