Freediving Tables
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Things you might want to know...
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Over the winter I looked into and purchased a couple of sets of Reef Runner Gear's fin skins. I had contemplated having my own manufactured but when I came accross these, it just didn't seem worth the hassle. You can create your own custom design for a few bucks more and although you can run into some small snags when doing so (I'll elaborate later on), Jon from Reef Runner Gear is an awesome guy to work with and he will do everything he can to make things right.
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....
After trying and being disappointed by the Omer Zero Cubed mask last year, I picked up a couple of other masks ( Mares Star and Sporasub Mystic ) that fit fairly well and did not disappoint, but were not the perfect fit I've been looking for in a low volume freediving mask so I didn't feel overly compelled to write a spearview about them. In defense of these masks, they are both low volume masks that are relatively inexpensive so for the money they are great purchases. Of these two, the...
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...
Believe it or not my latest addition to my spearguns is not one for shooting fish (well at least not shooting to kill them). But it hopefully will help others watch online what I love to do underwater. I have made a camera mount for my Riffe Euro guns. This mount will fit on any Euro that has the reel inserts (basically all of them). It was terribly simple to make. The only fairly tricky part was putting together the actual mount screw for the camera tripod mount itself.
I finally bit the bullet and decided to sell my No-Ka-Oi. It had gotten next to no use in the time I had owned it and it seemed a shame to have it just sit there so I Ebay'd it. With the funds from that sale, I invested in a gun that is a little more multi-purpose (at least that is how I convinced myself to get it :). I was extremely torn among 3 choices. I was considering the Euro 120, 120x and 130. After a couple of weeks of deliberation and a lot of flip-flopping, I decided on the Euro 120....
Seas: 1-3 feet (rollers) Winds: 5-10 SSE Temp: 78 F Viz: 30-35 feet We got in late Friday night and did a little unloading and setup for our first full weekend before hitting the sack around 3am. I was up early anyway and started cleaning up and laying out some of the items that we stored all winter in the RV's storage compartments. My brother-in-law rolled in to the campground around 8:30a or so and we began laying out the astro turf (so nobody complains about how hard or rocky the ground is)...
Seas: 4-6 feet Winds: 15-20 SSW Temp: 85 F Viz: 25-50 feet After a week of East winds (and the wind was still blowing), the clean water finally got pushed far enough West so we could try to hit some of our spots in that general direction. We headed out with 5 divers that morning hoping to find that clean water we had heard about from other fishermen and we weren't disappointed. The clarity was absolutely amazing in many of our spots from 25-35 feet deep. Unfortunately, the numbers of fish...
Winds: 10-20 East Seas: 3-5 feet Surf Temp: 84 F Viz: 5-10 feet Saturday was not too much fun. The seas were extra sloppy and the viz was not what I would like to see, even on the worst days. It didn't stop us from shooting our fill of mangroves, but it wasn't without it's effort. One of the spots we hit was only about 18-20 feet deep and we couldn't see the bottom much less the fish. We've gotten used to shooting in the low viz but its still difficult to do. You have to pick out the best of...
Seas: 5-8 feet Winds: 20-25 ESE Temp: 78 F Viz: 5 feet We pulled in late Friday night after a brief (who am I kidding?) legal discussion of highway driving with a friendly Monroe County Sheriff's Deputy. According to friends that arrived before us, the winds picked up around 9p. There weren't too many storms, but the winds didn't let up all night. Up before the crack of dawn Saturday morning, we found the conditions had actually deteriorated even more from the night before. High tide was too...
Well, the FWC met for 2 days on June 8th and 9th, 2011 and not only had a changing of the guard with a new chairman and vice chairman, but made quite a few other decisions. Most importantly for Florida spearos and fishermen are the changes in the Permit, Florida and African Pompano bag, size and gear limitations. You might need to take your Captain's course to be able to identify the new Special Permit Zones (SPZ's) that they have apparently approved wherein anglers (both rod/reel and spear)...
Winds: 8-10 West Seas: 2-4 feet Surf Temp: 83 F Viz: 10-15 feet Today we went to some of our closer spots, due to the lack of visibility at our offshore patch reefs. Visibility was minimal to nil at most locations deeper than 15 feet. To make matters worse, we missed the tide and were only able to shoot fish for about an hour and a half. The entire days catch amounted to 1 grouper and 1 hogfish. I was glad to finally catch a grouper. It seems like Jewfish (Goliath Grouper) have moved in and...