New Year's Eve - more diving, pics, & a couple poor quality videos :)

Continuation of:
http://www.norcalkayakanglers.com/index.php/topic,11194.0.html


Woke up and found the weather had once again turned sour.  The wind gusts rattled the windows and the trees bent in protest.  After talking to the nice neighbor next door, my mother and I had decided to give her the uhu(parrotfish) for their family gathering.  It was really nice to see someone so appreciative but it unfortunately put me in a tight spot as I needed to find a replacement fish... so I headed to the beach for a quick mission.

Getting in the car, I found Waffles perched on my steering wheel, waiting to go - must be a good sign!  Coming through again, I arrived at the beach and was pleasantly shocked to find a flat ocean with no wind.  Awesome!



I paddled out to the reef's edge and took a few drops.  The usual suspects were milling around - kala (unicornfish), palani (surgeonfish), and an assortment of other reef dwellers.  A few uhu swam in and out of range, but the high spearfishing pressure made them skittish.  Taking into consideration the serving presentation of the fish, I held off on any shot I wasn't convinced was 100% through the head.

The fish were semi-cooperative, but the conditions were so nice, I thought I'd head out deep and use the uhu as a backup fish.  The grounds were very barren - nary a fish for long expanses, then little clusters of fish in mini oases.  I dropped near one fish pile and from off in the distance, a little dot grew larger & larger - a Uku (grey snapper / green jobfish) materialized.  Tossing a handful of sand up in the water column piqued the fish's curiosity and it circled to investigate.  Slowly & smoothly raising my speargun, the shaft found its mark.



With a nice plump snapper secured, the pressure was off.  The uku is one of my favorite fish to eat, so I was pretty happy to be able to share it with the family.  I took the camera out and made a dive on the fish pile just to capture some of the variety around.  The size of the fish here on the outside were quite a bit smaller, but made up for it in variety.
http://tinypic.com/player.php?v=81txpxw&s=1

While diving on this fish pile, I noticed a roi (peacock grouper) swimming around.  These are an introduced species to Hawaii and voracious predators.  They're non-stop eating machines and I try my best to thin them out.  Luckily, they taste pretty good as well - like a smaller version of baja's cabrilla (leopard grouper).  They do have a predisposition for ciguateria, so unless you personally know the region that you're taking them from... don't eat them.  This particular fish had obviously seen divers before... and was wary.  It took 4 long dives to coax it within range.  Thwack!  Through the noggin and out the upper jaw.



At this point, I had been out for almost 2 hours and needed to get home for some do some prep-work and play with fireworks, so I decided to check one last spot(the diver's version of "one last cast").  A friend's dad mentioned that he would like a small kahala (Amberjack), so I headed to an area I knew they frequented.  Because of the ciguateria risk and just plain wormy-ness, I wanted to find one under 10#.  These are generally clean and better eating.  I brought out my camera & made a dive .
http://tinypic.com/player.php?v=6opi5ci&s=1

None of these fish were under 20#.    I just pointed at them and shot them in my imagination.  "POW, POW, POW"

I finally found a tiny one and struggled between aiming my camera with my left hand and my speargun with my right hand.  Not very easy.   Eventually I got it close enough and took it down. 
http://tinypic.com/player.php?v=81imdsl&s=1

Unfortunately, it was still too big at 10-12#... but he was happy to have it.   



Stowing my gear, I turned my bow to the beach and began the paddle in.  A bit overcast, but another beautiful day on the water.   



Picked up some more ice and dropped the kahala off with my friend's dad(who was stoked) on the way home.  At home, we did prep work for the next day.  On the menu was steamed uku (snapper) & roi (grouper) with cilantro/green onions/ginger/black bean sauce, fresh ulua (trevally) sashimi, and miso tako(octopus).   



Happy New Year's!!!

To celebrate the new year, I gave the fish a break... for a day.   

Nice variety. That gecko-BMW pix would make a great avatar.

Livin' the good life. Happy new year!!!

Fuzz, your pictures and reports make me happily miss a few good times in Hawaii and Guam.  Warmer clear waters and prettier fish.  The huge coconut land crabs in Guam were a little intimidating.   Now I wonder if they taste good.

Thanks much for your reports.

But does a BMW insured by Gecko really save 15%? 

Fuzz,

What camera are you using for the video?

-Brian G

....hate you

Come back to the main land and teach me how to free dive...I have a can of spam waiting for you