Cherry On Top

Nice!  I need to dive with you more. You are a fish magnet/slayer!

nice fish and great story and i like the rock trick lol what are Friends for right 

Cherry On Top is right!

Realized I never posted all the bad ass pics fuzz took...shrunk them so they are manageable.

 

Thanks again Harold!!

And thanks to Alshobie for helping me with the two above water shots! 

 

Sincerely,

Jim

I never get tired of seeing pics like that! . The ling looked good too

I have to ask a question, but want to explain something first. I think it is great the divers can spear all year. To me it really is good for you, but on another note. Do you guys ever pass on a large fish thinking I'll leave it to spawn. I always wanted to dive but was never able to, due to lung Illness conditions. I am aware you can't go to depths of 100 ft.

I did have a good friend who learned to dive. The diver instructors point of view were fishermen used Idiot sticks. And they were in a big fish market. And could pick their fish out, taking the large ones. Leaving the small ones for the guys with the Idiot sticks. Yeah I admit I'm a little jealous, And it is your rights to.spear fish. I'm sure others may feel that way too. I just wonder if there is a custom to leave a few large ones? Flames go a head it would be an interesting to see how many wonder the same thing. I hope I don't piss anyone off. If so I'll buy you a beer at albion. An Obama summit type thing  Jeff

I have to ask a question, but want to explain something first. I think it is great the divers can spear all year. To me it really is good for you, but on another note. Do you guys ever pass on a large fish thinking I'll leave it to spawn. I always wanted to dive but was never able to, due to lung Illness conditions. I am aware you can't go to depths of 100 ft.

I did have a good friend who learned to dive. The diver instructors point of view were fishermen used Idiot sticks. And they were in a big fish market. And could pick their fish out, taking the large ones. Leaving the small ones for the guys with the Idiot sticks. Yeah I admit I'm a little jealous, And it is your rights to.spear fish. I'm sure others may feel that way too. I just wonder if there is a custom to leave a few large ones? Flames go a head it would be an interesting to see how many wonder the same thing. I hope I don't piss anyone off. If so I'll buy you a beer at albion. An Obama summit type thing  Jeff

I do my very best not to shoot fish that are guarding egg nests. You can see me pass on a nice cab that was guarding eggs at the end of the vid on the first page of this thread. A hook and line angler would not have known that 19-20 inch cab was guarding eggs.



I also definitely don't shoot lings that I see guarding eggs. You can see an example in the beginning of this vid here, and right after the ling another nice cab on eggs that we didn't shoot. A hook and line angler may have taken both since they were both definitely legal.



In terms of passing on "big" lings...this was the only ling over 32 inches that I took all year...course it was the only ling over 32 that I had a shot on all year. Lol.

If I ever get to the point where I am finding "big" lings all the time, then I will have to make the decision for myself if I want to let some be. I know some guys who do, and some who don't and I can understand both stances.

My goal for this day was to shoot one big ling for 2013 and I did that and am super stoked on the fish, and very comfortable with my decision to shoot it.

As far as your last sentence...I guess I don't get the "Obama summit" reference, but I'm not pissed off and don't need a beer. Thanks though.

 

Sincerely,

Jim

Jim thank you for the answer. I'm glad you do pass on some large ones. Especially the ones on eggs. I was just curious how the diving community differs from the fishing community. As the spear can't do catch and release. As for the Beer or summit thing I was offering some beer, to say sorry if I pissed you off. Sorry I mentioned Obama just spoke before I thought about it. Is mentioned that because he inflamed people by stating something that was very bad and untrue. So he brought the two people together in question and had a beer with them to patch things up. So sorry If I offended Some here with that. Just offering Beer that was all.   

... I was just curious how the diving community differs from the fishing community. As the spear can't do catch and release. 

Hi Jeff,



Your question is very difficult for any single diver to answer as he/she does not speak for the "diving community".  Each diver has their own personal code or standard whether they consciously think about it or not.  For example, I like a certain size fish at a certain time of the year.  Another guy may only be interested in meat yield, and yet another only wants certain species...etc. 
 

Other factors to consider:

If you notice, Jim's reports all come from a pretty small geographical area.  A diver, unlike a boater or even a kayaker is pretty limited in the area that he affects once he gets in the water.  And we haven't even touched on the depth limitations.  There are some real studs here but even thouse guys aren't working more than 80'.  There are hundreds of miles of coastline that we don't affect in any meaningful way.   Then there are the poor vis days.

I think the reason divers are allowed to take rockfish year round is because DFG realizes the relative small impact divers, as a group, have on the rockfish stock. 

Catch and release vs. "release and catch".  I've read spearfishing as release and catch.  I believe what the person who coined that termed was saying is that as divers we see the fish and decide on it's fate.  We see it, decide not to shoot it.  Those are the fish we "released".  We do that until we find the one that fits the bill, that's the one we "catch".  So even though we don't have catch and release, but we don't have release mortality either.  I've read the survival rate of fish released is not 100% (I don't want to quote any figures as I can't remember the exact % and even if I did, I wouldn't feel comfortable using it without knowing the source). 

I hope this reply didn't come across as how much better divers are compared to rod fishermen, because that's not the intention. 

What Nate said. 

Just offering Beer that was all.

No worries! I like beer!

 

 

Sincerely,

Jim