Trinidad - 4/3 - PG13 Ab-Tagging Video Added

During the week Brandi and I made plans to hookup and get in the water somewhere today.  The forecast didn't turn out as good as it had been sounding two days ago (deja vu lately...), but inside Trinidad Harbor was still very flat with the good visibility holding - 12' in places is a gift up here.  I had a meeting with a client just north of Trinidad (how convenient  ), so I met Brandi on the water out at "thumb rock" just after 2:15.  She was her usual self - grinning ear to ear and excited to be back in the water for the first time this year.  She announced having done six dives to 18-20' in the 48 degree water and seen a dink ling, a couple of blacks, some blues, several perch and a greenling - her dives are a minute long!     I hopped in and didn't take long to get comfortable.  I do shorter dives of 20-25 seconds with significantly less top time in between - she's a pro, all into the relaxation aspect and longer dives - clearly superior to my methods and production.  Brandi brought an extra gun for me at my request, but I decided to cruise with my sling since I haven't spearfished in deeper than 10' of water in years.  I got a few angles on decent fish and saw a couple of lings that may have been just legal, but didn't have a good kill shot on anything, so no fish for me today.  Brandi bagged a decent black, but didn't fill her "shopping list" of a black and a ling.  I saw several small scallops and grabbed two larger ones around 6".  I also found an ab that was just over 9" which was a surprise since this area has been scoured over by both freedivers taking advantage of the shelter of the Harbor and scuba classes who may at times see abs on their scuba dives then come back later to freedive the spot...  First ab I've ever grabbed in the Harbor and first scallops I've pulled in years.  It was a great day in the water.  Brandi also spotted a heavy crab ring in decent shape (no rope or float), so I brought it home for rehab and future use in my little fleet of crab gear.  Afterward we enjoyed the sun and a cold Sierra or two down at Houda Point and watched the surfers for a bit.  Now I'm Jonesing to hike down the beach and go sub-surface on a real oldgrowth hunt.   

Awesome score Eric. I love scallops but am petrified of being underwater, so when's dinner Nature will only reveal herself to the anointed eye. Many dove over that Ab but she was waiting for you!

Thanks for the post, makes me feel good just reading about it, I haven't been in the water since November. 

dale

Nice man. Looks like fun! Didn't know there's scallops out there. Between that, urchin, and abalone.. oh man.. droolin. Sounds too great. Just wondering where the underwater vids in this report are.. 

Z

Just wondering where the underwater vids in this report are.. 

You know me!     Just about every dive I was thinking, "damn, I need underwater video capability!"  You see so much cool shit under there.  I did take some videos on the water - I've got editing to do and will probably add my next creation to this post later this evening.  I need to start importing some tunes to overlay on the paddling scenes.  I got some footage of the debacle of trying to use the new ab tag with a zip-tie...     Shredded that POS, but I made it work.

Hawk:  scallops and ab for dinner tomorrow night - the kids are making funny faces about trying them (even though they love ab and fish!), and mama had a bad east coast scallop experience 20 freakin' years ago, so they're all for me!     I'll hook you up with some next time there's an opportunity.  I think the limit is 10, with individuals needing to be at least 4" in diameter.  If I was just looking for them I probably could've gotten 3 or 4 more at that spot. 

I sometimes wonder why I went away from diving - probably the amount of work it takes...  yakking and yak-fishing are my number one activities, but diving is still right up there.   

Number one aspiration:  video geek!   

Got any more scallop pics?
PK

Got any more scallop pics?
PK

I'll take more and post them.  I've been picking up the "purple hinged rock scallop" shells off the beach for decades, and my eight year old can identify them along with a bunch of other native shells around here.  The purple area of the shell is limited in size and very distinguishing - what's cool is to find a piece of scallop shell that has been worn down to just the purple.  The juvenile, as you'll read below, free-swims until it's around 3/4 - 1" in diameter, then it settles somewhere and starts encrusting itself to rocky substrate.  The free-swimmer shells are really pretty - they're orange or pinkish and lack the irregularities that dominate the shell once it starts encrusting.  Love finding the juvies along with tiny urchins and abs down to the size of a tick!

I found the info and photo below by Googling for a few minutes - so there's not a huge abundance of info out there as compared to some other topics.  The "Orange Smile" is what you see when you're diving, because the shell is totally camoflauged with the same algae growth and other encrusted growth that surrounds the scallop in its permanent attachment which is usually up inside of a cave or crevice.  The two that I grabbed yesterday I was able to break off with my hand, and sometimes you'll need to wedge the ab iron in there for leverage - pulling a scallop is nowhere near as tough as pulling an ab - calcium encrustation vs. big suction muscle.  Yesterday's scallops were less than 20' deep at low tide (around a 0.2), and you won't see many (if any) until you get at least that deep.

I didn't think scallops had a minimum size limit.
Dave

From the DFG booklet
29.60. Rock Scallops.
(a) Limit: Ten.
(b) Methods of take: Rock scallops may be taken only by hand, by the use of dive knives, or
by devices commonly known as abalone irons in compliance with provisions of Section 29.15(e)
of these regulations.

I didn't think scallops had a minimum size limit.
Dave

That's what I thought for a long time and then I heard somewhere 4"...  Maybe it's just that there's no meat in one less than 4"!

Thanks, Dave.   

I'm not against the idea of monitoring ab-take, but the tagging system needs some work.  They should probably sell them with holes already punched...