Hello from Belize

  • MY name is Hank Bauman. Commercial aquaculturist by trade. Been spearing since the mid 90s but more intensively since about 6 years ago here in Belize. Only free diving here.
    I have a 25 foot skiff with a 90 ETEC and get out on the reef pretty much every week. Shoot muttons, dog snappers, black grouper, jacks, cero mackerel....hope to get a wahoo. We can shoot Goliaths here too. Legally.
    Looking forward to sharing stories and pictures.

  • Welcome.


    I too look forward to your reports. My brother visited down their for a fisheries conference and did some diving. He said it was amazing.

  • Welcome Hank. Good to have someone from Belize on board, I wondered before if spearfishing was even legal there.


    Thanks for the warm welcome.
    Spearfishing is legal here but freediving only. And they recently banned tourists from spearfishing, which made no sense to me. There are only a few sport spearos here that I know of. There are some commercial pole spear guys who have cleaned out areas inside the reef. But there are still some good areas.
    My regular buddy and I hunt the dropoff walls in front of the cuts. Also get out to Turneffe Atholl and have been to Glovers Reef.

  • hank, How deep do the commercial spearfishers dive?


    They mostly hunt inside the reef in 5-20 feet or so. They take grunts, snapper, hogfish as small as your hand. I've seen a couple guys outside the reef at about 35 feet getting lobster.
    They're good...they do it for a living. But they use slings so they don't get midwater, bigger fish.

  • They don't go deeper because there's no productive bottom? Or because of limited freediving skills? Does a deep diving spearfisher stand a good chance at taking better fish in Belize then?


    If they could get mid water fish maybe they'd give the little reef fish a chance to recuperate. Maybe you want to show them how to rig a shooting line on their slings.

  • These guys hunt from little one man canoes. They're about 6 to a "mother boat", which is about a 30 foot sailing boat with a small motor.
    I think they stay inside the reef mostly because they split up and are alone most of the time. Maybe they've lost a few to SWB? Not sure. But that's their MO.
    They aren't concerned with long term planning to save the fishery. Belize has established no take zones but they're not enforced because of pressure from these guys. I see them right in the middle of the Southwater Marine Reserve. They do stay away from Hol Chan and the San Pedro tourist areas though.
    But Glovers Reef is almost ALL a marine reserve. I spent 3 days out there a month ago and didn't see one conch inside the reef. Few hogfish. You can tell it's fished pretty heavily.
    The main problem here is education and enforcement of the laws. No money for game wardens.


    But yes, if can get down to 60-80 feet or more and hunt there are fish. This is probably because scuba spearing is illegal.

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member to leave a comment.