Howzit from Hilo

  • Howzit,
    Stoked to finally be on this forum after years of lurking.
    Born and raised in Hilo, Hawaii. Been fishing and diving since I was young, got really into spearfishing in 2009 after graduating high-school. Im a senior Marine bio major at UHH and Im currently working on my thesis on ciguatera fish poisoning in Hawaii. Ive built some guns, wood and carbon, using a lot of information from this forum so I hope to continue the legacy of helping my fellow spearos out. Look foreward to conversing with you guys and gals in the future.

    Mahalo piha,
    Josh

  • Welcome Josh.


    Jake, who is on here and is also my son, is moving to Kona next week to work for SIS shrimp breeding company. I'm sure I'll be visiting there soon. Also have a daughter in Kaneohe. Her grandfather is Jack Randall. He knows a bit about ciguatera in Hawaii.

  • Thanks Hank and Dan,


    I have a friend working at NELHA at the shrimp farms, I believe they supply larvae to food production facilities. He gets free growout shrimp weekly and supplies us with 5lb bags of fresh frozen shrimp. Great place to work in aquaculture.


    I believe Ive used Jack's books as a reference in almost every paper I've written. He's a legend.

  • Welcome. Use to be a Kona boy for a long time but moved to the mainland. Is that an Ulua in your avatar? What's the story behind that monster?

  • Thanks for the welcome all,
    Hookinfish, yeah its an ulua, largest fish landed with a spear so far, at 98lbs.
    Went out looking for ulua houses at one of our frequented dive spots the day before, and found a nice house we'd all heard about but hadnt found yet. Checked it, only a small Omilu (blue fin trevally) was home. We ended up swimming back and I hit my record depth at the time 98'.
    Next day, my other buddy who had to work the day before needed fish for a bbq and fish fry. We set out with our three prongs with a goal of just shooting Kole (gold eye surgeon) bringing our guns just in case some dumb mus or ukus came around. After shooting about 30 kole a piece my buddy Tom started following this mu pile and ended up dive bombing one, so the hunt was on. After chasing mu and some skiddish omilu around the current had taken us back to the house from yesterday. I went down not expecting much and a fat Ulua swims up to the front entrance of the cave. Everything is in slow motion now, I line up the shot with my 120 roller and bam....almost perfect stone shot....almost. Tip barely nicks the fishs brain and probably turned out the lights. With the shaft imbeded in her head the Ulua starts circling the cave entrance smashing into rocks and coral. I try to play the fish lightly so the shaft doesnt pop out. During ascent i signal to my partner that I shot something and he should back me up. He does....and misses point blank....yup. My shaft ends up pulling out as Tom reloads his gun, im yelling at him to hurry up. lol ME: "reloaadd Tom!!" TOM: "SHIIIIIITTT!". Toms gun is loaded, line wrapped all hamajang. I re wrap it in what feels like forever as the fish is swimming blind on the bottom at around 65'. I make a dive, thank god the fish has lodged itself between two massive boulders, and didnt swim the other direction into the deep, I shoot it on the top of the head, i miss the stone but the flopper is securely engaged in the fishs mouth/gill area. I horse the fish up after Toms reel line gets tangled in the bands. At this time the fish throws up an entire Kala (unicorn fish) estimated at 3-4 lbs. I gill the fish and attempt to brain it using a 4 inch skindiver knife, while tom helps me out with a slightly larger skeleton knife stabbing the fish a little too close to my face. After we have the fish secured I praise god and scream some profanities in my excitement and joy. We swim back to shore, guarding the fish from potential taxation. We get out, pull the buoy up to the rocks, clip on buoy breaks from the weight of the fish. I jump back in with no fins or mask. Pass the tail up to Tom. We hoist the fish up. And for the next half hour or so carry the fish up a sketchy ass rocky cliff. Once we get to my car, I estimated the fish to be only around 60 lbs and attribute the struggle carrying it to dehydration and dive strain. We take the fish to S. Tokunaga's (local fishing and sporting goods store) to get a certified weight.....and Holy shit 98lbs. Im stoked, just shy of a hundo but in my eyes when i shot it it was over 100lbs, too bad she had to throw up. After we got the weight, we took the fish to Toms and cleaned it up. Pulling another 3-4 lb kala from its stomach and discovering some big egg sacks. We dig a hole, throw the guts and carcass. Strip the meat out, soak it, and have smoked fish for what seemed like forever.:thumbsup2::thumbsup2: No cig either.

  • Thanks for the welcome all,
    Hookinfish, yeah its an ulua, largest fish landed with a spear so far, at 98lbs.
    Went out looking for ulua houses at one of our frequented dive spots the day before, and found a nice house we'd all heard about but hadnt found yet. Checked it, only a small Omilu (blue fin trevally) was home. We ended up swimming back and I hit my record depth at the time 98'.
    Next day, my other buddy who had to work the day before needed fish for a bbq and fish fry. We set out with our three prongs with a goal of just shooting Kole (gold eye surgeon) bringing our guns just in case some dumb mus or ukus came around. After shooting about 30 kole a piece my buddy Tom started following this mu pile and ended up dive bombing one, so the hunt was on. After chasing mu and some skiddish omilu around the current had taken us back to the house from yesterday. I went down not expecting much and a fat Ulua swims up to the front entrance of the cave. Everything is in slow motion now, I line up the shot with my 120 roller and bam....almost perfect stone shot....almost. Tip barely nicks the fishs brain and probably turned out the lights. With the shaft imbeded in her head the Ulua starts circling the cave entrance smashing into rocks and coral. I try to play the fish lightly so the shaft doesnt pop out. During ascent i signal to my partner that I shot something and he should back me up. He does....and misses point blank....yup. My shaft ends up pulling out as Tom reloads his gun, im yelling at him to hurry up. lol ME: "reloaadd Tom!!" TOM: "SHIIIIIITTT!". Toms gun is loaded, line wrapped all hamajang. I re wrap it in what feels like forever as the fish is swimming blind on the bottom at around 65'. I make a dive, thank god the fish has lodged itself between two massive boulders, and didnt swim the other direction into the deep, I shoot it on the top of the head, i miss the stone but the flopper is securely engaged in the fishs mouth/gill area. I horse the fish up after Toms reel line gets tangled in the bands. At this time the fish throws up an entire Kala (unicorn fish) estimated at 3-4 lbs. I gill the fish and attempt to brain it using a 4 inch skindiver knife, while tom helps me out with a slightly larger skeleton knife stabbing the fish a little too close to my face. After we have the fish secured I praise god and scream some profanities in my excitement and joy. We swim back to shore, guarding the fish from potential taxation. We get out, pull the buoy up to the rocks, clip on buoy breaks from the weight of the fish. I jump back in with no fins or mask. Pass the tail up to Tom. We hoist the fish up. And for the next half hour or so carry the fish up a sketchy ass rocky cliff. Once we get to my car, I estimated the fish to be only around 60 lbs and attribute the struggle carrying it to dehydration and dive strain. We take the fish to S. Tokunaga's (local fishing and sporting goods store) to get a certified weight.....and Holy shit 98lbs. Im stoked, just shy of a hundo but in my eyes when i shot it it was over 100lbs, too bad she had to throw up. After we got the weight, we took the fish to Toms and cleaned it up. Pulling another 3-4 lb kala from its stomach and discovering some big egg sacks. We dig a hole, throw the guts and carcass. Strip the meat out, soak it, and have smoked fish for what seemed like forever.:thumbsup2::thumbsup2: No cig either.


    Good story. Get it together Tom lol.

    Scupper Pro Gives You Wings!

  • Can you still buy the cig kits? I remember they use to sell them and some people would even test for you.


    I believe the Ciguacheck test kits were discontinued, due to them being unreliable and showing false positives and negatives. This may have been user error, but at $10.00 a kit(fish) they were just not making money. All of my thesis samples are tested in the lab using a mammalian neuroblastoma assay (N2a) followed by liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MS). I believe these are the most reliable methods for detecting CTX, and determining relative toxicity.


    Personally, I tend to avoid cig prone fish. But I was taught to eat what I catch, so i try to eat at least a small piece of each every fish I catch (other than Roi).

  • Dr Randall tells me it's crazy to eat those big Uluas. But he always gives me shit for eating the bigger snappers we get here in Belize too. It's pretty bad if you get it so he figures, why risk it.
    Too bad about the Roi being prone to Cig. They're everywhere on Oahu now. Like the lion fish here…..:(

  • Dr Randall tells me it's crazy to eat those big Uluas. But he always gives me shit for eating the bigger snappers we get here in Belize too. It's pretty bad if you get it so he figures, why risk it.
    Too bad about the Roi being prone to Cig. They're everywhere on Oahu now. Like the lion fish here…..:(


    Yeah, Roi tastes so gooood too! I ate a medium sized one years ago before I knew what cig was. Flakey, white grouper meat.


    I agree with Dr. Randall, most large reef fish here will probably have a little cig. Interestingly, I shoot most of my fish on the east side of Hawaii island, which is said to be less prone to CFP. This idea is the basis of my thesis, comparing two sites on the island, east vs west. So far, over 90% of Roi collected from the west side are hot, with only 40% of Roi being cig positive from the east side.

  • I have heard that the golf courses on the west side are one of the causes for increased cig as all the fertilizers drain into the ocean. I heard roi is supposed to be awesome tasting. I just used them for chum though cause cig is real bad. I know my teacher in high school had it when he was living in Samoa. He didnt eat fish for years. Are lobster prone to getting and transmitting cig? What about tako?

  • Yeah that, one theory, the eutrophication may cause a plankton (G.toxicus) bloom. But in places less developed there is still a problem. I think its the lack of a biological barrier, where streams flow out to sea. West side is very arid, little terrestrial plants to soak up the nitrogen so most of it flows out to sea. Also its hotter and saltier, better environment for dinoflagellates of that genus to grow.


    Ive heard of odd cases from tako and lobster, none really confirmed tho. Lobster and tako arent really in the same food pyramid as fish. Tako i highly doubt, They don't really feed on fish, and they only live up to two years in general. I doubt they would be able to accumulate very much of the toxin to cause sickness. A large roi (>48cm) on the other hand can be over 20 years old.

  • Yeah, Roi tastes so gooood too! I ate a medium sized one years ago before I knew what cig was. Flakey, white grouper meat.


    I agree with Dr. Randall, most large reef fish here will probably have a little cig. Interestingly, I shoot most of my fish on the east side of Hawaii island, which is said to be less prone to CFP. This idea is the basis of my thesis, comparing two sites on the island, east vs west. So far, over 90% of Roi collected from the west side are hot, with only 40% of Roi being cig positive from the east side.


    Jack told me a theory on Cig a long time ago. He said the dinoflagellate Gambierdiscus, that produces the toxin, is very similar to the lichens that are the first to populate a new lava flow (not sure how long that takes) And this was why Cig was rather rampant in the S Pacific after WW2. The US and Japan both dynamited reef structure to get material to build airfields and roads on the islands. The dinoflagellate quickly grew on the newly exposed calcium cabonata.


    If that's true, it makes sense that parts of the Big Isle with new lava flows interring the water may have higher levels of Cig?

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