a nice day spearing.......NOT!

    Got invited today by my friend junior and some new guy to go hit some spots around Fajardo today. We hit a spot were junior had seen some lobsters and a few samas last week, so I wanted to try the riffe m\t2s that i bought a while back and left my ''custom'' 120 in the boat. There was nothing really big in that spot plus the current was really strong so we decided to try another spot close to ''Cayo Largo'' known to hold some nice hogs. On the way back to the boat I spot a large shape at the end of vis which was like 25f in 40fsw. It turned out to be a big ass cuda like in the 80# range probably the biggest one i seen. Inmediately I wished I had the bigger gun but anyway I dove and leveled and tried to get as close as possible and fired the shot. Hit that monster right in the middle of the gill plate but the shaft did not even go past the flopper :0. So ''se fue con la chola ardiendo''. Anyhow we got back to the boat and moved to the next spot. Since the first one was cleaned up we decided that j.r check it first and then we jump in or move. Since j.r kept going and didn't say anything I decided to jump in and check it out myself. The place was full of big parrots but no hogs, samas and only small lobster. I went back to the boat only to find the new guy seasick sitting in the transom so I jumped in the boat and waited for j.r to decide our next move while sitting in the stern taking my gear off we didn't noticed that the rubber boot that seals the splash well hole where the steering cable comes out of the hull was torn and water was getting in the bilge real fast combined with our weight in the back and the building seas the boat started to take even more water. We went to the front of the boat and noticed the water in the bilge so I told the new guy to start the bilge pump and I called j.r who was coming back and started to bail water. When j.r came close I told him to check the bottom of the hull for a crack or something since we'd checked the drain plug and was still in place but he found nothing. He got in the boat and tried starting the boat to no avail so he started bailing but the situation stated to get worse so I told him to better start calling someone real fast, meanwhile I started to put my gear back on in case we had to swim back to shore. There were no boats around us to signal for help. I tied a big round buoy to 50' of line so we could locate the boat in case it sank .Stuff started floating around when I noticed between the gas tank and bottom of rear deck the water coming thru so I told the new guy to stuff a rag in the hole left by the torn rubber boot. Meanwhile j.r got in touch with the maritime police and they were on their way along with Sea Tow. We started gaining ground since we had discovered where the water was coming thru as the maritime police got there. They collected all our valuables in case we got swamped but we kept bailing cause we were trying to save the boat. I looked funny bailing water with an ice chest in full gear minus wetsuit and gun, hell I even had my fins on...:laughing3: Sea tow got there but we were winning the battle with the water and just waited until we got the water out and only jump started us. So we picked up anchor and chased the maritime police to get our gear back at the dock. So thanks God we were able to save the boat :thumbsup2: and proceeded to take it out only to snap a leafspring on the trailer on the way out:angry5: but thats another story.............


    Sorry no pics camera got wet:(

    Two ''short'' 5/8 , 5/16 shaft with riffe's big spearpoint ( which I don't like) but it came with it. I shot the fish from kind of far from the gun for it was wary and didn,t allow to get any closer (about 10- 12 feet).BTW they do get big my pb is 46# but on rod and reel, and this one was way bigger than that, I probably exagerated the size on this one(closer to 60+) but world record is over 85# and you know how we fishermen are.........:D

    Ahh it was that big double barb spearpoint. Also two 5/8 bands may be a little weak for an 8mm shaft and that big point.


    Here's Pantoja's 40 pounder, the biggest one I've ever seen.



    And another biggy which we never weighed. Sorry to clutter your thread with my pics, I just wanted to be reminded how impressive those big cudas are. Were you rigged with a float line and float? I believe in open water that thing could've taken a speargun with a reel if the shot didn't hurt it.


    Thats a nice one. Do you know how tall is he? Just to give me some perspective cause the one I saw today seemed bigger than that one.

    I believe that some fish like ''cudas'' and snook put more weight and ''thickness'' but not much more length after they start to grow real big. I dont know if you notice how a smaller specimen looks slimmer but larger ones look thicker. Sorry I'm slow typer and didn't see your question between pics. Now that I think about it it was probably for the best I didn't spear it since I only had a 30' float line (I am not a deep diver and usually hunt 15-25 ft) and the fish would probably would had bolted to the nearby channel.

    No, I added the second pic and the question a little later.


    It would've been a hell of a ride though :)


    Here's the world spearfishing record for the great barracuda, 64.88lb shot by Paul A. Smith in Okinawa Japan Oct. 5 200g. The pic always looked photoshopped to me however http://iusarecords.com/twenty_first_century_record_list.php



    From http://marinebio.org/species.asp?id=108

    Quote

    The world's record on hook and line is a 1.7 m great barracuda taken in the Bahamas that weighed 46.72 kg.

    Yep, this got me thinking and found the same info on the marinebio.org site. That's roughly 102lb and 67'' long. Soooo I go back to my 80lb ''estimate'':D After all you know how we fishermen are......:D

    It makes me wonder if spearfishers are more prone to this than hook & line fishermen. After all they can only exaggerate about what they caught :fishing2: we can also exaggerate about what we saw :shark1:

    Remember, everything looks bigger underwater so technically what we ''see'' is bigger than what it is...


    Now let me tell you about that 70# yellowtail snapper that I ...................:D

    I'm 5.6 . that pic you posted dan , looks like fotoshop for sure. some time ago I saw a card with records and stuff and it said cuda was 100 lb. :0

    that second video is nuts...no guts or head and still that much residual energy in the spine and flesh ...that is crazy...so theoretically even a spine shot might not stop em

    i like to spear fish

    it happened to me once that we killed a tiger shark , I guttd the thing and about 10 to 15 minutes later it tried to bite me. it was dead allright but still the thing tried to bite me. i guess I had to chop off the head.

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