First Fish

Its been quite some time since I've been able to post any reports due to an extremely demanding work schedule and home life. Sadly, there has not been a lot of time in my life for diving.

I got a call earlier this week from my regular dive buddy, who happens to be working out of state, as am I; that he would be home this weekend and wanted to go diving. My wife, who has just recently been introduced to spearfishing was going out for her first full-fledged spearfishing trip where the intent was to get her on some fish.

I bought her the basics some time ago; mask, fins and snorkel. I recently picked up the new Speardiver suit for her. She has missed out on some trips because of the lack of a suit that was appropriate for the water temps which have been in the high 60s.

We didn't have a lot of time to make a long offshore run, so we stuck to the closer rigs. The water was really dirty. We had about 3-5' of viz. A little tough to shoot fish in, especially with a 120cm gun. I made due with the conditions and promptly loaded the boat with some pretty healthy Sheephead. We had quite a few in the 5-8lb range.

My wife, who has only made one dive with us, thus far, finally got her chance to get back in the water. She has been itching to get back in and get a fish. The last trip she went on, she managed to shoot a fish, but lost it to Davey Jones, and probably at least 1 or 2 sharks out the 40-50 that were under the boat that day:D

We stuck to the surface. We got up in a corner of the rig and I told her to just hold out the gun and wait for the fish to swim in front of the gun. She could barely see the tip of the shaft. Several really nice fish swam right in the front of the gun but she never saw them. After about 15 minutes of this a really nice one came in. I started yelling "shoot! Shoot!" through my snorkel. It was pretty comical. I saw the fish turn and go down and I am thinking that she missed another opportunity. But she pulled the trigger and I see the shafte go down. I'm thinking there is no way she hit that fish and then the line shooting line goes tight and starts veering off to the left. Fish on!

We get the line pulled back in and to her delight, there was not one, but two nice Sheephead on the shaft! A double on the third time she's ever pulled the trigger on a gun:cool2:

Thanks for the kind words all.
My wife is definitely hooked. She can't wait to get her first cobia.

Dan, the suit fit well with the exception of the shoulder and arms. It was baggy in that area, but the suit sealed well at the wrists and ankles. The hood was a little large but her long hair filled most of it out. The face seal would be better if it were a bit smaller. The length was good all around. She was very pleased with the color. It was a surprise for her:)