A few from Belize - Page 3

hank · 11-29-2010, 11:19 AM

I had big plans yesterday even though we'd kind of missed the days after the full moon. Going to Turneffe, the fishiest place I know in Belize to see if we could scare up another king or maybe even a wahoo. But, my two buddies showed up 2 hours late so that blew the morning session and it's 25 miles out so we kind of have to run home before the evening session gets going or I'll be coming home in the dark.
My son and I gave it a look though. We jumped in and drifted along outside the wall for about a quarter mile. I had a flasher and we saw lots of baitfish, which more than a few times darted down for cover but I didn't see anything.
Jake got bored and decided to go for the dog snappers that had come out to check us out a few times. We found a nice school of them right where the reef top slopes from 40 feet down to about 90. They were playing with us and dropping down deep. We just kept diving down, acting uninterested in them and a few would veer off and come to check us out. I watched Jake nail two of them while I was on the surface. Nice.
A school of permit would cruise by every now and then and these horse eye jacks too. They were more spooky than usual and I had to go down about 40 feet to get a shot.
I lost one dog snapper. I used my big gun with the slip tip on for wahoo. It must have edged the spine and pushed the slide ring hard into the electrical tape I use so it WON'T slide. But it did and I think the slip tip didn't open. I hit him good but he slipped right off.
The day glassed off in the afternoon. Beautiful conditions.

Don Paul · 11-29-2010, 11:36 AM

Nice fish Hank, what brand sliptip is it ?

Cheers, Don

hank · 11-29-2010, 11:40 AM

Wong.

LunkerBuster · 11-29-2010, 11:45 AM

and I see you caught a bag of crisps too..looks like a keeper

sounds like another great day of father / son diving.

hank · 11-29-2010, 04:32 PM

Two fathers and sons. The guy on the right in the picture, is the father of the guy in the back of the console.
Hopefully this is our wahoo team. The other son likes to drive the boat.... so we can drift.
Andre, the other father is from Jamaica and is 71. An inspiration. He feels bad sometimes because "I can't do what I used to do". But he's always the first one in the water.

Don Paul · 11-29-2010, 06:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hank

Two fathers and sons. The guy on the right in the picture, is the father of the guy in the back of the console.
Hopefully this is our wahoo team. The other son likes to drive the boat.... so we can drift.
Andre, the other father is from Jamaica and is 71. An inspiration. He feels bad sometimes because "I can't do what I used to do". But he's always the first one in the water.

That is so bitchin, take good care of those kids.

Cheers, Don

Dan · 11-29-2010, 06:36 PM

Yeah Hank that sounds nice. Sad though about the old guy

I live in fear of when the time comes and I'll say that. I think the only counter to it is to take everything to the highest level I can now, so I won't have any regrets later.

Roberto Reyes · 11-29-2010, 08:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hank

Thanks Roberto. Are you seeing any decrease in fish numbers there since the lionfish came in?

Hank
Very hard to tell, somedays there are sooo many fish, other days no fish, so
its hard to figure out how bad is it.
but, some studies have revealed places were 30% of population is lion fish, imagine that.
Also, seen videos of lion fish eating until fish tails are out of his mouth, stomack streches 30%
while eating.
And of course, you kill them and their bellies always full,always hungry, is not hard to imagine the
worse in a few years.

hank · 11-30-2010, 03:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roberto Reyes

Hank
Very hard to tell, somedays there are sooo many fish, other days no fish, so
its hard to figure out how bad is it.
but, some studies have revealed places were 30% of population is lion fish, imagine that.
Also, seen videos of lion fish eating until fish tails are out of his mouth, stomack streches 30%
while eating.
And of course, you kill them and their bellies always full,always hungry, is not hard to imagine the
worse in a few years.

Whoaa. 30% of the fish biomass is lionfish? They are gluttons. I had two in my aquarium when I lived in Iloilo, Philippines. I would feed them baby shrimp that I'd bring home from the hatchery. I couldn't believe how much they could eat.

I guess our only hope is that the local fish will learn, adapt and hide from the new predator.
If you dive in the Philippines, the reefs are packed with them too, but there are still lots of other fish....unless it's been dynamited.

hank · 12-12-2010, 10:52 AM

Hit our favorite wall yesterday. Water was really green but there was a nice current line where it clearly divided into nice, clear warm water. Lots of grass and weeds on the surface too along the current line. We hunted that edge for about an hour with a flasher but nothing big only a few small ceros showed up. Wrong moon.
I was trying to hide myself back in the green water and hold the flasher out near the clear water. There was that much of a "wall". There was a big school of horse eyes, about 30 nice permit (we don't shoot them though) about 20 nice fat spade fish, barracudas, and some dog snappers and grouper on the bottom. A nice black came up near the surface following a school of 3-8 lb horse eyes. He spooked and dove for the bottom as soon as he saw me though.
We got 2 nice dogs, 2 black grouper, 1 yellow fin or yellow edge? grouper, an 11 lb horse eye, and two barracuda. I shot the cudas for a couple guys on my staff for Christmas. These guys love them.
I tried KitKat bars for flashers. A few fish came in but then I got hungry so that ended.

Note the sweatshirt. It was really cold here yesterday. Lower 60s in the am and evening. Cold ride home.