Tools of the Trade

Slay Day

Had this beautiful Santa Barbara hot sunny Sunday to dive in the ocean who's weather was also chipper with very minimal wave action on a rising neap tide throughout the afternoon. Perfect.

Hit up the homie brosidon who is down to get swooped. Quick seshskies mobbin up the coast. We gear up for freediving and rock the polespears. Bro forgets his fins, "no biggie, take one of mine". Water looks absolutely gorgeous as we suit up. Entering the water is like a dream, soooooo bloody clear. 20-30 feet deep no problem top to bottom and all around. We kick over to the kelp forest. Opaleye are there to meet us. The kook in me thrashes with the one fin in a vein effort to get at the pray. I get a few chances but blow them all eventually spooking the school. Spend some time wrecking lil perch but I get kinda over being a mermaid. Time to man up... I pass my fin to broseidon and swim in.  Huff it up the cliffs, run the trail and hurridly rig up my Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus. Snag the speargun too for good measure.

A few minuets later i''m kicking out to sea resting on my inflated bc like a boat. Once I hook up with divebro I expel the bc and sink like a rock to the ocean floor. Once there I crawl along gun at the ready.

Breathing underwater is one of the most incredible feelings imaginable, it is a truly religious experience. Throw in 100ft visibility and a vibrant ecosystem then arm yourself with modern hunting tools and the attainment of nirvana is possible.

Imagine my joy at being completed with the gift of souped up propulsion. Once my fins were secured I was unstoppable mobbin below the waves. My first worthy victim I ambushed on his afternoon nap. He never saw the it coming. One second he is lazily rocking laterally too and fro in the light surf dreaming dreams of plump kelpfish the next he is reeling from a spear passing through his gill plates. Perfect shot placement. I secure the monster and continue the hunt.

The next fishie to catch my attention I see hanging mid column within a group of strands. On his upper back I can clearly make out a gaping wound with a piece of skin hanging. Looks like him and broseidon have already met. BOOM! I blast him. To the end he puts up a struggle.

Kill a couple more rubberlip head in to shore. Broseidon his surprised to see his fish. Passed straight through below the spine no tear out. I have no idea how that fish managed to get off his slip tip. I see a pair of young spearos heading out. "you boys ready to slay some fish?!?" I yell out as I enter the surf zone.

"I'm not a boy!" one of em replies

by god she's right, doesn't she know diving is for men?

I egg them on showing them the tricks of the trade. Kill a rubberlip with the pole to show em how its done. Seem to be more interested in splashing after smelt. Oh well I make my way shallow. White dots announce the presents of the blue eye. I draw bead after bead, finally I make the connection on a big ol fella. Pin him in a crevace but its no good, a large intestine sits pinned under my spear. Then I see the big kahuna opaleye daddy o King and I know what I must do.

Jump out of the ocean mutter some profanities, ditch the perch and grab the speargun.

Killed dat moddafuckin opaleye fo dinna!

Will Hunt for Food

BBQ

Feast

Two bull male spider crabs and a steak o batray

Yummy yummy in my tummy!

Pus fo dinner

that's right

The Dark Side

Shot a spear gun for the first time in my life today directly into my favorite pray, opaleye!

Batray steaks are filling my freezer

My favorite pastime: killin Opal Eyes

The lil feller was lanced no-band with a thrust. Bitch got owned savage style

Epic mob to Dank Hunting Grounds

Kyle (K5Reefer) was generous enough to invite me to accompany him on a hunting expedition across the Santa Barbara Channel today.

Motoring out of Santa Barbara Harbor at 6am the 4stroke Honda outboard roared to full throttle against the onslaught of sea. Bashing the lil 15ft craft against the crests and troughs cold ocean spray lashed our exposed skin and soaked our previously dry warm cloths while the sun remained hidden behind the fog, I could only hang on for dear life, clinch my teeth and pray to god my body could withstand the occasional jar as the craft landed after becoming air born.

24 nautical miles later we arrived at our destination.

After draining the vain it was time to don the dive gear. Hurriedly we retrieved our tools from the hold. The capn was first in the water.

I splash into the luxurious hunting grounds, decompress my suit, adjust my weight belt and observe.

Many critters roam this reef. None that I can immediately make out to look tasty. Many female sheepshead, one in particular is very adamant about requesting I impale her. Jail Bait

Thorn back ray drifting lazily through the beds...there! A large kelp bass hanging in a semi circle of stalks. I slowly extend my hand, grab a trunk and pull myself forward gently floating toward the creature. He turns about shyly but then comes around to broadside me. All the while I am slowly drifting closer and closer! Eye to eye I aim center stage.

I let fly!

The spear launches high entering the fish between two rays of its dorsal fins. Naturally he escapes to freedom.

The Hunt is afoot! Although I did not land what would have been my first calico bass a specimen is landed aboard the boat nonetheless by capn Reefer!

As we make ready to check some new turf, kyle observes the scene propagating a little offshore. A cloud of birds frenzies the sky with members dive bombing the ocean. A congregation of humans circles the activity.

Must be a bait ball being hunted...

Still in our wetsuits we waist no time throttling it to a little miniature point holding a reef. This time I am first in the water.

My first visual cue was a group of white spots against a background of green.
Opal Eye!
Curious blue eyes examine my addition to their habitat. Choking on my snorkel I rush to retract my horizontally aimed pole spear into something that resembled a firing position and haphazardly thrash downward in a vein attempt to execute a dive all the while the creatures circle each other in two overlapping circles taking turns to say "hello".

A good solid breath of fresh air from my home world straightens me out.

I dive into the group, extend my blessings and wait. The largest of the immediate group floats facing me then slowly arcs across my field of view. With it's blue eye trailed by its monstrous portion of black and blue sheen and the tell tail white marking beckoning... I swear my stomach growled.
But patience is key...I tell myself..
One by one single file they flaunt in front of me. Finally I can take it no more. My pole orgasms right into an unsuspecting opal eye!
Medium sized, sure not underage. I quickly add the dying fish to the stringer and continue diving.
Sure enough I locate the still unsuspecting school and the drama plays out once more. This time I nail a fat old fella. Instead of adding the fish to my stringer I take advantage of the wound in its belly to gut/gill and de-scale the fish. Blood, guts and a sprinkling of corn kernal sized flakes rain on the kelp forest from above.

So much for surprise. The only opal-eye I found from then on was small little children, and only then as they hurriedly swam purposefully through the kelp being damn sure not to talk to strangers.

Saw a large female sheepshead who looked like male. Fish these days

Aboard the "kick back" Kyle informs me that we are going to attempt to catch fish the good ol fashion way.



Kyle hands me an impressive setup of salt water tackle (lure+weight) and throttles his engine to its lowest speed. I watch the reflector flash in the boats wake.

"Did you see that?!?" I exclaim

"yea I saw that what the hell was it?"

"Looks to me like small shark or something" says I

No sooner had my weight hit bottom than my line had given a sharp shake. Excitedly I wrangle in line. Nothing...but maybe? Still new with a heavy weight shaking at the end of a long length off of a moving craft I wasn't sure.
There! a pull this time!
"Fish on fish on!" I exclaim.
But my lure comes up empty...

Feeling like a kook I pay out line once more. Immediately after feeling my weight touch down I feel the unmistakeable sensation of a fish at the end of the threaded line.

Woooooooooeeeeey! Hes fighting!
Kyle readies the impaler hook and my poles tip gets sucked into the sea more than once. Finally I have him near the surface. The creature is brought aboard.

A fearsome barracuda! With gnarly teeth. He must have been playing with the flashy lure since I first put it in the water.



Guess what I catch next like 10 minuets later!!!

WSB


Kyle then hooks a fighting monster which we are sure is it's 50lb brother. After toiling long and hard to fight it up, it ends up being an unwanted batray

Still, he then lands a Ling in the zone where we kept catching kelp from the depths.

With grins as big as jackolanterns we jet into the exposed channel and I gleefully hold on for dear life as we slam, turn and roll, ocean spray drenching everything including my happy sunburned wetsuit wearing being. Way better than any roller coaster.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you Kyle

HCE

Hunt

Cook

Enjoy!

HCE deja vu

Hunted...

Cooked

Enjoyed

HCE

Hunt

Cook

 Enjoy!

Peace Killing

Today I had the opportunity to hunt Santa Cruz off the vessel Peace. I had an awsome experience. This was my first time spearfishing the islands and it didn't disappoint! My first dive at 7am had me chasing a massive school of opaleye right at the bottom of the boat. I finally nailed one right in the face as he was checking me out.

Having secured dinner I relaxed and absorbed the beauty of the forest. Found some pretty cool shells for my collection and munched some uni to the disgust of the boat crew.



I was surprised how few fish were brought aboard with spearfishermen numbering nearly two dozen strong. Everybody with their big guns had sea bass on their mind however the entire day only saw one barely legal specimen landed. Here I am with my lil polespear securing dank seafood while the seabass hunters come home skunked.

The last dive was the most epic. Struggling through thick kelp I finally made it to the near shore shallows with wonderful rock formations. Inside a cave I found what I came for. A resident rockfish met the cold steel of my double flopper tip (thanks namor). After pinning him I reached in to secure my kill and was met with a rude awakening. Lancing pain shot up my thumb and continued to throb like crazy the whole trip back through the insanely thick kelp.

Back on the boat I nursed my poisoned thumb while rigging my fishing pole. I caught a smelt right away but he made good his escape flopping on the deck. Using guts from the rockfish I baited my hooks and fished my lil heart out on those poor smelt while just about everybody else clamored aboard empty handed.

Epic day, fish for dinner tonight!

Urchin fo Breakfast!

Dove the pier and the pipe this morning on scuba. Maybe 5 foot vis but conditions will most certainly improve this afternoon.

We found some breakfast though...

Off the Peir

I got up nice and early this morning. Mobbed on my pre packed motorized bicycle to summer point, the wind and swell and tide was tearing up the beds. Figured Id skip an intense dive swimming against the current. Called up the homies and met up on Goleta peir. Drinkin some brews, no macs striking. We catch 10 tiny baby spider crabs with Jason's crab net.

I decide to take a dip. Jumping in I got cold to the head. Dove with my pole but nothing worthy seen. After loading some mussels on the hooks we go below and climb the crossbeams. At the very end of the peir gibson requests his camera.

I toss it down to him, it goes right on past into the pacific. Quickly I dive after the treasure, locating it shining nice and bright red from the Monterey Shale sea floor. Guarding Gibsons camera was a laviathan...

__________________

Catfish in Redrock

Alex snagging my pole and showing me up

but I caught one of my own

Epic Find

Some bloke walking up from the beach with his kid, I sure wish I had found it

completely intact! wtf

Shoulda chopped the hand and snagged the gold + skeleton!!!

Lobsta fo Breakfast

My first lobster ever.... :)

Caught Night Diving on SCUBA

Mussels fo dinner

Crab fo Lunch

Tools of the trade