Guests
Conspearasea, Fishunta, and their buddies Dave, Rob, and Woody. John
Riddick (SB-Redneck) came along to dive in place of Jim Zurbrick who
opted to just to be the bus driver this weekend. It seems that the cold
water has made him misplace his manliness .
Sea Conditions
If you stayed at the the dock this entire weekend then this is the
part where you begin kicking yourself. Saturday was 2-3 laying down
Saturday night to facilitate the hook and lining. It blew up late up to
around 4-5 with a couple bigger rogue waves knocking us awake, and then
progressively laying down all day on Sunday to flat calm on the ride in.
Vis was a spectacular 50'-60' which was amplified by the bright sun
reflecting off the sand surrounding the rock piles we dove. The water
had almost a tropical blue color, and you could almost imagine yourself
in the Bahamas with the TINY exception of the 58-60 degree water. By the
end of the trip my man junk had shriveled up so much from the cold that
I would have been able to fully cover it up with a Post-It note. If
you're coming up to the Hatch any time soon bring some neoprene. We'll
provide the hot water deck hose, fully enclosed cabin, hot soup kitchen,
and dive spots so loaded with fish that you won't have time to think
that the fish box is probably warmer than the Gulf water you're diving
in.......
Slay Report
Three day dive windows seem to more rare this winter than finding a
curly red headed Chinese Presbyterian vegan in Mississippi. In
retrospect, judging from the poor reports of scattered fish in the MG
that I've been hearing about, our local rock pile Plan B trip ended up a
better deal.
Dive conditions were outstanding, and the fish were there in great
numbers. I've noticed that the hogfish have come in big time to the rock
piles like they always do in late winter, and many brownsnouters in the
5-8 pound class were taken. Gags were also in force although with the
great vis, they would spook out onto the hard bottom pretty quick. No
worries, just ignore direct eye contact, and continue slinging up your
hogs and mangos while keeping one eye scanning with your peripheriphal
vision until you see them. Typically in this situation the gags will
hang off 50'-100' from the main structure checking out what's going on.
SLOWLY crawl along the bottom toward them gun pointed out, and they will
become entranced, staring at you straight on. If you do this correctly
you should be in range before you violate their comfort zone, and begin
to make their turn to bug out. This is your moment of opportunity. As
they turn to swin away, you'll get a couple seconds of a full profile. I
lift my gun up slightly so that my shot will strike downward, and not
shoot through the fish, followed by a quick pounce if not stoned because
a speared gag out in the open will run like a beserker for structure.
We had a pretty good gag bite at night which was key for us because a
couple of our guests were mainly hook and liners. Needless to say they
will be diving more on the next trip after they witnessed our ( SB
unedited ) HOD's. For those that have been on the boat before, you can
imagine the whoops, yells, screams, war cries, and plaintive
lamentations that pierced the night air as the groupers slammed our
baits. Fishing on the JR2 has never been a quiet affair, and that's not
even factoring in the post Jolly Dog digestive sonic after effects.
Speaking of which, we are proud to introduce a new entree addition to
the famous Jolly Dog feast which has finally emerged from the test
kitchens at JR2 Corp HQ after years of R&D. The Sloppy Rogers is a
sublime evolution of the sloppy joe which is guaranteed to tantalize
your tastebuds with its secret 26 herbs and spices, and send you into
gastronomic nirvana....
Slaytistics (Realize this was a FOUR tank trip!!!)
Gag Grouper=72
Red Grouper=5
Hogfish=80
Mango Snapper=42
Amberjack=6
Sockeye Salmon=1
AJ Suarez
