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Spearing video from my recent holiday in Miami.
- Thread starterdario_deli
- Start date
Thread Status: Hello
, There was no answer in this thread for more than 60 days.
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Small barracuda are delicious and safe, like 5 lbs and down. Meat is green till you cook it, looks a bit dicey. Bigger ones are poisonous often enough that few Florida locals eat them, also far more rare than they used to be. Most experienced local divers leave them alone.
Permit are illegal to spear in state waters
Loading a gun above the surface is practice for a few divers, including some good ones, , but is generally considered bad practice. It would get you banned from my boat.
Shooting big strong fish freediving in deep water with no shooting line, float, or reel is a good way to experience a BO.
Permit are illegal to spear in state waters
Loading a gun above the surface is practice for a few divers, including some good ones, , but is generally considered bad practice. It would get you banned from my boat.
Shooting big strong fish freediving in deep water with no shooting line, float, or reel is a good way to experience a BO.
Read the regulations before even taking the time to write to my posts. Permit is permitted in Florida, see attached.
Not a problem to be banned from your boat mate, you don't even read regulations. It would be too risky to get a fine. Ah ah ah
Not a problem to be banned from your boat mate, you don't even read regulations. It would be too risky to get a fine. Ah ah ah
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Some people say that barracuda contain ciguatera but if you do a good research apparently ciguatera can be in many other fish. I didn't eat any of those fish and I donated them to the people that took me out fishing. The barracuda were eaten by family and friends of the guy that took me fishing. They have been eating them for many years with no problems whatsoever and said they are very good eating.
In state water, the only legal gear is hook and line. In Federal waters off Florida, spearing is legal. Read the regs carefully. The marine patrol has no sense of humor and tend to have an expansive view of where state waters are.
Ciguatera is a complex phenomenon. Ciguatera symptoms are produced intermittently from many species in southern Florida and the Caribbean. It appears that most predatory fish in the Caribbean have at least some ciguatoxic compounds in them. Most don't have enough to cause symptoms in most people. Large barracuda have a particularly bad reputation for poisoning people, along with yellow jacks. Other species can be particularly bad or clean in different places, amberjack for instance. Some people are either lucky or resistant to the poison(me). Some are not. I have more than a few diving buddies who have had at least one set of symptoms. A few have been more or less permanently screwed up. One friend can no longer eat any fish from the ciguatoxic areas, but those from northern waters cause no problems.
None of the above means you are going to get poisoned. But it does mean that eating large, old predators, like barracuda, is playing with dice that are loaded against you, not a good plan.
Suggest you clean up your attitude.
Ciguatera is a complex phenomenon. Ciguatera symptoms are produced intermittently from many species in southern Florida and the Caribbean. It appears that most predatory fish in the Caribbean have at least some ciguatoxic compounds in them. Most don't have enough to cause symptoms in most people. Large barracuda have a particularly bad reputation for poisoning people, along with yellow jacks. Other species can be particularly bad or clean in different places, amberjack for instance. Some people are either lucky or resistant to the poison(me). Some are not. I have more than a few diving buddies who have had at least one set of symptoms. A few have been more or less permanently screwed up. One friend can no longer eat any fish from the ciguatoxic areas, but those from northern waters cause no problems.
None of the above means you are going to get poisoned. But it does mean that eating large, old predators, like barracuda, is playing with dice that are loaded against you, not a good plan.
Suggest you clean up your attitude.
Dario,
No where in my posts is there any assumption about the video showing state or federal waters. Nor does it matter.
I guess you correctly assumed that I did not like your video. I should have explained why in my first post. Please accept my apologies and here goes.
Videos like yours, posted on DB, will be seen by all sorts of divers, including those much less experienced than you. They will, understandably, assume that what they see is a good way to do it, not realizing that the gun rig is dangerous when used as pictured, that loading a gun above the water can lead to some horrendous accidents unless the diver is very very careful,that shooting permit only ok in some places, not realizing that this will be a hot button issue for some marine patrol officers or realizing that they need to be extra careful where they are, thinking that its OK to go out and slaughter lots of old, slow growing, large predators, and since somebody must be eating those barracuda, they must be good to eat, not realizing that big ones have a well deserved reputation for poisoning people. People see such videos, go out and do stupid stuff, end up dead, poisoned or arrested, and my sport suffers. Having been an avid spearo in Florida and the Bahamas for almost 50 years as well as a fishery biologist actively involved in fishery management, I've seen the results of such videos more than once, and don't like it.
No where in my posts is there any assumption about the video showing state or federal waters. Nor does it matter.
I guess you correctly assumed that I did not like your video. I should have explained why in my first post. Please accept my apologies and here goes.
Videos like yours, posted on DB, will be seen by all sorts of divers, including those much less experienced than you. They will, understandably, assume that what they see is a good way to do it, not realizing that the gun rig is dangerous when used as pictured, that loading a gun above the water can lead to some horrendous accidents unless the diver is very very careful,that shooting permit only ok in some places, not realizing that this will be a hot button issue for some marine patrol officers or realizing that they need to be extra careful where they are, thinking that its OK to go out and slaughter lots of old, slow growing, large predators, and since somebody must be eating those barracuda, they must be good to eat, not realizing that big ones have a well deserved reputation for poisoning people. People see such videos, go out and do stupid stuff, end up dead, poisoned or arrested, and my sport suffers. Having been an avid spearo in Florida and the Bahamas for almost 50 years as well as a fishery biologist actively involved in fishery management, I've seen the results of such videos more than once, and don't like it.
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You are right, just seen you wrote state waters. No problem for me, to be totally honest I got the barracuda only because the boat owner told me to catch them as he wanted them. Also I was there for only a few days so I wanted to catch some big fish as where I come from a 10lb is a huge fish. Unfortunately those days there were not other good fish to catch. Some groupers but forbidden at that time of the year. Had just 3-4 days and took the most out of it. We looked for wahoo, mahi mahi and cobia with no luck.
Loading the gun out of the water is not dangerous, pointing the gun at somebody is dangerous. In or out it doesn't matter. Personally, I wouldn't eat big barracuda, these guys I was with eat them nearly every day and they are fine. It could be as you say however I was reading that many other fish can have ciguatera in those waters but I don't really know.
Loading the gun out of the water is not dangerous, pointing the gun at somebody is dangerous. In or out it doesn't matter. Personally, I wouldn't eat big barracuda, these guys I was with eat them nearly every day and they are fine. It could be as you say however I was reading that many other fish can have ciguatera in those waters but I don't really know.
Completely understand the desire to shoot big fish, been there, done that. The adrenalin rush is hard to beat. Not being from Florida, there's no reason you should be aware of the background.
