Dealing with flag/float line handle while lobstering

[Scuba-74]

Thanks for all the valuable advice, guys!

Sounds like the Northeast hunters mostly use weights, and Florida guys use hooks. So I guess I'll start with 1-2 pounds of weight, and see how this set up works in mild current. It's great to have at least couple of options to try.

 

[Rred]

If you're required to stay within 100' of the flag, and there's ANY small patch of sand or mud or gravel where you will lobstering? Go to any pet store or hardware store, they sell those ground screws that you screw into the lawn (or the sand!) and clip a dog lead to. Screw into the sand, attach your float, staying within a 100' radius of it should keep you legal and make it easy.

 

[scubadada]

If you're required to stay within 100' of the flag, and there's ANY small patch of sand or mud or gravel where you will lobstering? Go to any pet store or hardware store, they sell those ground screws that you screw into the lawn (or the sand!) and clip a dog lead to. Screw into the sand, attach your float, staying within a 100' radius of it should keep you legal and make it easy.

Not a viable solution for drift diving is SE FL.

 

[MAKO Spearguns]

We offer an excellent, easily towable float, a hook and a reel combo in a discount package for this exact application.

SCUBA Divers Surface Float Package | Mako Spearguns

 

[Scuba-74]

If you're required to stay within 100' of the flag, and there's ANY small patch of sand or mud or gravel where you will lobstering? Go to any pet store or hardware store, they sell those ground screws that you screw into the lawn (or the sand!) and clip a dog lead to. Screw into the sand, attach your float, staying within a 100' radius of it should keep you legal and make it easy.

With 10'-12' visibility we often have around here, I know it would be very hard for me personally to find a flag that I left 100 feet behind, unless I follow exactly the same path back, which is kind of awkward if one wants to cover as much area as possible. But I would like to hear opinions of more seasoned divers if this is a good option at least at some sites.

 

[Rred]

Drift diving? For lobsters?
I suppose, but I'm used to more of going to a spot and then getting under and into the places the bugs may be. Whisking by them on a drift dive would be new to me. Especially drift diving without having the boat up there someplace, which places the flag obligation on the boat, not the divers.
You do beach drift dives for bugs??

74-
If you're doing a line dive, no, that wouldn't work. But if you were doing an area, where a grid or circling was possible, the anchored flag would work. Diving in restricted visibility...I guess I'm spoiled from NY, where the dive flag on a diver usually just means "Hey Bozo! Bring that watertoy over here!" More of a curse than a blessing. Of course we pay for that by not being allowed to use tickle sticks, you have to prepare for armed combat. Not the same as Florida at all.(G)

 

[Johnoly]

Drift diving? For lobsters?... I suppose,...

2 weeks ago I was pre-scouting for our season opening day on 8/6, and current was ripping that day.
I drifted 1.6 MILES in 40 minutes in 85 ft deep.
Like @Scuba-74 said, we have to cover alot of real estate underwater to fill the cooler.

 

[Scuba-74]

74-
If you're doing a line dive, no, that wouldn't work. But if you were doing an area, where a grid or circling was possible, the anchored flag would work. Diving in restricted visibility...I guess I'm spoiled from NY, where the dive flag on a diver usually just means "Hey Bozo! Bring that watertoy over here!" More of a curse than a blessing. Of course we pay for that by not being allowed to use tickle sticks, you have to prepare for armed combat. Not the same as Florida at all.(G)

I've started both shore diving in the Northeast and lobstering this May (only did charters before), and as much as I hate towing the flag, it does give me some sense of security when I know there are boats above me.

I guess I see how your plan might work at some of the sites here. Yesterday I was diving along the wall covered in crevices, and I guess I could have placed a flag at one end of that wall, and then start zigzagging back and forth gradually ascending, and at some point just pull the line up. Most sites I've been to around here are more like mazes of boulders and reefs, where you follow your compass for general direction, but chances of you going back to the exact spot are slim to none, and even if you are 15 feet from your flag line, you won't see it. Maybe when I dive each site 2-3 times I'll get a better sense of where I could try to plant a flag.

 

[mmerriman]

How much weight do you put, about 1lb?

ankle weight - 1.5# I'm shore diving in New England - not much current. I realize if I were in current I'd need more weight, or a hook

 

[mmerriman]

Thanks for all the valuable advice, guys!

Sounds like the Northeast hunters mostly use weights, and Florida guys use hooks. So I guess I'll start with 1-2 pounds of weight, and see how this set up works in mild current. It's great to have at least couple of options to try.

my buddy attaches his line to the bag, and puts a 2# weight in the bag..