Lionfish cull on Grand Cayman, everybody welcome

[Dave_lucas]

I am bummed that we will miss it by a few days but excited to be back in GC to dive with our friends at divetech!

 

[scoobydrew]

Looking forward to it Dave, I'll fill you in when you get here

 

[master_diver_UJ]

Hey Drew:

My wife and I are flying in this Saturday - any chance I can get through the D.O.E. non-resident license course on Saturday & be out there harvesting on Sunday??

Let me know.

John

 

[divesergeant]

Hey Drew:

My wife and I are flying in this Saturday - any chance I can get through the D.O.E. non-resident license course on Saturday & be out there harvesting on Sunday??

Let me know.

John

Now that's what I call getting right to it! Fly in and train one day, and start hunting the next. Wish I were there.

I see we're fleeing the same area here in S/E Michigan. Kind of wish we'd have left last weekend and missed the sloppy wet stuff that dumped on us the last day and a half.

 

[master_diver_UJ]

Hey Sarge:

I figure why not. While in Cayman last year, the group I was diving with found a small school of Lionfish on the North wall. The dive op I was with let me spear one of them - and we all took turns feeding them to the fish around us. I thought is was great fun & I'd like to help. Plus, any excuse to get underwater....

Actually, I need to change that part of my profile. My wife and I moved from SE Michigan (Novi) last October & now live a little north of Traverse City (Torch Lake - if you know where that is).

The dive community is a small one; maybe I'll have the opportunity to meet & dive with you some day.

Anyway, have a great day.

John

 

[scoobydrew]

Hey Drew:

My wife and I are flying in this Saturday - any chance I can get through the D.O.E. non-resident license course on Saturday & be out there harvesting on Sunday??

Let me know.

John

John

Hey there buddy, it's too late to compete in the event itself but if you want to do the course on Saturday and shoot fish on Sunday then it'll be possible. A colleague of mine is currently free and very able to teach the DoE course on Saturday and we have space on the boat on Sunday where you would be able to use our spears.

If you'd like to make a booking then drop a line to reservations@divetech.com

As I mentioned before, there are other operators on island who can teach the DoE course and facilitate culling.

Either way, feel free to come along to Dukes on Saturday or Sunday night to see how things are going. I think Sunday will be more of a party as it'll be the end of the tournament.

Best regards & safe diving

Drew

 

[divesergeant]

Hey Sarge:

I figure why not. While in Cayman last year, the group I was diving with found a small school of Lionfish on the North wall. The dive op I was with let me spear one of them - and we all took turns feeding them to the fish around us. I thought is was great fun & I'd like to help. Plus, any excuse to get underwater....

Actually, I need to change that part of my profile. My wife and I moved from SE Michigan (Novi) last October & now live a little north of Traverse City (Torch Lake - if you know where that is).

The dive community is a small one; maybe I'll have the opportunity to meet & dive with you some day.

Anyway, have a great day.

John

Be sure to try some lionfish as table fare. Light, flaky white meat and quite delicious while not over-poweringly fishy.

Beautiful country up near Torch. Especially for water people. Still, you won't catch me diving up there, too damn cold!

 

[scoobydrew]

So, here's how it ended.

Conditions on the weekend were tough so everyone did well to bring in a total of 1,339 fish. A record was set for the smallest lionfish in the tournament's history at 19mm.

What I found interesting was that the weather on the weekend meant that only the south and west of the island were diveable. Anyone who spears lionfish in Grand Cayman knows that down to around 130 feet, there are very few left on the west coast due to volume of spear fishing activity, as such the majority of teams headed south out of Red Bay. I first dived this area 2 years ago and was amazed by the amount of lionfish there. It wasn't uncommon to find groups of 20-30 hanging out together. Over the weekend I did 8 dives on a rebreather and, like my 4 teammates and members of other teams noted that the numbers have dropped significantly, it really was hard finding the fish.
So I guess in this little part of the world, the culling activity seems to be working.

Thanks to everyone involved in this event and the wider lionfish control program.

 

[divesergeant]

Casey's crew at Neptune's Divers is who we dive with. Looks like they did well, especially for such a small outfit.

I can only imagine the fish fries going on right now.

 

[mi000ke]

I dove with Casey and Neptune Divers this past Friday, Sunday and Monday. Great operation and glad to see they took some honors. We didn't see any lionfish so seems to be working, at least down to 70 fsw or so.