Tales From the Logbook--Have Spear, Will Travel

 

While standing in line to cast my ballot in early voting the other day, I struck up a conversation with an avid sport fisherman and car enthusiast.  Our discussion lasted the 40 minute length of the line. He asked if I did a lot of fishing.  I explained that other than a few outings to the local pond with a bamboo pole and plastic red and white bobber when I was a kid, I never developed into a fisherman, unlike my younger brothers.  I did mention that as a diver I did a bit of spearfishing and took shellfish, crab, and lobster.

I recall that on the first day of basic diver certification class, when the instructor, Dave Rowell, asked “why do you want to learn to dive” most student divers responded, “it’s something I always wanted to learn to do” not “I want to kill fish.”  Dave emphasized the need for “marine preservation” throughout the class.  He made it clear that no game was to be taken during the class.  Doing so made practical sense.  Many student divers find learning and mastering the basic skills and knowledge in a short period of time challenging enough.  Adding how to use a pole spear, spear gun, or abalone iron would push task loading to the breaking point. 

Course lectures and the written materials briefly discussed identification of marine species and emphasized avoiding dangerous marine animals over killing tasty ones.  Lectures were more of what the marine environment could do to us, not what we could do the marine environment.  During our training dives we saw a few different fish species.  After the dive, we spoke excitedly of these contacts as encounters with “exotic” species whose name we did not yet know.  I am not sure anyone thought of them as a dinner entrée.  Only at the end of the class, when Dave spoke about local species, did he mention that some could be taken and consumed.

In the 1980s when I started diving, it seemed rare to dive with someone intent on hunting. Lobster seemed to be the exception, it was the most sought after game but many divers’ enthusiasm for going after lobster seemed to quickly wane as the season progressed.  Most divers did not carry abalone irons, gages, or game bags. Those divers that did seemed to do so as an afterthought, taking a shellfish like abalone, rock scallops, crab or lobster opportunistically.  Only one or two divers on a boat of 25 divers might have a pole spear or speargun and fish stringers. 

I decided to give spearfishing a try after a cookout at a friend’s house featuring delicious fish tacos made from locally caught calico (kelp) bass (Paralabrax clathratus) and California sheephead (Bodianus pulcher).  The host of the bar-b-que was an avid skin diving (breath hold or free diving) spearfisher but even he admitted he got most of his fish from line fishing on the various “party boats” out of Santa Barbara Harbor.

Learning the particulars of what species could be taken, when, where and how was largely done on a learn-as-you-go basis.  The most common but highly unreliable source of this information, especially on the “how” came from your peers.  I do not recall a single dive shop in the Santa Barbara area offering a specialty course on how to hunt, collect, and prepare marine organisms for consumption.  Dive shops carried abalone irons, gages, and other tools needed for taking shellfish.  The shops offered a single type of pole spear—the Hawaiian sling attached to a six foot yellow or red fiberglass shaft with a three prong “paralyzer” tip and a very limited selection of spearguns. 

Most shops did not distribute copies of the California Department of Fish and Game regulations. The shop copy was buried amongst the various catalogs, dive magazines, and other information crammed in the neglected magaine rack.    Divers were expected to get personal copies of the regulations when they purchased a fishing license at the local bait and tackle shop or sporting goods store.

Going Spearfishing

On Friday, November 9, 1984, I boarded the Barbara Marie a 42-foot dive boat out of  Channel Island Harbor (Oxnard) with my dive buddy, Mark Bursek.   I recognized the skipper, Mick Kronman, a local commercial fisherman and correspondent for National Fisherman. Mick and I met playing racquetball a couple of years before. He supplemented his income driving the dive boat for Charles Curtis, owner of a Camarillo dive shop.  Mark was a slightly more ripe shade of green than I when it came to spearfishing experience.  The boat did not have an air fill system. The boat’s below deck compartment carried dozens of spare tanks.  Each diver boarded with one full dive tank.  A diver’s empty tank was replaced with a full spare tank.

Mark and I each had a yellow six foot long fiberglass pole spear with paralyzer tip purchased from the same dive shop—Aquatics of Santa Barbara.  We did three dives at Anacapa Island.

Dive Details

Dive	Maximum Depth	Length of dive
1	57 feet	25 minutes
2	45 feet	25 minutes
3	48 feet	36 minutes

 

We targeted calico bass, probably one of the most plentiful and commonly hunted fish.  I had no problem identifying a calico bass, after all, they just kind of hang suspended in the kelp.  Once underwater, the ones I saw looked too small to be of legal size.  All fish look larger underwater than they really are.  Judging a legal-size fish takes practice.  I quickly discovered the larger kelp bass got that way because they had a real knack for sensing when a diver was approaching.  I did notice that the biggest kelp bass would swim leisurely through the kelp but sharply turn and quickly dart away when I or Mark approached.  “They hear the sounds of the regulator and get spooked,” a more experienced spear fisher later explained, “spearfishing with a noisy regulator is kind of like deer hunting accompanied by bagpipes.”Neither Mark nor I of us got calico bass that day.  

Bat Ray Encouter

We did encounter a flight of three bat rays (Myliobatis californica) that swam by us, turned, and then swim back toward us.  The largest had a wingspan of what looked like five feet.  

Marty Snyderman in the book “California Marine Life” notes “bat rays are among the most graceful of marine creatures in California waters.  Watching a bat ray majestically weave its way through a kelp forest is a treat divers never tire of….Bat rays possess formidable barbs located at the base of the tail.  The barb is used as a defense mechanism when the rays feel threatened….if you don’t step on a sleeping bat ray you are highly unlikely to experience a threatening display.”    

They were graceful swimming away from us but looked menacing as they turned and swam toward us.  We reflexively brandished our unslung pole spears in the mistaken belief that the rays could be a threat if they approached too closely.  After all, this was one of the hazardous marine animals that I had learned about only a few months earlier during my basic certification.  They presented no real threat, just a mistakenly perceived one. I attribute that perception to the appearance of the creature and my lack of experience, especially in the dark kelp forest in the waning light of a November afternoon. They just majestically swam past us. I soon realized our defensive posturing was completely unnessecary.

Aftermath

After those three dives my pole spear took up a lengthy exile at the back of my shed, never to emerge until I sold it a few years later.  I did develop an interest in taking shellfish and quickly a hierarchy of preference emerged based on taste, effort to catch, and ease of preparation.  Also, I came to consider that spearing fin fish while using scuba gear is not really sporting. 

Years later, I resumed spearfishing as a means of helping eradicate invasive lionfish while diving in the Caribbean.  I also tried my hand at spearfishing invasive species in Hawaii while freediving.  Those episodes will be described in future tails from the logbook.

Tales from the Logbook--Underwater Pumpkin Carving

 

An old copy of SeaScope, the newsletter of the UCSB Scuba Club, contains the photo shown above of the club’s 1986 Underwater Pumpkin Carving Contest and campout at El Capitan State Beach.  Underwater pumpkin carving contests is a staple of autumn diving.  Yes, it is a slightly esoteric activity, but nonetheless a popular one.  I see announcements for these types of events everywhere there are divers and a body of water.  I got my start in Santa Barbara. 

My First Pumpkin Carving

The UCSB Scuba Club held its event every October, usually the weekend before Halloween, sometimes in conjunction with an overnight campout at one of the nearby beach campgrounds.  My first attempt at underwater carving took place on Sunday, October 28, 1984.  A handful of Club members rented 14-foot aluminum fishing skiffs at Goleta pier, two divers to a skiff.  The pier’s crane lowered the boat into the water and a pair of divers boarded each.  We motored as a group to the nearby kelp beds of More Mesa for our dive.  I learned a lot on that dive.  It was pretty much a series of firsts for me—my first dive with my new buoyancy compensator and Conshelf 14 regulator (which I still use); my first dive from a small boat; the first time I operated a small powerboat; my first post class dive with Lisa W; and my first underwater pumpkin carving. 

According to my dive log, this was my 13^th dive, an accurate harbinger of what unfolded.  Underwater visibility was 20+ feet, my maximum depth was 25 feet, and my time underwater was 25 minutes.  My pumpkin carving technique and result left a lot to be desired;  as did my back roll entry and climb over the freeboard exit.  Entry and exit has to be coordinated and between both divers, one on either side.  Any imbalance could partially flood or capsize the boat.   I will leave it to your imagination to fill in the details.  They largely have been purged from my memory.  I do recollect thinking Lisa was less than favorably impressed with my seamanship, dive technique, and boat handling.

Pumpkin Carving in the Later 80's

In the years following, the Club’s pumpkin carving was done from the beach, either as part of a camping trip or as a single day activity.  If a campout was scheduled with the contest, as it was in in 1985 and 1986, El Capitan and Refugio State Beaches worked great.  Judging was somewhat subjective, with each diver both defending their design while criticizing others.  The judging was accomplished with uproarious laughter.  A consensus candidate eventually emerged, usually the most artistic or most bizarre looking.

In 1987, Halloween fell on a Saturday.  The Club scheduled the pumpkin carving contest for for the prior Saturday, October 24th, at Goleta Beach.  I did not participate in the event that year. I had just started my graduate studies program at UCSB and was swamped with readings, weekly essays, seminar presentations and preparing the 30-page seminar papers.  I recall remarking to my roommate at the time, Dean, a junior studying aquatic biology, “I can’t go out and do underwater pumpkin carving with my friends because my homework isn’t done.”

Dean, on the other hand, had no such time management problem.  He was as carefree and as happy-go-lucky as anyone I had known.  Dean did the pumpkin carving dive.  He brought home a decently carved pumpkin and promptly placed it on the porch with a candle inside.  That October was particularly warm.  Almost immediately, fruit flies took up residence in the decaying flesh of the pumpkin.  A few days later their progeny joined the swarm.  Dean could not understand why I wanted to deep six the carcass on Wednesday night with three days left to go before Halloween.  By Thursday morning the pumpkin had the look of a corpse left too long in the sun and the odor of rotting vegetation.  I placed it in a paper trash bag and tossed it in the dumpster.  Dean was a bit upset when he discovered the pumpkin went missing.  I told him that kids had come through the neighborhood the night before and did a grab and smash. 

Underwater Pumpkin Carving Techniques

Pumpkin carving is pretty straightforward on land and most folks over the age of five likely have done it several times.  Underwater carving involves some special considerations.which I learned from that first dive.

1. A pumpkin is a sealed soft tissue squash with a big internal air cavity.  If not vented, it will float.  It is like trying to submerge an inflated volleyball.  The deeper you go the more it resists.  It needs to be opened and gutted prior to descent.  Failure to do so will make for a difficult descent, although I have not heard of a pumpkin imploding due to increased water pressure.   I have known divers who found it necessary to knife their pumpkins while submerging to kill the buoyancy.
2. Sketching the lines of the design with a permanent marker prior to descent helps.  Creativity on a blank slate that is an unmarked pumpkin seldom occurs spontaneously at depth.
3. Even a gutted pumpkin will have slightly positive inherent buoyancy.  Placing a weight inside the cavity will help keep the pumpkin on the bottom during carving.  A diver may want to also be slightly negatively weighted so as to stay solidly on the bottom while carving.
4. A backroll from a boat or beach entry and descent while holding onto a pumpkin is a bit unweildly.  Place the pumpkin in a goody bag for easier transport to the bottom.
5. Kneel on a sand bottom to carve the pumpkin.  This way you are not disturbing the hard bottom habitat and won't end up with urchin spines in your knee.
6. Do not use a dive knife for the carving.  Most knives that divers wore in the 1980s, the big frigging dive sword variety, were more useful for fighting off sharks and as pry tools rather than as precise cutting blades. 

Tales from the Logbook--Lobster Season Opening Night 1986

 

Most of the divers board Sea Ventures out of Port Hueneme early for the UCSB Scuba Club’s “opening morning” lobster boat.  Lobster season for the California spiny lobster, Panurlirius interruptus, opened at midnight the first Wednesday of October, which fell on the 1^st of the month.  The Scuba Club was offered a much sought after boat charter that year.  We grabbed it.

While waiting for skipper Mickey DeFazio to arrive, the divers milled about the deck in semi-darkness arranging gear in the Ventures’ side bins.  Some divers talked about the proper technique for catching lobster.  Others engaged in conversations that kill time and are quickly forgotten.

The skipper arrived a few minutes late, so the 9:30 p.m. departure time is proportionately delayed.  As the scheduled departure passes, some of the divers grow a bit anxious; concerned that ever minute delayed will be one minute less they are able to look for lobster.  But, we are quickly underway.  Immediately upon clearing Port Hueneme’s breakwater, the boat speed increases as does the swell.  One of the divers in bunks below decks trying to catch a quick catnap says “it’s like trying to sleep on a roller coaster.”  On deck, divers huddle in small groups while others try moving around doing their impression of a loose cannon.

The passage to Anacapa Island is rough.  The pitching and rolling of the boat prevents divers from accessing equipment in the bins to set up their scuba rigs.  About an hour out, a slight change in course indicates that we are heading to the backside of Anacapa.  Other boats report the large swells make diving the front side impractical.  The skipper relays that he intends to go first to Cat Rock, from there we will see how things go.

The swell subsides as soon as the boat passes Arch Rock on the island’s east side.  The ocean’s surface is nearly flat.  The rough passage is quickly forgotten in the animated antics of 28 divers gearing up at the same time.  Each diver believes they will be the first to enter the water, grab a limit of seven lobster and get back to the boat before that last diver enters the water.  Everyone has “bug fever” which is not broken as they giant stride from the boat into the water. 

Visibility at Cat Rock ranges from 6 feet to 20 feet.  In shallow, divers experience a strong surge but lobsters are present.  Immediately on descending, one buddy team spots a “short” lobster (one not of legal size).    They go in shallow where the surge chews up and spits out divers in tight passages.  One diver reports “I see them as the surge pushes me out, they seem to wave “so long” with their antennae as we go by, but they are gone when the surge pulls us back in.”

The surge combined with the lobster’s disinclination to be easily caught makes for a small catch.  As we recover the divers on the stern, a National Park Service ranger paddles up in an inflatable boat to inspect the catch.  He stands off for a few minutes as we recover the last of our divers. Once aboard, as he checks the meager catch, one of the divers asks “what is the proper way to measure a lobster?”  That question piqued the attention of the ranger and he carefully checked each diver’s catch, license, and gages.  Each of the handfull of lobsters is of legal size, every diver has a license, and everyone has a gage.  No surprises or citations.

Mickey decides to move the boat to East Fish Camp, which is a great spot for training dives but also good for lobster on this night.  It also seems to be the one spot that you can dive when the rest of Anacapa proves difficult.  We encounter good conditions.

I descend with my dive buddy and Scuba Club president, Dave Porter.  Dave learned to dive in a class for which I was the assistant instructor a year earlier.  We do a “lights on” descent scanning for urchins in our landing zone. Lobster molts are everywhere acting as decoys. We spot a couple of abalone.  They are untouchable; they can’t be taken at night.  Dave and I head in shallow and ride the surge.  I get bounced around like dice on a Vegas craps table.  We go deep and find a promising ledge.  We spot a large lobster and many tiny lobsters undet the ledge.  A shadow behind the lobster catches my eye and my light reveals one of the largest moray eels I have seen on Anacapa. Shoving your hand in a hole with a moray eel is a surfire formula for getting bit. We move on.

We spot another promising hole, but find it devoid of lobster, occupied by a very large male sheepshead.  We spot another hole.  It contains another sheepshead but no lobster.  We then see antenna sticking out under a cluster of rocks.   Many lobster holes have a "back door" or "escape tunnel." Dave approaches from the front as I move around the back of the rock.  As Dave moves in to grab the lobster, the lobster quickly retreats,  and its tail emerges from the back of the rock. I pinch the tail and extract the lobster.  It ratchets its antennae with the unmistakable grating sound that a pissed off lobster makes.  We measure but it is just a bit short.  We release the critter and it disappears into the darkness with a quick swish of its tail.  

My tank pressure gage tells me our dive is at an end. We surface and inflate our buoyancy compensators and kick on our backs like a couple of contented otters toward the boat’s stern. This dive is one of my best dives to date despite the empty game bag. The bowl of stars overhead, too many to count, is magnificent. 

Back on board everyone has a story about the one that got away.  The winners count their catch, while others scheme about how the next time will be different.  No one is sure why they are out here at 5:00 a.m. They only know they will be back next year.  It is not just the bugs or the tradition of opening night.  It is also the friends gathered in the galley on the way back in.  Some play liars poker, others grumble about attending an early class in a few hours, a couple of people drink champagne toasts to the lobsters in the live well and those left behind, while others crawl into bunks below to grab a well-deserved rest.

Note:  This blog derives from an article I wrote for Sea Scope, the Newsletter of the UCSB Scuba Club, Fall 1986, Volume II, No. 1

Tales from the Logbook--Green Eels and Anenome Fish

 

When I started diving I wanted to explore, covering a lot of territory during the dive.  In an alien environment, everything is new and exciting and I wanted to see it all.  Years passed before I learned the art of picking a spot, hovering over it, and watching what transpired below.  I puffed through a lot of air before I came to appreciate the advantages of staying in one place and judicious observation.

By the time I went to Fiji in 2017, I had pretty much perfected my technique for doing so.  My divelog for Thursday, October 19, recorded my impressions of the three sites in the Vuya Passage:

Location	Depth (ft)	Time (min)	Impression
Humann Nature	55	58	This reef in named for Paul Humann who did a great deal of work at this location for his Fish Identification books.  These are widely regarded as one of the best publications of it type.  This location is loaded with all kinds of fish.  The three minute safety stop at the 15 foot depth is like swimming in an aquarium.
Cat’s Meow	66	42	This site is a small pinnacle.  I swam around its perimeter three times in one dive.  It has a few swim through spots which I did not do because it would have been a tight fit with my tank and I might have damaged the reef.  I did have a chance to see pygmy seahorses and spent time watching Fiji anemone fish in a red anemone at the top of the pinnacle.
Unde Naiable Pinnacle	68	53	Started deep at the outer edge of the pinnacle and moved shallower.  Green eel (video below), swim through, and anemone fish (video below) highlight this spot.  Rough waves on the surface made getting on the skiff and transferring to the boat a bit challenging.

 

Eels have always fascinated me.  While often portrayed in pulp media as a species that will attack humans without provocation, nothing could be further from the truth.  They do look foreboding with their maws agape and their seemingly lifeless eyes.  But, as the Diver Alert Network’s Handbook “diving First Aid for Professional Diver’s notes, “if an animal acts aggressively, it is likely a defensive reaction from a perceived threat.  Examples include putting your hand into a lobster hole only to find that it is also home to a moray eel.”

That is exactly how I came to be bit by a moray eel at Anacapa Island in 2001.  I was on a dive collecting specimens for the Channel Islands National Park underwater video presentation. I spied a lobster’s antennae sticking out under a ledge I swam over.  I thrust my hand under the ledge to grab the lobster when I felt the bite.  Immediately I knew it was a moray eel.  I waited a few seconds until the eel released my finger.  My right index finger had four scalple-like punctures wound through my neoprene glove, two on the top two one the bottom.  I felt pretty dumb because for years I had cautioned students to always look behind the lobster to see if there was an eel behind it.  I thoroughly washed the wound.  While the eels are not venomous, their bite can introduce bacteria. 

In recording video of the green eel, distance, good buoyancy control, and slow movements are key to preventing an encounter.  The same holds true for videos of anemone fish.

I do believe that I could be entertained for hours watching the antics of clownfish and other anemone fish as the swim in and out of the anemone’s tentacles, immune to the effects of its stinging cells.  The National Marine Sanctuary Foundation website describes the partnership as “mutualism because it provides benefits to both animals. Clownfish receive a safe place to live and even prey to eat, and in return clownfish provide food to the anemone, help rid it of harmful parasites, and chase away fish like butterflyfish that feed on anemones. Since clownfish receive such great protection from anemones, they rarely stray far from them, and will even lay their eggs in close proximity to their humble anemone abodes. If a tasty morsel passes by, the clownfish may dart out of the anemone and return once they’ve made their catch. At night, clownfish say safely within the swaying arms of the anemone.”