Bahamas.. Pole spearing

[johnny7]

Hi,

I recently got into Pole spears after always using spearguns, and i am hooked...

here are a few pics of some fish i caught in Bahamas and thanks so much Aaron for such an awesome Spear and a pleasure to deal with you.

http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/1654/cuberaverticalsv0.jpg

http://img516.imageshack.us/img516/2805/grouper8thjuly2dn1.jpg

http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/2565/8thjulyfishud6.jpg


:D

[jbspear91]

wtf....what kinda spear/harpoon is that in the first one??? but some great fish you got their....

[SeaWeed]

Those are some realy nice fish John.

[jmik90]

wtf....what kinda spear/harpoon is that in the first one??? but some great fish you got their....thats a polespear

[OceanEd]

Congratulations. Looks like you are using one of Aaron Christ's pole spears?

[Man-O-War]

Nice Johnny!!!

[johnny7]

Thx Guys,

how ya doin Davie ? hope to catch up soon mate.

Yes Stephen it is an Aaron Crist Pole Spear and i love it :D thanks to your good advice mate, 8,2 with 18" shaft i think or was it 12 " unfortunately we didn't make it to the Jumentos...weather wasn't right...we just got as far South as long Island.

;)

[pantoja73]

I see you are having fun over there. very nice fish. I was just talking to my brother about going over there some time.

[johnny7]

I see you are having fun over there. very nice fish. I was just talking to my brother about going over there some time.

VAMMMMOOOSSSSSS :D

[ApneaSpearo]

Nice fish Johnny! Is that a big dog in the first pic? It's a little hard to see...

Tell us more about the diving out there, I'm sure you have a few good stories from your month abroad.

Are you back in Ft. Lauderdale?

[njspearo]

nice job man, where in the bahamas were you?

[SnpperWhisperer]

Great stuff mate - good to see some chunky fish coming in! Let's have a decent debrief on what you saw, missed, couldn't get, and species, weights, and sizes on those fish that you did get! We all wanna hear all about it!

[johnny7]

Nice fish Johnny! Is that a big dog in the first pic? It's a little hard to see...

Tell us more about the diving out there, I'm sure you have a few good stories from your month abroad.

Are you back in Ft. Lauderdale?


yes i am back in town.

give me a call sometime i have lost all my contacts..my phone took swim, i am still on the same number.

snpperwhisperer: cheers mate, i saw a really niiice grouper that day but he was smart i think my buddy spooked him before i got a chance to surprise him... and then he hid really well in his castle. i didn't weigh the fish, they got cut up real quick and got put in the fridge.

i think it is a Cubera Kris. at this spot i studied some charts and took a chance on some coral heads in about 15 meters of water,... so i dived down first dive, HUGE Brain coral head laying like a lost ancient cathedral in a bed of white white white sand... i peekd inside quietly head down position ..... arm stretched out, ready, this cubera came at me like a puppy dog... vvvussssssshhhhhhhhhhh straight in the eye out the gill plate.. so up we went.

oohhhh mate where shall i begin with the stories!!! i cant write all that down, i'll tell ya in the boat mate, i had some sharks rip a 20lb plus grouper off my spear at 63ft... ahhhHHHHHHH i was gutted....Then ..i went to Hog Heaven but i had to stop .... i felt bad it was so easy. I was spearing from the Exumas right out to the Tongue of the Ocean, west, then both sides of Great Exuma and Long Island unfortunately our trip got cut short and we didnt make it to Jumentos,... got to leave something for next time i suppose. jejeje.

really cool highlight was Dean's Blue Hole on long island..... spent 4 days just falling with sandfalls into the Abyss..

http://img516.imageshack.us/img516/8564/imgp0428ps3.jpg

[greekdiver]

guys from the med dont mess around. :thumps:

Nice catch Johnny!

[azspearo]

Nice to see your on the Board Johnny. The impressive part about those fish is they were taken without a floatline.
I posted some of your pics you sent me on my website.

[primalpete]

Thats a massive dog in the first picture. Congrats

[hardway]

Damn! Nice fish bro, those things are huge!

[mnguy]

Nice to see your on the Board Johnny. The impressive part about those fish is they were taken without a floatline.
I posted some of your pics you sent me on my website.

Looks like stone shots on the dog and yellowfin grouper, but still:eek:

[av001]

Nice Fish John!:thumps:

[Hector]

Excellent fish John, it was great diving with you today. You are a mad man with that polespear

[OceanEd]

John:

Nice to see everything worked out so well on your trip. Hope some of the information I gave you worked out well.

Very happy that the Aaron Christ pole spear worked out so well. Aaron really does make a quality, heavy duty pole for spearing big fish such as you have in your pictures.

Now you are starting to realize some of the stuff we talked about before your trip. The southern Bahamas is a magical place if you have a pole spear in your hands and the ability to dive down a wee bit.

I am not surprised about the shark story. Welcome to the club. It is a very interesting experience when it actually happens to you, personally. I thought you took a Shark Shield with you?

If you plan on going back down again we should talk about float lines for pole spears, blue water hunting with pole spears, and the Jumentos.

I will probably be going back down in early October and will be cruising the southern Bahamas on my boat until March. Hopefully we can meet up somewhere.

SnpperWhisperer:

I just wish we could get you down there sometime. I think you would go crazy with the conditions and the fish.

[settingsteel]

WTG go Johny:thumps:

[johnny7]

I thought you took a Shark Shield with you?

If you plan on going back down again we should talk about float lines for pole spears, blue water hunting with pole spears, and the Jumentos.

I will probably be going back down in early October and will be cruising the southern Bahamas on my boat until March. Hopefully we can meet up somewhere.


Hi Stephen,

Yes i did order 1 shark shield but it never got ordered properly so i had to leave with out one...then i ordered 3 through an agent straight after that incident :eek: ...who never got them to me in time...

i should be back out there from October onwards for quite some time.....we should definately try and hook up out there.

;)

[OceanEd]

Should be easy to hook up down there. We have SSB and Ham radios on our boat. We also now have E Mail capability via the Ham radio and the Winlink program. We'll trade info before we both leave so we can communicate.

There are several great blue holes in the Jumentos I want to show you. The best blue hole I know of in the entire Bahamas is down there, just south west of South Water cay.
There is another one about 10 miles west on the banks that is not on any chart that is magical.

I hope to use the Winlink program this year to send back some stories and picture to the board while we are down there.

[Lazy Bones]

nice fish.

what kind of yacht is that? That is certainly an ample dive platform.

[johnny7]

back out in Exumas with my lovely pole spear :D

http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/9356/pa250810qb0.jpg

http://img224.imageshack.us/img224/6531/pa100657sg4.jpg

http://img224.imageshack.us/img224/8826/pa100669fl2.jpg

gotta love the bahamas :D

[njspearo]

damn dude, nice fish, again.

[SnpperWhisperer]

OOOOOhhhhhh yyyeeeeaaaaahhhhhh.

That'll do

[settingsteel]

way to put the hurt on'em Johnny:thumps:

[azspearo]

Johnny, I'm not impressed, this is tooo typical of you....i'm jealous. You still using the 3/4" sling and are you still not using a floatline or slip-tip?
Way to go!!

[johnny7]

thx Guys ;)

Hey Aaron,

yeah i am too lazy... to drag around that float line... i think it is a pain. maybe for 60ft plus i would use it.

i must admit i had to let go of the pole spear at one point as it got to complicated with the grouper on it and then i had to go down with my buddies hawian sling spear and stab up the fish to finish him off.

i am using your 9ft two piece spear always,.. and hope to be in Jumentos before christmas .......:bolt:

i said oooohhhh yeeeeeeaaaahhhhhhhhhh

[mnguy]

Wait, if you would use a floatline for 60 foot plus how deep are you diving for these fish?

[johnny7]

i think i have confused you..sorry.

60ft plus i mean depths over 60ft...

this way i could leave a fighting fish on the pole spear and track him with the float line.

saying that i caught all the fish so far in Bahamas between depths of 25ft - 65ft and used no float line..

but i am sure those big deeper groupers would be a challenge without a float line..we will see...i hope :D

[mnguy]

Well if you're only doing about 65 feet tops for these nice fish, then maybe I need to go to the Bahamas some day and polespear.:D

[OceanEd]

Johnny7:

The good thing about using the float line on the bigger/deeper grouper and hogfish is that it actually allows you to dive deeper. With the float line you never have to worry about fighting the fish once you shoot him. All you do is hit him with the pole and start up immediately while holding on to the float line. While ascending you are controlling the fish with the line and it is easy to keep him out of the holes and cracks and start him up to the surface along with you. It is a lot easier than you would think.

Because you don't have to plan for any bottom time to work the fish you can go a bit deeper to shoot. Of course, if you whack him back in a hole you are still going to have to dig him out the old fashioned way. Maybe Aaron will come up with an exploding slip tip or something to make that easier also.

Just a thought.

[johnny7]

this time i made it to Long Island and Jumentos Cays .. absolute heaven on earth.

after some awesome days freediving in deans blue hole with Will we made a trip out to the jumentos cays :D armed with Polespears and Slings..

with a sliptip and float line on the pole spear i got this niice jack...

http://img172.imageshack.us/img172/7894/dsc01823hk7.jpg

;)

[OceanEd]

Johnny:

Nice to see you finally made it to the Jumentos. All the good spearing in the Jumentos on the WEST side of the cays in in the upper half of the Jumentos. If you go down to the lower half and out on the banks to the west it is mostly a grassy bottom.

The lower half has some amazing spearing on the EAST side of the cays but the size and agressive nature of the sharks down there makes it a positively interesting experience if you decide to try it. In the lower Jumentos try going close up against the cays on the west side and you will find lobster and some grouper.

One place I never made it to and you might is the very southern most Jumentos. Look on a chart at the Columbus Banks that are a little south and west of the Jumentos. It looks like it should hold some of the best spearing in the world. Of course, I have talked to the locals about Tiger sharks the size of submarines, but who knows.

Those jacks will really give you a run for your money. Have you managed to shoot any of the large African Pompano's yet? A lot of times you can find them in the passes between the islands in the evening just when the tide is changing to an outgoing tide. The best way to get them is to dive down to the bottom and kneel on the sand. Throw up a handfull of sand and they will come right in to investigate. I usually get a good shot into their side and let go of the pole or they will pull off. Just grab a second pole and then chase them down.

Aaron just made me a custom front end for my pole spear out of carbon fiber and I can't wait to try it out. Talk to him about it. I think it will take the pole spear to a whole new level for a number of reasons. Less weight, still good mass for punching through big fish, better swinging/tracking the pole after a fish, eliminates the problem with bending the front end on a big fish.

[SnpperWhisperer]

nice jack.

[njspearo]

nice lookin fish..what kind of jack is that, a black jack?

[azspearo]

One of these I imagine. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carangidae I need to get to the Bahamas. Nice fish Johnny.
My big dive trip this year will be at Ft. Bragg,Ca. Next year I'm taking the wife and kids on a two week trip diving with my friends in Alabama then on to Florida the Keys and a trip out to the Bahamas.
The plan is to dive as much as possible and have my children spear fish along side of me.
Any advise on time of year we should make the journey would be appreciated.

[johnny7]

hey Stephen,

real shame we didn't meet at the blue wild ....

anywayz yes i have been looking/drooling at Columbus Bank now for quiet some time, it looks amazing i really hope i can get out there one day soon:D i was spearing around water cay area... i did see some african pompanos but just couldn't get close enough, we shot a HUGE cubera snapper... and lost him,, he was easily 25kg.

Aaron i can give you all my contacts whenever you want bro fro your trip out there.

;)

[OceanEd]

Johnny:

If you chase the african pompano you almost always will lose them. As long as they can see you, just settle on the bottom and throw up the sand. Have you pole spear cocked and out in front of you, pointing into the sand. They almost always will turn and come right by you to check out the cloud.

One of us will get to the Columbus Banks one of these day.

[a.s.alvarez]

Arron the summer is the only time that the weather is Good Most of the time in the Keys and the Bahamas. May thur Aug.

[pirate_diver]

AWESOME fish...great pics and stories

[johnny7]

back in the Exumas :D

hawaiin Sling

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/9783/dsc01862p.jpg


Pole spear, no float line and no slip tip .... ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh !!!

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/3126/dsc01878a.jpg

i couldn't surface as he was dragging me down and around, i look up and my buddy Ryan is swimming down grabs me, both finning like mad with my right calf muscle crammping up i surface for a few quick breaths and back under we go.... Ryan pops his pole spear into him and were good !!

Aaron the new floppers pass the test i think ;-)

:D

[SnpperWhisperer]

Awesome stuff!

[azspearo]

You should be ashamed for shooting such a little fish:) I will be the first to say it's the diver and not the spear. Johnny is an accomplished diver and if you gave him a piece of re-bar to hunt fish he wouldn't go hungry.
Thanks for putting the flopper pin to the test.

[Hector]

johnny, your a mad man!!! nice fish

[settingsteel]

Nice man, them AP can put some muscle in a hustle:beer:

[biggsy]

Extremely jealous over here...nice work! :up:

[OceanEd]

Johnny:

An AP at last. Now you know how strong they are.

[GivmeGills]

Hey Johnny, do you own or work on the boat your standing on in your pictures. The reason I ask is because I am a mate on a sportboat during the summer time and thats how I get to dive the Bahamas. Just wondering if you are doing the same thing.

[pirate_diver]

back in the Exumas :D

hawaiin Sling

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/9783/dsc01862p.jpg


Pole spear, no float line and no slip tip .... ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh !!!

http://img14.imageshack.us/img14/3126/dsc01878a.jpg

i couldn't surface as he was dragging me down and around, i look up and my buddy Ryan is swimming down grabs me, both finning like mad with my right calf muscle crammping up i surface for a few quick breaths and back under we go.... Ryan pops his pole spear into him and were good !!

Aaron the new floppers pass the test i think ;-)

:D

Nice Pompano!