The Tampa Bay Times
Hurricane Eta moved through the eastern Gulf of Mexico just over a week ago. Eta’s category 1 winds kicked up the sand and sediment on the bottom of the Gulf enough to destroy underwater visibility. Just in the past couple days the underwater visibility has improved enough to do some marginal spearing. Just after the Eta rolled through the visibility was down to one to two feet in depths of 50 to 60’. The water temperature on the bottom is now 76 to 75 degrees and this is instrumental in moving gags closer to shore. Now there are good concentrations of gags in to 30’ to 60’ of water. Using a fishing rod may still be the most successful way to bring the gags onboard. Until the visibility gets around 15 feet or more (maybe another week with calm winds), it’s going to be hard to get a good shot at these stealthy gags. If you have access to pictures of some speared gag’s from this past week, you will see a lot of “window” shots. These are bad shots that ruin good meat on both sides of the fish. Most of the divers have been just barely getting off the spear shot just as the gag is turning tail and running away. You might want to try fishing first and then drop down with scuba gear and see if you can catch a gag or two before the fish sees you.
- Jay Mastry - March 26, 2024
- Captains Corner, Gorta - March 23, 2024
- Dave Zalewski - March 12, 2024
