December 13, 2013.

We're at Double Breasted Cay in the Ragged Islands. Internet here is sketchy so pictures will have to come later.

Christy and I were out doing a little spearfishing today and we had a first. We had a fish and a pair of bugs in the bucket and I wanted to hit one more spot before heading back to the boat. I dropped into the water while Christy stood by in the dink.

I spotted a big lobster right away and was about to go get him when I saw a good sized Hogfish lurking nearby. I quickly realized that the lobster had made a huge tactical error. He was hiding under an overhang with no back door, he had no way out of his lair but to come towards me. I decided to leave him for now and to take the Hogfish first.

The Hogfish saw me coming and tried to weave away between some sea fans. I nailed him with a solid shot and started swimming him to the surface when he spun, flipped and freed himself from my spear. Crap. I gave chase and he swam away from me trailing huge plumes of blood. He dove like a dime into a coin slot under a rock the size of an automobile. I went round and round the rock and had no way of retrieving him.

It was definitely a mortal shot and I was bummed at not being able to harvest him after killing him. I swam back to the lobster and grabbed him. I swam him up to the dink and told Christy about failing to grab the soon to be dead Hogfish. I swam the rest of the reef and found nothing else worth taking. I even checked the rock twice more trying to find the Hogfish. Nothing.

I had had enough so I hopped in the dink and we started the ¾ mile long trip back to the Veranda. We were idling along towards home and I was lamenting the fact that I felt so bad about killing this Hogfish without getting it. Christy listened to me for a few minutes before she moved some lobsters in the bucket and reached down inside. Then she yanked my Hogfish out and asked “Did it look like this one?”.

I almost fell over the side. It was my Hogfish, massive spear wound, dead in the bucket and the last time I saw him he was under a rock 15 feet down. WTH? She said that she saw a flash of orange on the surface 80 feet away and headed over to investigate. She said he was lying on his side swimming along in his death throes when she pulled up alongside. She had time to put on her gloves, reached over, grabbed him and dropped him into the bucket. So all is well here and we've got a pretty cool fish story to tell.....