Gletwyn Rubidge 's Spearfishing and Freediving

Gathering data on great whites in Algoa Bay

2012-01-24T10:01:00.001+02:00

Go check out this link to see a project on tracking and figuring out the presence and movements of great whites in Algoa Bay.
I suggest all readers submit your great white encounters on the submit section on this site - we can eventually compile record to see what teh chances of meeting the whites are.
http://www.millerslocal.co.za/algoa-bay-great-white-shark-project.html

Resisting the chill

2012-01-23T12:28:00.002+02:00

Last winter I posted a clip about the legendary Iceman Vim Hoff who was able to resist getting cold and spent a lot of time chillin in ice buckets setting world records etc. Click here for that post.

Recently I borrowed a book from Fanus Gerber a colleague who represented SA in the Iron Man World champs in Hawai last year. The book is about a local lad (British borne, but spent most of his childhood in SA). The book is titled Achieving the Impossible by Lewis Pugh. Lewis also like to chill - but he does it a bit differently to Vim Hoff - he swims in cold water.

Now I consider swimming in 13 degrees bloody cold and I much prefer my wetsuit - but an occasional splash in such seemingly frigid water is refreshing and invigorating - I feel like my dog s behave after a swim - energised. The coldest water I have been in is 8-9 deg but that was with a suit on - my exposed hands got "bitten " by the chill.

Lewis on the other hand would say that 9 deg is warm and he would not bother with such insulation as a wetsuit or hood - No he just hops in with a speedo and goggles. He has done swim in Cape town as long as 10 km in 8-10 deg water with no suit. Not at first I understood why he called his book Achieving the Impossible. But there is more - he took on other crazy swims to Fjords (especially where the meltwater enters!!!!). Later he went on to swim at / near each pole (yes, North and South poles - where polar bears are a possible risk). Seems he still did not need a wetsuit. One swim he did at the North pole, 1000 m, was in water that was minus 1.7 deg C! Batty!
Let me digress a tad, I have an idea how cold that is - I used to dissolve ammonium nitrate fertilizer to purify it in water - the more you add the colder it gets. I used to stir the fertilizer into water by hand eventually the temperature went down to minus 2 deg. It was so cold that my hand and arm could not tolerate it for 10-20 sec - an excruciating pain would engulf my submerged hand - the like of which I cannot explain - I used a stick instead at a later stage. The thought of willing full body immersion is off the chart. I think it would make and excellent form of torture!

Anyway, so Lewis dumped his whole body in that sort of temperature for about 1/3 of an hour and was able to complete his goal of 1000m of swimming with a speedo, goggles and a cap! Oh yes!, and the water there is about 4 km deep - that too is a challenge, not to mention the fluffy white teddy bears out there. His objective was to make a statement about global warming and the melting of ice at the N Pole where there should be ice but now one person can swim there.

He also did a swim on Mt Everest

In reading the book you can see how he pulled it off with appropriate physical and of course mental conditioning and training.

Check out his clip of the swim:

Doing these seemingly impossible things requires a bit reality shift - you have to change what you believe is possible. I think back on my pb breathhold of 7 min and 2 seconds last winter - it was off the radar for me but only at around 6 minutes during that hold did it creep in as a possibility. In retrospect now that I am not so fit it has faded back to the edge of the radar. Let's see if 8 min will crumble before I exhale this year - one way I can help myself proceed is to think of Lewis's 1 km swim in minus 1.7 deg - that will definitely help - perhaps before the breath hold I must stir a fertilizer mix just to feel that freezing crushing pain again and it will become easier. Interestingly being cold helped my breathholds in a big way.

Us spearos and swimmers like Lewis both have to consider the same adversary - the great white shark - he did a lot of swims in the Cape in sharky waters and even one swim here in PE where the greath whites are not so rare any more. On occasion he had a POD strapped to the boat and on occasion the POD was lost. There is nothing like a great white charging you at full speed - or the thought of it....!!!!! (read an encounter I had)

Do go and have a look at Lewis's blog - it may help in times where you are attempting tough stuff.
His website is http://www.lewispugh.com/http://www.lewispugh.com/

I have become a bit of a wimp with my solar heated pool and jacuzzi - but in the back of my mind I have always wanted a plunge tub to chill off in for short periods - perhaps I will add some ice one day just for shocks - that way I can briefly experience what Lewis did while training.

Every now and then we see something that helps us wake up and look at the world a little differently - thanks Lewis!
Here is a dare - for the average person - switch off your electric geyser for a few days and have a cold shower! Hmm! I'l be divorced by winter...

AH! Some decent thermoclines at last

2012-01-23T10:44:00.000+02:00

In November and december ther water warmed up a lot - too much for hunting decent reef fish easily. I was at Plett and suffered in my 5 mm suit - too hot and water temperatures went up to 23 on top and 22 degrees at 20 m down.
The thermoclines were not chilly either - 16 deg was the coldest. For good consistent fish action they should be 14 deg down to say 9 deg then the fish come up as the cold water rises and often fish focus on "islands" of reef that jut up into the cold water - those are fun days when you get a buz on the reef and top up you fish crate.
Yesterday I was diving with a pair of fins that were to tight for booties - the chilly water (13/14 deg) below around 10 m was refreshing on my ankles. Interesting to see how few fish were down in the cold - on one spot I sat at 15 m and the fish streamed down from the warm for a look and after about 20-30 sec they departed back up to the more confortable 18 -20 deg above.

I look forward to more diving this late summer and autumn.

Sealegs

2012-01-15T20:18:00.001+02:00

Check out this cool way to go to sea:

It would be great to avoid dragging over sand / pebbes!

Holiday Dives

2012-01-10T11:17:00.000+02:00

I just got back from a 2 week holiday at Plettenberg Bay.
I got in two dives with Mark in the Grootbank / Natures Valley area before new year and we eventually got flat water with viz up to 16 m - warm water of 20 -23 deg on top and a bit cooler at about 24m say about 18 deg and at 30 m it was about 16 and rather yellow from river sediment residues I guess.
Bonito were plentifull - we encountered them in shoals of up to 500 fish. Sashimi was a regular evening starter.
We had a bit of intereference from raggies but nothing serious - just prodding off a few curios specimens of about 2 -2.5 m.
Soon after new year the swell rose to about 3 -3.5 m and diving was off but I went with a neighbour and fished off the Bloukrans area just outside the reserve at Bloukrans(the bungy jump bridge) and where we had good geelbek catches - my neighbour lost his rod to a geelbek - will go look another time when the water clears up on my next outing there.

Both Mark and I share the opinion that Plett reefs are poor structure for fish and it is often barren. The best time for getting good catches there will be after a good thermocline has risen from deeper water to focus fish in the divable depths - unfortunately the water - especially the thermoclines from the deep are often yellow.

In my off time I did a fair amount of excercise - 3 x 70 min swims in the Keurbooms River and 3 x 10 km runs - this just to keep up my base fitness.

Great White & Kayak Fisherman Report

2011-12-21T18:25:00.000+02:00

I chatted to Mark earlier and he was rattled on the account of a kayak fisherman who had been "assaulted" by a white.
Apparently the guy was fishing off Noordhoek in the vicinity of some spots I dive on his kayak along with some buddies on theirs. Next thing he was airborne - knocked flying off the kayak! He apparently scrambled back to the dammmaged kayak and the kayaker headed fast for shore. Mark saw the damaged kayak and reporte dit being trashed.
Hmm! I was contemplating another no fins spearfish in that area over the next while - immage getting down to 25 m without fins then seeing a fat aggressive white!!! Scary stuff!

Guess that shark pods may find their way onto kayaks too!

Good Water in PE area

2011-11-15T14:12:00.000+02:00

Eventually the crappy viz and cold water "Drought" seems to have been broken. I ate Bonito for supper last night. They show up when the water is warmer and generally clearer.
I went for a dive on Sunday. Down at Beachview the whole are was full of DOlphins such that we had to drive the boat more caustiously as they were all around - did their ussual about turn to follow for a bit till they lost interest. Needles to say there were very few fish about in that area - dolphins spook them well.
I also saw many humpbacks about slapping the water with the long pecs and some breaching too. Juveniles amonst the adults.
Despite the 17-20 deg C water there were many small poenskop and musselcracker about - most too small to take but a heart warming sight anyway.
I look forward to some good diving over the next few weeks when the weather (and work) let's us get in.

Speargun for Sale

2011-11-02T10:38:00.002+02:00

I have a Freedivers speargun for sale, 1200 barrel, used only once. Normal price R1200, my price R980.
contact me on 0845733085 if you are interested

How will you fare with spearfishing this season? Part 9 of 9

2011-10-04T21:05:00.001+02:00

In the last post I altered Piet van Rooyen's equation by raising the whole righthand side to the power of m, for mindset.
Mindset is made up of desire x passion to excell + strategy x leverage factor.

S = (A + B x C + D + E + F + G)m

The other strategy and leverage factors are worth discussion. Strategy is the plan to achieve the success.

Let me ask you this:

Do you strategise for success before going on a dive or do you charge out there and dive expecting/hoping for some fish?

My dives involve a prediction, then spot dives to test water quality then the original plan is "approved" and followed; or rejected/adapted according to what I find.

I read an article a few years back comparing millionaires and billionaires in the US.
How do they differ?

The billionaires reviewed their goals[and strategy] twice a day while the millionaires did so once a day.

So in a days spearfishing would it not be worth your while reviewing your objective and strategy in relation to outside factors(wind, swell, competitors, nature of prey, sharks, viz, thermocline, boat, fuel reserves...etc.) as well as internal factors such as your energy levels??

Leverage factors are catalysts for success. It's like diving off a boat as against no boat - there are more options.

It is also using technology to aid you - charts, GPS, geological information. Add to that record keeping and predicting success (using stats) from past failures and good days.

The internet is also leveraged - use GoogleEarth to check viz, catch poachers, get an hour extra divetime by paying bills by electronic fund transfer etc.

How about me being able shoot a fish, film it and show my brother in the US the whole thing just after I get home from my dive - that's leverage!

What about timing the thermocline just right and using that narrow, but supremely effective window of opportunity. e.g. I could get as much fish in 1 hour of a well planned dive as in 2 days of randomly planned diving.
My mentorship students get an insider look at the mindset for success and leverage factors and their application for success. In the online program I dissect each leverage point and show how I use it.
I hope I made it clear how the m-factor can increase your success in any field you just find out the facts that influence success, the leverage points and you might as well delete the words failure and impossible from your dictionary.

One of the assignments I give my mentorship students to do is to memorize the equation.

S = (A + B x C + D + E + F + G)m
Did you find these nine posts usefull?

:

What do these terms represent to YOUR spearfishing??

How can you build each one up?

A= ?

B= ?

C= ?

D=?

E=?

F=?

G=?

m = ?

How will you fare this spearfishing season? Part 8 of 9

2011-09-30T11:32:00.000+02:00

So far we have covered Piet van Rooyen’s equation for success in spearfishing. Here it is again.

S = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

Can you define all the terms yet? (see bottom of post if not)

There is a key aspect I believe he overlooked.

But it is easy to overlook because it is so close. I only became fully aware of it in recent years.

So to alter the equation I would raise the whole right hand side of the equation to the power of m,

where m = mindset.

Mindset is made up of desire x passion to excel + strategy x leverage factor.

m = d x p + s x l

So now the equation looks like this:

S = (A + B x C + D + E + F + G) to the power of m

(here m is raised to the power - blogger does not offer superscript yet)

Raising something to a power is like giving it exponential power – sort of like taking gunpowder and converting it to dynamite.

This is exactly what the “m”- term does.

All the factors in Piet's equation will be running at certain levels but when desire and passion are brought in the spearo tends to get rather obsessed with spearfishing –

he eats it,

he thinks it,

he drinks it,

he dreams it,

he does it,

he takes time off to dive,

he gets up before dawn and into the water before dark,

he comes out the water after dark,

he makes contacts,

he get some success and that spurs him on even more.

The recent spearing of a good fish he took replays itself at night when he tries to sleep, he becomes aware of every shift in the trees and thinks how that wind will affect his next dive, he bunks a few lectures to dive, he rushes through work at a furious pace to free up divetime.

Get the picture?

Piet was aware of the characteristic but left it out of his equation - I remember he said a spearo would delay his wedding to squeeze in a dive!

The equation as it stood before was likely to produce better that average results if the spearo worked on improving all the factors, but it does not explain excessive achievement. We need to include the extra term.

Next and final post on the topic will be on strategy and leverage compnent of mindset.

NB NB

Today is the last day of my specials on training courses - tomorrow prices go back up by 20% .

Online Mentorship Program R640 (Normally R800)
Advanced Spearfishing Course on CD R320 (Normally R 400)
Spearfishing intro course (Correspondence) R 310 (Normally R395)

How will you fare this spearfishing season? Part 7 of 9

2011-09-27T12:08:00.001+02:00

Now we get to the last term of Piet's equation describing success in hunting fish with a speargun.

S = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

Term G is Luck

What is luck?
It’s defined by dictionaries as good fortune.

Let me ask you a few questions before we go on.

Well,is Donald Trump lucky?

How about Bill Gates?

Do consistently successful people always have good luck?

Or are there other factors involved.

Can one arrange things to bring about good luck?

My opinion is in line with that of Samuel Goldwyn

who says this about luck:

"I think luck is to quite a large degree the ability to recognize an opportunity and the ability to take advantage of it."

It is being at the right place at the right time with the right ideas and knowledge.

Imagination at work doing some "chemistry" with knowledge and the present state of the environment. I think you can probably explain a lot of luck that way.

Then there is the pure unintended occurrence that was completely unintended that sometimes happens. I think that this is what Piet was referring to.

Perhaps I was once lucky while diving on the RIY banks to spear a yellowtail of 8 kg, and disable it with a spineshot. The spears momentum was sufficient to push through the fish and go strait into the brain of a 10 kg one swimming behind it.

So now we have gone through Piet's equation and see that it covers a lot

In the next two posts I will alter Piet's equation slightly to offer an explanation for the Donald Trumps, and other super achievers in many fields.

How will you fare with spearfishing this season? Part 6

2011-09-26T13:19:00.000+02:00

This 6 th post on the spearfishing equation describing success of a spearo adds yet another term, F

Success = A + B x C + D + E + F

F = alertness/instinct/fish sense

Now we get to where Piet van Rooyen says nothing more than the above – he did not elaborate on how to develop fish sense or instinct. Well, not even alertness.

Fish sense is a spearo’s instinct that directs him to the fish. There is also the logic component to it.
e.g. The crackling of the reef can tell of the structure and hence likelihood of getting fish in that direction. Listening to the reef is a habit of mine - I seldom enter the water and just dive, especially on a new spot - I prefer to "cock an ear", listen and then dive. It is possible to hear your way to better reef in dirty water by the ghost shrimp choir(crackling). A further part of fish sense would be predicting their behaviour.

With regards to alertness there are techniques to enhance your concentration and peripheral vision - covered at length in my mentorship program.

Sixth sense is knowing something through other means than seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling and tasting. It is even possible to enhance your sixth sense that is capable of:
1. alerting you of danger and,
2. making you aware of opportunity.

I have two lessons in my mentorship program covering sixth sense which inludes exercises to get the students on the road to developing this mysterious quality.

All the flowers of tomorrow are in the seeds of today – Chinese proverb

P.S.
This weekend I was able to view the lack of animal sense in occupants of the gamedrive Landrover I was in at Pumba game reserve. Our driver Stemele was a local and understood animal behaviour and could predict their actions. He drove us in near some elephants that were eating acacias with complete disregard for the long white thorns. The matriarch was close and walked toward us - the ladies were no longer at ease. Now the pachyderm made a half-hearted mock charge and the ladies were really spooked - I was filming and Stemele was calm as he knew she would stop which she did ears flapping and trunk waving in our direction. The next day saw us out with another game driver who was more cautious and would not allow the vehicle to be between the young bull elephant and the two big male lions he chased.
I must say that I would far prefer to be circled by a great white than by a lion.

I think a land-based hunters animal sense is much the same as a spearos fish sense.

Spearfishing Course Specials - & days to go

2011-09-23T08:20:00.000+02:00

I am offering 20% discount on my courses until the end of September - only 7 days to cash in on the discounts.

Online Mentorship Program R640 (Normally R800)

Advanced Spearfishing Course on CD R320 (Normally R 400)

Spearfishing intro course (Correspondence) R 310 (Normally R395)

The total is R1270

But that's not all, there is another fish in the bag, but only for another 7 days.

You can get all three courses for R999. That is an amazing 37% discount!

This special only includes postage in South Africa for the Advanced Spearfishing Course and the Spearfishing intro course manual.

Special End is the last day of September 2011.

For more information on these courses see these links

Online Spearfishing Mentorship

Advanced Spearfishing Course

Spearfishing Course (Correspondence)

Need to know more - contact me on 0845733085 or email me on freedive@freedive.co.za

How will you fare this spearfishing season? Part 5

2011-09-21T11:04:00.000+02:00

We now come to the fifth variable that affects success in speafishing:

S = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

Where E is marksmanship

Plus marksmanship which depends on concentration, visibility and equipment.

I have often heard and read how a yellowtail or a dogtooth tuna stripped out plenty of line and weaved it onto the reef and then made it's departure. If the shot was perfectly delivered then such stories would not exist.

Snipers did not become snipers by going out into action and learning to shoot by knocking off enemy.

Often the great snipers of the wars were farm boys who spend many a day traipsing through the woods or veld with a rifle slung over their shoulder.

To get good at shooting you must shoot and shoot and shoot some more…. Smooth-bore muskets are very inaccurate compared to rifles - I know – having used both a great deal. Similarly rail-spearguns are far superior to non-railed guns assuming spears are strait and barbs are symmetrical.

The shooter will need to be able to concentrate, control muscles and steer his gun. Also he will need to predict – trajectories, distance and timing of fish speed and direction to land his shot effectively.

On occasion you may have to judge the viability of a shot and may purposely take a poor shot to permit penetration.

There are times when your shot would have been excellent if it was not for the fish turning at the same time as you pulled the trigger - sometimes the fishes sixth sense works too. So marksmanship also depends on the fish - if they just watched one or two of their buddies being taken out they may just keep their distance next time they see you.

In my opinion marksmanship is a subject best learned at sea with lots of shooting after brief review of physical phenomena at play.

You can make up a target or draw one in the sand and take potshots to get a bit better.

Viz – you may need to shoot fish you cannot see at the time of pulling the trigger by prediction of their swimroute.

Also there is a way to “cheat” a meter or so extra viz in very poor conditions – you shoot the shadow when facing toward the light source”. My spearfishing courses offer detail on this topic.

Check out this quote:

You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. Wayne Gretzky
[Also you get no fish on the dives you don’t take]

How close you can get to the fish or get it to come to you will definitely affect your success. Also the size of the target has plenty to do with markmanship.

In 1998 on Fayal, one of the nine islands in the Azores I met the French target shooting champion - they even had championships for markmanship with spearguns!

2011-09-19T11:28:00.002+02:00

Join me as my Gun mounted Sony picks up what I see, or don't see, as I dive into a cave at Jaheel Island near Coega Harbour.
Jaheel Island is probably the best spot I know of to find plenty raggies, small, medium and submarine-like.

I start off swimming to the crack that forms a cavern - expecting some sand tigres to be dozing off or idling about - let's take a look-see....

How will you fare this spearfishing season? Part 4

2011-09-19T10:25:00.000+02:00

Previously we looked at Piets' formula and defined A as availability of fish, B bottom time and C times down.

We now add term D

Success = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

D = Experience which depends on age and frequency of diving.

Success is the result of good judgment, good judgment is the result of experience, and experience of often the result of bad judgment.
A Robbins

Experience includes how to act on the sea floor or in midwater when a fish shows up – certain behaviour and body language will inform the fish of your intentions, which are not to the fish' liking. Violate these and you will probably not see that fish again.

Often in spearfishing one needs to get a nice specimen of a certain type of fish to get on a roll with that species – all of a sudden you get them regularly while before you never had any success.
In a similar manner an experienced car salesman will sit back and observe the potential customers behaviour and one certain reactions will he begin the sale. An inexperienced salesman will rush up to the potential customer and will probably not get the sale.

Personally I have had lots of bad judgement, but I recorded my bad judgements and now I get much closer to having good judgement for my dives.

Can you get experience from others?

YES
YES
YES!

Why re-invent the wheel?

Watch DVD's, read, talk, listen, study, consult an expert.

We are creatures of habit and tend to get stuck in a rut and forget there are other ways to do stuff - then after doing something a certain way someone shows you a new easy way and you feel kinda like you want to hide cause your did something so inefficiently!

Ever happened to you?

Certainly has happened to me.

So we have defined the first four terms, yet still a key ingredient is missing...

How will you fare this spearfishing season? Part 3

2011-09-16T09:37:00.000+02:00

Last post on How will you fare this spearfishing season? I added bottom time (B) to availability of fish(A). Piet van Rooyens legendary equation describing spearfishing now requires that we multiply bottom time by times down (C).

S = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

According to Piet C is times down which depends on:
1. water temperature, and
2. fitness

Water temperature is in my opinion one of the single greatest determining factors of a spearo’s success. There are many factors that influence water temperature and if you are not aware of these then you are undoubtedly disadvantaged.
The factors include wind strength and direction, current strength, topography and direction, season, air temperature, and in shallow areas swell size(mixing thermocline and upper layers) and tide.
Cold water slows up your work rate and even your mental processes if you loose heat.

Fitness obviously affects your dive rate. I am presently busy in my sparse spare time writing a course on training, bioenergetics and physiological performance for freediving and spearfishing - I hope to have it done by the end of this year.

From my experience there are numerous other factors that heavily influence times down, these include:
current,
depth
and swell,
and species of fish being hunted.

For some species one dives to the bottom and must wait for 40 seconds while with others one may shoot while still descending.
We can add to that the use of devices and techniques to attract fish:
chumming(burley), sound, body language,flashers, vibrators (Rodger Rabbit finds use in spearfishing!)

So am tempted to expand the equation to include factors that worked for me - more on that to come Success in Spearfishing post 9 of 9

I will end this post with an quote of what I consider to be of supreme importance to field of endeavour such as fishing or spearfishing where many factors all interact and play together to give a final result that depends heavily on them:

Enjoy the little things for one day you may look back and realize they were in fact the big things.
Robert Brault

Think of something you really like doing - something that lights your flame. What teeny little seemingly insignificant actions can have a great impact?

To end let me ask a question:
How can you make a fish approaching you feel like it is the one that will scare you?

Kieran Bishop's PB Breathhold

2011-09-15T09:57:00.000+02:00

Join me in my Jacussi pool with my kids and Kieran Bishop (My nephew). Kieran did a few warm-ups and pulled off a personal best breathhold. Quite good for a 7 yearold I d say. At age 17 I could not even do half of his but then I did not have an apnea teacher to help.
Kieran had a 3 min relax in the 36 degC solar heated water then....

With a bit of training I could take him to 2 min.

Video Clip of freediving with blacktip sharks

2011-09-13T18:47:00.000+02:00

Click on this link to see a freediver surrounded by blackfins of good size.

http://youtu.be/tVnCa45t0dE

How will you fare this spearfishing season? Part 2

2011-09-13T11:41:00.000+02:00

In my last post entitled How will you fare this spearfishing season, I posted a formula for success and defined the first term. Today let's hop across the first plus sign to the next term:

S = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

Now we add B - bottom time which depends on:

1. lung capacity,

2. relaxation,

3. equipment, and

4. training

Lung capacity
It is said that we cannot change lung capacity.
Well, I am not 100 percent sure of that - actually I totally disagree.
I tend to think that one could increase it somewhat by having positive pressure within – obviously a slight positive pressure or else a rupture of the lung wall may occur. Your diaphragm is the “pump” driver – if you can improve the function of the diaphragm then it is quite possible to increase the amount of air taken in.

Relaxation is very important – you need to be relaxed, calm and extroverted. There are a number of ways to relax even under conditions that should stress you.

He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior - Confucius

Equipment is also very important – for example switching from thermoplastic to carbon fins divers often claim increased depth of say five meters on their operating depth – typically one can add this five meters onto a 20 depth thus giving a 5/20 = 25% improvement. A good suit that keeps you warm is a great help. Bottom time is killed by a lowered body temperature - I know - over the last month of local dives I watch mine drop as I get cold.

Training improves ones capacity to perform – especially in more severe conditions such as deep water or rough water where greater exertion is required.
In my Mentorship program (www.freedive.co.za/metorship.htm) I kick off with super efficient training methods from the first lesson and raise the level of training as diving muscles are strengthened.
(Let me explain: back in 1992, the second year of my diving career, I developed a training method that allowed me to dive comfortably to 34 m with no warm up dive - this involved physical training and the use of an exercise to enhance concentration). Naturally this is part of my program.

So you need a fair bottom time to get down, look around - perhaps enter a cave and shoot as well as get back up safely. There are a host of tricks one can do to get fish in closer but you can't do these without decent bottom time. Locally most fish we take are taken in say less than 1.5 minutes so you may not need an excessive bottom time just a bit of self mastery will do for getting good, or even excellent fish. In fact many times we take good fish 30-40 seconds after reaching the bottom[and doing the right action on the bottom when you get there] in sallow waters and in the deep they often come in faster - 10-30 seconds. See my 100+ Youtube clips on my old channel http://www.youtube.com/user/gletwynr and my newer channel http://www.youtube.com/user/gletwynchem most are quite short.

Variable weight dives also improve bottom time by saving energy - ditch you belt and pull it up after the dive.

It is a good thing that there is lots we can do to improve our bottom times. My online mentorship and advanced spearfrishing course students know those or will know them when they reach the appropriate lessons.

Spearfishing Courses Spring Specials and Super Combo Special

2011-09-12T19:53:00.000+02:00

AHA! The winter is finally over and spring is warm so far.

I am offering 20% discount on my courses until the end of September:
Online Mentorship Program R640
Advanced Spearfishing Course on CD R320
Spearfishing intro course (Correspondence) R 310

The total is R1270

But that's not all, there is another fish in the bag.

You can get all three courses for R999. That is an amazing 37% discount!

This special only includes postage in South Africa for the Advanced Spearfishing Course and the Spearfishing intro course manual.

Special End is the last day of September 2011.

For more information on these courses see these links

Online Spearfishing Mentorship

Advanced Spearfishing Course

Spearfishin Course (Correspondence)

Need to know more - contact me on 0845733085 or email me on freedive@freedive.co.za

How will you fare with spearfishing this season?

2011-09-08T17:46:00.000+02:00

A few years back I put together a series of 9 articles describing factors that will make or break your spearfishing. I will post those articles over the next few days.
Read carefully and all I ask is that you ask yourself how you can use the info to improve...

Enjoy:

Post # 1

This is the first of series of posts I will make on success in spearfishing. If you are not mathematically inclined – like me – do not worry as it is not complicated. There is one thing you will be able to note for sure - it takes a while to master all these aspects of the equation. I have been at it since 1991(17years) and still do not believe I know everything about spearfishing. To believe that would block further progress for me. Spearfishing is like chemistry – though I have a doctorate degree in the subject that does not mean I am clever and also it does not mean I know all about chemistry – it simply means I worked hard and persistently in one field of chemistry (actually a minute aspect of chemistry – effluent treatment to remove arsenic from water). Success in chemistry also involves mastering a certain equation - not unlike the one you will see shortly.

Before everything else, getting ready is the secret of success
Henry Ford

Without wasting any more time here is an equation derived by spearo Piet Van Rooyen back in the 1980’s.

S = A + B x C + D + E + F + G

S is success in spearfishing. It is equal to the terms on the right hand side of the = sign. Add those up and we could predict the success of a spearfisherman with fair accuracy.

Success – What is success?
Ordinarily we refer to success as prosperous progress in any field. Success means different things to different people in different positions. I like to consider the context of progress to decide if it is successful.

If I think back on the Euro-Africa Qualifier that Mark Jackson, Guyla Plagyani and I dived last year in Rota, Spain – we were getting very few fish but sufficient to qualify us for getting SA to enter the world championships this year. It felt most unsuccessful to weigh in two fish in six hours!!!! I got a zebra of 2kg and about a 1 kg sargo(blacktail). That felt terrible!
Anyway at the weigh-in it was not too bad as some people came in with nothing.

So don’t feel too bad when you consider how you do relative to others but also consider how you do relative to own past progress.

So success depends on the above six terms – over the next few posts I will define each and discuss them to some extent.

When I first saw this equation back in 1991 it honestly was not that meaningful to me but now it makes sense after a good few years of experience and I am able to criticize it and expand considerably on it especially in certain parts such as the last three terms that were not discussed in detail.

The first term, A, is availability of fish i.e. What, and how much crop is there to reap?

OK, so get to it what determines the availability of fish? Surely if I can know the answers, or at least some answers to this question I will be able to get more and better fish. Absolutely – next post I will present some of my views…

Getting to know the availability of fish in any area you dive is probably going to have the greatest influence on your success as a spearfisherman, fish photographer or just being a nature-loving freediver, or even a "scubie".

On www.freedive.co.za I offer a tool you can download to record your success with South African species on the SA records list. The file you can download is an Excel file where you see the list of SA fishes, the record of each as well as the biggest of each species I have taken and those are expressed as a percentage. I then calculate the overall percentage – what I call the record percentage. If you download it and want to use it you simply enter your biggest fishes weight in place of mine and Excel calculates your record percentage – instruction are on the download. I request your email to get access but do not worry that it will be given to some spam list – I get enough to hate it.

Spearfishing a 20 Kg King Mackerel at Leven Point

2011-08-24T15:01:00.000+02:00

I got a mail from John Greenland telling of a nice 20 kg cuda - John this made me green!
Check out this pic of the fish taken at Leven Point:

He was even able to direct me to his youtube channel so I could see it being speared - check it out...

Here is Johns' Description of the hunt:
Cape Vidal in July 2011: Got lucky waiting on a sandy bottom about 20m off the reef. The Cuda (Spanish Mackeral) just came out of the blue and gave me a perfect shot. Managed to break the spine so the fish came in without much fuss. Jo backed me up and kept an eye out for Zambezi (Bull) sharks, but luckily none arrived.

Well done John.

Evolution of fishing

2011-07-18T11:37:00.000+02:00

Quote for Spearos

2011-07-18T08:57:00.000+02:00

Look at your light bulb. In it's history lies a key to success.

Thomas Edison took something like 11000 attempts to perfect his incandescent lightbulb. This included a recreational contribution - he had gone off to Wyoming to view an eclipse and was fishing on a lakeside using bamboo threads. He considered using a carbon filament made from thin strips of bamboo. In those days they used high resistance carbon filaments attached to platinum electrodes to produce a lamp with a functional life of 40 to 100 hours on DC current.

"If I find 10,000 ways something won't work, I haven't failed. I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward."

"Many of life's failures are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up."

Now there is a reason not to throw in the towel too soon - OK, you could end up maddening your divebuddies (or lady in waiting) by staying out too long.

Yesterday while doing some exploratory diving I found the end of the reef I was following - it turned to sand. I swam on in the same line for about 150 m.

Mark pitched up then with the boat - I could have gotten out and joined him but decided to let him leave me and go on to the next spot. About 20 m further on I found a nice isolated little cave with some nice baardman in it. I was so close, and easily could have missed that nice little discovery.

Revising my static breathhold goal

2011-07-05T11:17:00.000+02:00

Over the last few months I have been training a bit ti jack up some of my personal bests in freediving.
One goal was to do a 7 minute dry static. Last week I managed 7 min - a tough hold and rather shaky towards the end.
I plan to train for another two months so I have revised the 7 min to 8 min - that should be challenging - follow me on twitter to see how I train. It is a an experimental approach. Right now I am suffering some mild food poisoning so I will take it slow for the next two days.
In terms of diving - oops I 4-got what that is - the sea has been so crappy lately - I hope to get out for a dive or two in the next while - the weekend looks OK but the flooding here may have taken care of that.

my freedive@freedive.co.za email if working again

2011-07-05T11:04:00.000+02:00

my freedive@freedive.co.za email if working again

freedive email not working

2011-06-29T09:30:00.000+02:00

The email address on my website http://www.freedive.co.za/ is presently not working and has not been working since last weekend.
If anyone urgently needs to contact me here is my cellnumber 0845733085
I will post an update as soon as my IT guy gets the problem sorted out.

Sorry bout the incovenience,

Gletwyn

Video - getting ultra-close to the musselcracker

2011-06-23T11:14:00.000+02:00

A while back I promised another clip of getting real close to the target - in this clip I do just that on a sneaky specie - getting the fish to come close just requires a series of carefully applied actions that pull it in - my advanced spearfishing course on CD covers that in detail. Note that in this hunt the spear only goes about 2/3-3/4 of the way out the 1 m gun and I have the fish.

Now let's go down in the sea:
I drop down about 7 m into the harbour wall at Coega, Port Elizabeth. I am in a maze of concrete. My gun-mounted camera is looking down the barrel of my 1 m Freedivers speargun.
On entering a channel I see a musselcracker move off, I settle down and wait... it turns back for another look and I get out of it's line sight - it comes...

Ultimate "Breathstroke"

2011-06-21T20:55:00.000+02:00

Last year I posted a video clip of a freedive record - CNF (constant weight without fins and no pulling on the rope) taken by William Trubridge, it was an impressive 88m.

Later he went on to break the 100 m barrier.
Just looking at the divesite where the 100m barrier fell is a pleasure - it's Deans Blue Hole on Long Island in the Bahama's

Here is a video clip of that awesome dive

Mola Mola Sunfish off Noordhoek, Port Elizabeth

2011-06-13T14:04:00.000+02:00

After finding no fish on a favourite spot and yukky water in the deep we headed west to the next proposed site.
I saw the telltail "lazy fin" paddling on the surface.
Mark dropped me close and I followed - soon out of breath while the seemingly slow sunfish waddled with his odd vertical fins.

Next I tried getting in up ahead to meet him - we did meet:

It was a fun dive.

Black-out & samba - what does it look like?

2011-06-12T20:24:00.001+02:00

A lack of oxygen (hypoxia) is what causes a blackout. Oxygen partial pressure in the aterial blood is around 100 mmHg (13.3 kPa). When you hold you breath the partial pressure drops depending on your requirement. Labour under water chews it up fast. When arterial oxygen partial pressure falls to 40 mmHg (5.3 kPa) or less you are at the potentially lethal range and you need to breathe ASAP, even then there is a delay between the oxygen reaching our lungs, tranferring to the blood and being pumped up to you brain. This delay could be 7-20 seconds. Watch you divebuddy for a while after hard dives!

Typical breathhold profiles may look like this:

Time (min) 0   1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 6.0 7.0

O2 mmHg 99 99 98   96    88   74   52   40

Pulse bpm  65   65 67   68    61   47   41   37

Note the steep drops in both pulse and oxygen levels.

On longer holds you can clearly feel how you muscle reoxygenate.

So what does a black out look like - here is an almost amusing samba (more like a breakdance).

Note:
1. The back-up to help the diver - you should have this in hard pool training, ideally in any breathhold pool training.
2. That he believes he was ok and still attempted to convince the judges that he was ok.
3. He got to 6 min 58 sec - not bad! A definite disqualification.
4. Note how he regains some control - enough to go through the surface protocol of removing mask and giving an OK sign. That was probably as the oxygen reached his brain.

Need a wetsuit?

2011-06-09T14:09:00.000+02:00

Need a wetsuit?

No! Not if you are Wim Hoff, The Iceman.

Wim can resist cold very well - check out the video on this link - he could dive with no suit.

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/2735127/wim_hof_ran_is_an_extraordinary_person_iceman/

Actually he has dived with no suit and set a record for under ice diving:

How does he do it?

He uses an ancient Tibetan Yoga art (tummo) where one can generate heat thus remaining warm despite exposure. The cold would obviously kick in a massive dive response but this would draw blood away from limbs and frost bite would ensue.

Perhaps this winter I will sell my heater, switch off my geyser and learn tummo.

Pipin Ferreras making a come-back

2011-06-08T17:25:00.000+02:00

Pipin, the 90's freedive hero was talking about making a comeback to freediving for one last dive. His last deep dive was back in 2003 to 170 m; matching his late wife's 170m no limits record attempt where her lifting bag failed and she died. The bag never filled enough to lift her the 170 m back up. She was the legendary Audrey Mestre.

Yesterday a brief interview was recorded with Pipin:

http://rumbum.com/2016-you-ve-got-to-spend-a-lot-of-time-with-you#

Perhaps he plans to challenge Herbert Nisch's 214 m dive - check out that dive:

Monofin Evolution

2011-06-04T18:41:00.000+02:00

Check out this swim by world champ Natalia Molchanova using mono that has evolved to something close to a sporty fishtail. It is the DOL-fin hydrofoil monofin manufactured by Smith Aerospace. She had apparently practised only a few hour after receiving the fin before doing this impressive dynamic swim.

She looks pretty calm afterwards.

Spearfishing a garrick - getting the fish ultraclose to the speargun

2011-05-31T13:54:00.000+02:00

In earlier years I always preferred a long gun that could shot far. In those days I had not mastered getting the fish in close as possible. I remember the Springbok spearo Mike Saunders chatting about fish he had shot and explaining how he had waited till they were very close - I was often amazed at how close he described them coming before he took the shot. He almost never lost a fish and mostly placed shots well as a result of the close approach.

In time I learned to do the same and noticed how I too shifted to use of a shorter gun. I my spearfishing courses I cover techniques to draw in or attract the fish. Check out this clip taken down the barrel of my gun to see how close this garrick comes. Here is a description of the clip from my channel "Gletwynchem".

Diving at Coega Harbour. I try to show how to get really close to the fish, or how to get the fish to come in close. I dive down slow, position well on the bottom and wait for action - I am expecting it as there is a vibe in the water today - viz and depth both about 6m.

My Sony w390 gazes down the barrel of my 1100 Freedivers speargun. Action comes soon - a garrick of about 10 kg approaches, grow curious and turns - I track it from below with... See how close I get the fish to come in...

Later will feature another clip where I take a musselcracker similarly - the spear was not even near out the muzzle after the shot.

To learn more about getting the fish ultraclose to your speartip see my Advanced Spearfishing Course on CD which covers deep diving and fish hunting methods.

Speargun Handle Mounting

2011-05-30T14:53:00.000+02:00

I had some request for pics of how I mounted my speargunCam

I welded a 316 grade stainless steel bold 6 mm to a short 316 rod,
then welded the rod to a fat stainless steel screw

Note the screw is turned in at the position where the pin holds the gun's trigger mechanism in place.

I use the nut to secure the camera housing onto the bolt - wing nuts are easier.

My welds (with a stainless steel rod) are not great but they hold.

There is a slight risk of weakening the handle - so far with Freedivers handles I have had no problem on 3 guns - this system is attractive to me in that I simply screw it into the next gun when I need to change - bolting it through would be more secure.

The disadvantage is that if I get a muzzle wrap I could loose the camera - that almost happened once at 32m! Fortunately I was fresh on a variable balast dive and I freed it up in time to loosen the reel.

The gun mount takes a stable clip down the barrel allowing the use of my left hand in heavy surge conditions.

Saiccor petition

2011-05-27T20:11:00.000+02:00

Saiccor effluent wipes out the viz south of the effluent pipe when a north current runs and vice versa. Aliwal shoal is now a Marine Reserve - should companies still be allowed to dump their effluent in the sea, close inshore?
I dived in this 2-3 m viz from the effluent pipe and certianly complained loudly back in the nineties. I also dived the pipelie seekiking salmon - I remember seeing the dark effluent pouring out the diffusers in the milde N to S current. In this day companies are required to be resonsible and act in a more green manner - i.e. have some thought for the environment and not only the bottom line. The saiccor effluent still blacks out the viz.

I just signed the petition that is sent to the minister of Environmental Affairs - my signature was # 330.

Why not add yours...

here is the link:

http://www.care2.com/find/site#q=aliwal%20shoal

Bottom time to aspire to...

2011-05-27T19:10:00.000+02:00

Check out this dive Walter Steyn did - 40 seconds on the bottom - that may not seem great - but just check out the depth...
His dive profile is on this facebook link:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=519096&id=105677202805861

He sat for 40 seconds at 121 meters on a variable weight dive that lasted 4 min 28 sec!

Spearfishing Video Clip - Cholking the speargun on a baardman ina cave

2011-05-24T11:30:00.001+02:00

Here I demo cholking a speargun in a cave. I was using my Freedivers 1100 reelgun with my camera mounted on the handle. The spot was 8m deep with about 1012 m viz at 17 deg C.

I aim grip the rubbers over the barrel and apply a moderate squeze to impede the rubber's pull. It works well, spining the tassle and preserving my speartip. The weak vibrations were, however, enought to spook the remaining tassles from the cave and it was vacant on the next dive.

The tassle fillets were excellent in a fish curry my wife preapared. Griffin, my 20 month old boy who produced background sound and advice during the filletting is now keen to go to sea on the boat - life gets more interesting - he can watch older brother Zephyr dive. "Family dives" will perhaps be a future activity for me.

Griffin love da Fishes - pressing the eye is important!

Chevonne, my wife, currying the tassle fillets - she did a splendid job

Cape Vidal Shark Attack

2011-05-24T11:17:00.001+02:00

Yesterday I saw the headline about a shark attack and learned a spearo was bitten on the leg by a zambezi shark. Later I found that Warren Smart died of bloodloss from the bite.

My condolences to those Warren leaves behind.

It is quite a shock when you hear of it, especially having dived there quite a bit. I am at present rather too complacent when spearing a fish and often forget all about sharks, especially now as we enter winter and sharks thin out in PE.

I remember Koos Jordaan bellowing at aggressive Zambezis last year at Cape Vidal when he had a wahoo on his spear. They were quite problematic then - circling all around in the distance and advancing when a fish was speared.

I have never used a shark pod as I deemed there to be no urgent use but in recent years I have begun thinking more and more of using one. A great white was seen recently at Bushy Park - yet another!

Warren had a blog site for Zululand spearfishing (http://zululandspearfishing.blogspot.com/) that was a contribution to the sport, especially to those in the far off Cape.
In closing I must say that it is really sad to loose a spearo.

Can you ID this fish

2011-05-23T12:24:00.001+02:00

On saturaday I dived off Noordhoek and found these fish under an overhang in 18 at a site called Mark 4 - never seen them before.

The big eye, slanting mouth and white marking on the tail are distinguishing characteristics. Their length is about 75 -100 mm. These may well be juveniles that have not take on adult charactersitcs.

Here is a clip of these fish:

If you recognise the fellows let me know on freedive@freedive.co.za

Comment added 24 May - Terence Bellingan suggested: Centroberyx spinosus, short alfonsino - I agree very close.

Feedive under Ice

2011-05-19T21:31:00.000+02:00

Diving under ice - perhaps I will shut my mouth next time I get cold...

Check out the clip on this link

http://www.avex.cz/martin_stepanek/CoolApnea.wmv

Spearfishing a bank steenbras - my reelgun jams at 27 m

2011-05-19T10:33:00.000+02:00

I head to the bottom - camera zoomed out by itself to 5 X! - wait a bit and a bank steenbras comes in - I take the fish spining it. Then head up and discover the jam - voluntary resistance training ensues....

I have experienced this a number of times - often works well to cut down the muzzle of the gun so the rubbers do not lie along the barrel, this reduces foul-ups especiallt if your line is not tensioned before shooting - I did so yesterday.

New Spearfishing Club to open in PE

2011-05-16T20:58:00.000+02:00

Gully Jumpers Searfishing club is being officially registered with Sauff (South African Underwater Fishing Federation) and we will be holding monthly and annual competitions as well as social events with the first one being the CLUB LAUNCH!
It’s all kicking off on the 4th of June at no. 28 Albert rd Walmer, 6pm. We will be introducing you to the club, what we are about and giving you an opportunity to register. Club fees are R200 for a single member and R100 per family member there after; this includes your Full membership to SAUFF. There will be a free club T shirt for everyone who joins on the night. We will also be doing the briefing for the first competition (Gully Champs 101) to be held on Sunday, the 5th of June, weather permitting. (If not the next date will be advised)

There will be fires on the go, salads and rolls, so please join us for a braai and the latest action packed spearfishing movie called One Fish will be on for all of us to enjoy! http://www.onefish.co.za/

So come along and make some new friends, bring your own chow and bar and lets enjoy this great sport together!

If we have missed out some of your friends with this mail please feel free to forward on to them, please pass on their details to us for record purpose.

Shot for all your responses

For more info call:
Nick Horne: 083 447 1482
Richard Leonard: 074 102 3385

Mistakes while spearfishing

2011-05-16T12:14:00.002+02:00

Yesterday I made a few mistakes - perhaps I was a bit too tired from the party the night before. Got to be at 2 or 2:30 am.
1. Slept through my alarm - only woke up whe Mark arrived at my house.
2. Dived too light and I was manhandled by surge - not able to stay down when I needed to to try lure in a cracker.
3. Dived down and saw a big school of bonnies - small bonito - careful aim - spined one great shot! Then I looked down as I swam up - a wall of tail were below with fish up to 15 kg!!! And I had a stamp on my spear!
4. Deep dive to almost 30 m - ~12 kg tail comes in and I take a shot - did not spine him. The fish sped off down the pinnacle and reefed my line up at 38m under a low overhang. Now I got to test my fitness training - it worked - I did two clean-up dives to retrieve my empty spear and coped just fine, despite having done a hard 6 km run the afternoon before. I did take 4-5 min rests between to ensure complete reoxygenation.
I am happy with my training results and will work more a deep dives over the next month or two. Follow my training on Twitter if you like. Click here.

Despite the blunders I had a nice dive in clean water - up to 15 m viz and 18 deg C. Had dolphins entertaining me with their squeaks and clicks for a minute or two as well.

Unfortunately my camera is zooming in from a depth of about 8-10 m repeatedly - I suspect the pressure may be triggering the outward zoom - MAINTENANCE!

Zephyr's PB static

2011-05-12T10:05:00.000+02:00

Yesterday arvie I spend some time training on walking apnea. Taking a stroll in the garden up on breathhold. The grass is soft if I pass out and much safer than the pool. I had a good session with some holds around 1 min 40 sec towards the end.
Zephyr joined me for a bit and did some impressive 1 min walks. At the age of seven he is doing well I think. He then sat down and relaxed for a few minutes then did a 2 minute dry static - this beat his previous best of 1 min 30 by 1 /3rd. I think the apnea walks kicked in his dive response well and gave him the edge. I am positive that with a little training I will get him to 3 min - its just the focus at that age which is a bit lacking but I may get him to focus on a reward of some sort...

The cast is looking great for the next five day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Quote For Spearos Part 2

2011-05-09T11:52:00.000+02:00

This is the notion of the first man to climb Mount Everest...

You don't have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things - to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals.

Sir Edmund Hillary

Mountaineer and Explorer

See you do not need to be a natural. You can be an "ordinary chap", motivated, and you need a challenge.

In part 1 of this topic I asked two questions after this quote:
When you develop yourself to the point where your belief in yourself is so strong that you know that you can accomplish anything you put your mind to, your future will be unlimited.

Brian Tracy

The key phrases there in order of importance are:

1. develop yourself and

2. where your belief in yourself is so strong

So my question to you is how would you develop yourself ?

How would you create the confidence?

So what answer did you come up with?

First you need to decide what you want to achieve - it must not be easy but rather make it challenging!
Next educate yourself - get excited about your pursuit and read all you can about it. Do courses, talk to those who have achieved your goal find out what their successful actions were, duplicate those and adapt where it suits you better.
I find the big trick is often remaining motivated - vary your activities(training) sufficiently to avoid getting bored with the same exercise again and again.
Also avoid creeping into a no gain comfort zone - when you exercise become relatively easy you are not progressing any more, or you are progressing slowly forwards. That is the time to raise the bar or change to a new training method that will add strength towards the same goal by a different method.

example:

Perhaps you trained breathholds on your bed and reached a maximum time and are not progressing but also you are becoming bored with this. Now is a good time to change to another exercise - perhaps gym training of diving muscles, or pool training - swimming for distance on breathhold. [IN POOL WORK TRAIN WITH A DIVER IN THE WATER WITH YOU - HE/SHE MUST BE COMPETENT IN RECOGNISING IF YOU BLACK OUT AND KNOW WHAT TO DO TO REVIVE YOU SAFELY!!!]

At present I am getting fit to work on some diving goals. I have ten exercises lined up that I will use to get fit. Sticking in any one will see me change to another or another group of exercises.

At present I am working on static CO2 tables and have made good progress and stepped well outside my comfort zone. I also use home gym work with and without breathhold and even roped my son into strolling up a hill on breathhold. You can follow this on Twitter.

So this is part of the self development and the confidence come is little chunks with each improvment in each excercise. There are times where leaps and bounds occur but mostly it's incremental improvement - little bits at a time.

Freedivers - New Items & New Store in Durban

2011-05-09T08:28:00.000+02:00

Video clip - pilot whale drags woman down

2011-05-08T20:54:00.000+02:00

Some years back I heard about this incident - surfing the net toady I got to see it...

Quote for spearos - Part 1

2011-05-05T12:08:00.000+02:00

When you develop yourself to the point where your belief in yourself is so strong that you know that you can accomplish anything you put your mind to, your future will be unlimited.

Brian Tracy

The key phrases there in order of importance are:
1. develop yourself and
2. where your belief in yourself is so strong

So my question to you is how would you develop yourself ?

How would you create the confidence?

RIY Banks

2011-05-03T11:13:00.000+02:00

Went to RIY again this weekend - Huge swell day before and it dropped to about 2 overnight.
Water was OK, but cooler that expected - not tail and basically no other shootable size fish.
A memorable dive in that is was so quiet despite opposite expectations!!

At least the blue water is showing up again!

Blue-Fin Tuna Spearfishing

2011-04-26T13:46:00.001+02:00

Have a look at this clip where Herbert Nisch takes a bluefin with a sleek Trygon reelgun at Crete.

What amazes me is the number of bluefin in the shoal - it was estimated at about a thousand fish ranging from an estimated 80 to 400 kgs.

Enjoy...

Yippee, got a dive in again

2011-04-26T09:45:00.000+02:00

On Sunday we headed out to the RIY banks in the hope of finding clear water. There was 5-8 m viz, about 18 degC above and from 10 m down it was 16.5 deg.
There was a fair west current - enough to crank up the heart rate enough to trim dive downtime. We spent half an hour on the first spot - I saw two fair sized tail on my first down and then nothing more for next while.

Three stops later I descended into a shoal of 2-3 hundred bonnies and got one - it made splendid supper last night.

Mark got a bonnie later on the NW side of the bank and lost a big tail.

Later we moved south and each managed a tail there. I dropped down to 23 m and expected a red stump on the bottom - looked left and as I looked back right three nice tail were close in - they shied off as I turned and I swam after them keeping low behind a ridge and managed a quick shot on a departing tail 2/3 of the way back - as he turned the spear was through and I knew I could pull hard and would have to to keep him off the pinnacles 10 m jagged face. Luckily I was between the fish and the pinnacles giving me a bit of time to keep it back. I swam really hard away fro the pinnacle and the fish naturally headed for it 5 m from the top I had to give some line and managed to reach the surface and hold the fish off. Eventually I got the 14 kg fish up - that hard swim up really taxed me and it was a good while later that I dropped down to the same spot only to find no more tail but a lot of excited small fish.

It was one of those day when you get fish soon after entering the water then it remains dead for long enough to be a waste of time to stick it out.

Next we did a random dive and I said to Mark to shoot a big tail - on his second dive a shoal of big ones came in and he got a nice one. I saw him being pulled under time after time. It really must be big! I kitted up and swam over to put in a holding shot. Focusing on the fish I retrieved my spear and set off to seek more - but only found a fat shoal of Bonnies and got one nice one of about 3 kgs - more sushimi!

Back on boat Mark did not re-enter. Strange?
Only when I got on did I see why - his carbon fin had snapped in half way down where the blade fits into the footpocket. Now it made sense why the 16 kg tail had time after time pulled him right down. The snapped fish had been a long time coming as over the last few few dives we had seen it widen and finally the tail's pull had been enough to finish the job. half an hour later we left.
It was good to dive again.
I am doing a bit of training to keep fit and it's worked well as I maintained better than expected after such a layoff. The sinus infection I had is also gone totally and I can equalize hands free again - what a pleasure.

ByeBye First Base

2011-04-11T12:27:00.000+02:00

Progress always involves risks. You can't steal second base and keep your foot on first.

~Frederick Wilcox

There you go... "second base" is deeper, a stronger fish, a sharkier dive etc. etc - there is always that extra risk - you must find out what risks there are by educating yourself and reducing the risks. Or, you can find out the risks as you go - it is more risky but you also stand the chance of learning new things that others do not know. Rather not reinvent the wheel - I learned spearfishing mostly by trial and error, often a lot of error, the learning came only from one or two books and chatter with mates at a dive club.

My preference is toward the other side of safe but not in the region of reckless - calculated risk is what I favour. Having 3 kids has definitely reduced my risk appetite.

Your risk appetite will also change probably you will be spooky in the beginning but later you may go through a fast growth stage where risk excites you and later [where I am now ] seek less risk.

I would say that now I do riskier stuff than before such as casually prod sharks or follow after a white or even continue diveing an are after seeing one - the reason is that I use stats and if the odds favour survival then the fear fades and certainty(Confidence) rules...

It is a strange evolution of a mindset.

I find the same in my financail risk appetite now - previosuly I feared debt and strove to devour it - yet now I embrace it and seek to use debt for wealth creation - it take a change of mindset and definitly a step off first base to get there.

So say good bye to firstbase....

Plettenberg Bay Spearfishing

2011-04-11T11:33:00.000+02:00

Last week saw me revisit some divespots at Plettenberg Bay. I must say that I am still pretty well unimpressed with Plett divesites. Mark was with me and he agrees fully. Despite Mark Fanus and me winning the Plett Nationals when diving there we still have yet to find good fish in significant numbers.
I like flatter reef structure with sandstone caves holes and cracks - it pull fish strongly in the Eastern Cape. We dives at the eastern side of Plett just west of the Tsitsikama reserve - the water conditions were poor - viz 3-6 m with a 1.8 m swell. I just got one decent sized cracker and that was it! I saw a few bronze bream and some red romans of about 1-1.5 kgs. Mark had a disinterested white waddle past him in the shallows.

The lack of diving saw me don my running shoes and take to the road - at least I did a PB longish run of 20 km to work on fitness. I was impressed in my running ability - I expected to have to walk but I made it easily. The hardest part is occupying your mind in such an activity. OH yes ,Fanus Gerber just reported taking 3rd place in the Iron Man held here in PE yesterday - Mooi soo Fanus, Jy het nie geroes nie, Boet!

I did attempt a few [non-spearfishing] dives in the Keurbooms river - found a spot just north of the bridge that dropped off to 24m!!! I only got down to about 9 m though where the viz black out and I could not see my hand - it is really creepy diving in such viz - next time I will take a torch in the unlikely event that it is clean down there. Interestingly I found that the mud on the bottom is warm to the touch - probably 2 deg warmer than the water - it must be an exothermic reaction of sorts within the mud.
My son, Zephyr, now 7yrs old is demanding to go on my next dive trip - I am using this as a carrot for him to push through his fears of diving in dirty water - so let's see how the carrot goes.

Spearfishing a Leervis

2011-03-23T13:48:00.002+02:00

I drop down to the bottom in 4 m of water, look right and swing my 1 m Freedivers gun hard right - Sony is running on the speargun filming, Viz 3-4m.

A fast moving leervis passed by and I just got the gun on it in time to squeeze off a rapid shot...

Video clip of a shoal of musselcracker in Coega harbour wall, Port Elizabeth, South Africa

2011-02-22T13:18:00.002+02:00

I descend about 6 m into the east Coega harbour wall camera rolling - it's mounted on my 1 meter Freeedivers reel gun. TI have to use the mounted camera because the surge is rather harsh as the waves wash into the structure, viz about 4 -6 m. It's and art to avoid collisions and hunt at the same time. I enter a cavity I meeting a shoal of musselcracker there, about 3-7kg fish. I am in no rush to shoot and wait for a bigger one...

Ja well as you saw I waited too long - if I shot quick I could have had a better one of about 7kgs. Only the one smaller fish returned.

A few dives earlier I took a shad of about 1.5 kgs - it made excellent sashimi - we even had some for breakfast today.

Big Red Steenbras taken at Arniston

2011-02-17T10:41:00.003+02:00

The fish was taken in 2.5 m of water!
Short gun in action!

Are you using the right speargun?

2011-02-16T13:20:00.000+02:00

Over the last few dives I had my longer guns on board the boat. They pretty much stayed there or if I did a dive I dumped them back on the boat. Surge has been one influence and crappy 2-4 m viz the other.
I really like to use the 1 m gun - it is far more maneuverable than 1.1, 1.2 1.3 etc. You can turn and shoot more like a sniper in foul conditions. The 80cm gun is even better.

The one thing is that the last few fish I have taken were between 6 and 14 kg and the shots did not all get through.
Three of five shots did not make it.
I did manage to land all five fish though. This was because I know the reduced power of a 1 m guns spear. I shoot and quickly assess the need to inspect the shot before pulling the fish up or back. What I do is shoot and swim over to the fish and spear and keep the spear in the fish if need be by holding it onto the spear - one hand on the spear the other to keep the fish on until I surface - then push up with both hands on the spear if it is not jammed in bone - normally I can push it through this way and open the barb. It is best to have the fish on teh surface - pushing upward on the spear as though trying to push the fish up out the water with the spear - gravity and the fishes flapping help get the spear through.
Otherwise, if the spear is hard or bony parts it is time to get my hand in the gill plate to hold it. This can be risky with really big fish especially ones with sharp gill rackers such as rockcod, cob etc. If your hand gets stuck in the gills you may be dragged back down!

So the bottom line is the 1 m guns are good for poor conditions but one must pay some extra attention to the shot and to collecting the fish on the way up.

Also one can focus on shooting in thinner, softer areas but then the fish often flap about spooking off other quarry and attracting Mr Biteyou!

No diving? What I might try when I really need a dive...

2011-02-07T10:54:00.002+02:00

Next time there is a six week layoff I may call up two dive buddies and try this:

Spearfishing a white steenbras at Coega

2011-02-02T08:55:00.001+02:00

I descend, Freedivers 1100 in my right hand and camera rolling in the left - viz is ok and there are some fish about - not a long wait and two ~ 10 kgwhite steenbras comes in from the left...

Spearfishing Pics

2011-02-01T13:15:00.002+02:00

Check out this garrick taken Thys Du Toit at Knysna:

Great white shark - cage diving accident

2011-01-30T12:00:00.002+02:00

Check out this shark cage dive - divers in the cage & shark supposed to remain ouside!!!???

Wreck spearfishing - Spearing a soldier on the Haarlem, Port Elizabeth

2011-01-24T11:22:00.000+02:00

Down I head for the bottom at 19 m - I go slow to keep hte interest of the fish up and to scan on the way down - as soon as I am in position on the bottom a soldier is watching...

Fish ID - Black Beauty (Macolor Niger)

2011-01-24T08:52:00.003+02:00

Here is the ID of the fish in the previous post:

Angelo Spada sent me the following data:
The fish is a Black Beauty.

They are part of the Snapper family - the juveniles are black and white (at this stage, they are pretty).

Its scientific name is Macolor Niger.

By the way, Jeremy Williams holds the SA Record - 4.8kg

There we go - answers come easy these days with our connectedness of electronic systems.

Can you ID this fish

2011-01-20T09:45:00.002+02:00

Can you ID this fish taken from Bassas da Indias?

Squid Spearfishing - Attempt number 2

2011-01-17T09:45:00.003+02:00

I was on a mission to have my son get blasted by squid ink - he was keen too.
Mark and I and our two boys headed out to sea to find the squid and catch.

As we reached the destination we found many squid boats about - on the exact same spot we found the same boat from last week - a few tons richer in squid. No line were out on any boats - the squid had now started taking lures only at night - the skipper reported no squid around.

We tried a bit and validate the skippers view of no squid. Off we went fishingand were not successful so we returned to the squid boat and loaded the boys on - this was much more fun for them that fishing. I anchored and opted to dive and heck out the eggs - there were plenty eggs, and clear water with great vertical viz but only 2-4 m horizontal viz. I found one bed of eggs that was at least 8 x 12 m in size.
There was not a single squid.

So this time the squid won - but next time I will call the skipper and get some inside info - he recons the squid are now coming in at about 1 hour before dark - so I may head out again soon.

Quotation for Spearos

2011-01-14T10:26:00.003+02:00

Here is a cool quote for spearos - sometime we need this attitude to get us through the various doldrums we experience - be it - bad water, good water devoid of fish, blunders that need righting, or simply not finding that big one you want.

Failure is only postponed success as long as courage "coaches" ambition. The habit of persistence is the habit of victory.
~Herbert Kaufman

Squid Spearfishing

2011-01-11T09:52:00.004+02:00

Sunday saw Mark and I go out to sea and seek fish - poor conditions and very few reasonable fish about. I had some squid lures in the boat so we drove to Maverick - a squid boat - Mark knows the skipper and we saw them getting some squid. We managed to catch two squid when my patience for fishing blew up. Line up and mask on - I dived down hoping to see the squid eggs. At a depth of about 13 m the viz dropped to about 1m but then opened up to about four below. I saw silvery white shapes all over - it was a big shoal of squid.
Moving slowly kept them relaxed and I landed on the sand in 19 m next to a big bank of squid eggs. Slowly the squid approached and I picked out a big one - there was a puff of black ink as the spear hit.
Mark was quite impressed when I told him what I had found. I told him where to fish and he began catch some - small ones though. While each dive produced a big one for me. Not long and he joined in too and we took a good number of squid by spear. One needs a short gun though as the squid are easy to shoot through. I had one come off because the barb did not open - it is best to have a loose barb and confirm it is open before pulling on the spear.
My camera is busted but next time I will take the other camera and hope to find the squid again.

It is a rare sight in our normal dive spots to find squid - I guess they stay away from fishy areas where the chances of being eaten are greater.

Here is a video of squid spearfishing down under

(Nice big ones compared to ours)

Huge Crayfish from King Island

2011-01-10T08:47:00.003+02:00

Have a look at the size of this bug - It is ona a scuba cylinder!

I recon that tail can deliver quite a wallop and the claws could rip your guts out.

Pacific Blue Marlin Record - Spearfishing

2011-01-08T22:36:00.002+02:00

Check out this awesome footage and fish...

Spearfishing a spotted grunter Part 2

2011-01-07T10:36:00.001+02:00

The shoal of grunter return and I head off after them - they do not let me close and I have to approach slowly to get in range. They were probably nervous due to the presence of many raggies (sand tigers) that day. Anyway, I manage to get one fish out of the shoal.

Spearfishing a spotted grunter Part 1

2011-01-07T09:44:00.003+02:00

I wait on the wavebreakers(dolosse) of the Coega wall - a school of grunter pass above - they do not like being approached from below. Viz 6-7 m, 18 deg C

Spotted grunter are rather scarce in the PE dive areas - one has to focus more in the bay and at sandy areas to find them. I have once take one of 6.5 kg and seen some even bigger ones in deep water near the Swartkops river mouth.

They make excellent eating.

My Kids advance their breathholds

2011-01-04T10:13:00.002+02:00

In the pool with my daughter - I has a scaffoldingtype ladder in the water - Ateya, now four years old went down and did a 23 second hold, after having her relax( a difficult task with the young ones) she did a 28 second hold and after another relax for 3 min she reached 35 seconds - so she did well.
Zephyr, now almost 7 years old was challenged by his sisters attention and on the thrid attempt he did a 1 min 15 seconds - wiped dad out - at 17 years of age I battled with 25 seconds!!!!!

Unfortunately the drought has trashed almost all the pools with diving 4 m section in our city - though being the pool game I wonder - catching rain and a dose of creativity could have kept all those pools running even if water levels drop. I will have to take Zephyr to the sea on a warm day and try get him to dive 5 or 8 meters.

I prod my second great white shark

2010-12-20T20:36:00.002+02:00

Mark and I were diving off Hobie beach in about 8 meters of water. I asked Mark to drop me on a little reef and he anchored off on a deeper spot. I took a nice 12.5 kg white steenbras and swam to the boat and deposited the fish. Next I headed out to another spot that had produced once before.
I landed in a depression and nestled in to a crack with my 1100 Freedivers gun trained of the middle of my ambush zone - awaiting a good fish. I watched a nice bronze bream which in turn curiously sussed me out. Scanning to the right I saw blur in the 3 m viz and looked back at the bream before reviewing the blur. A pointed snout approached slowly - "AH, a bloody sand tiger" I thought - "Nope - not the right forest of teeth".
The shark was well-cammoed - a very similar colour to the hazy plankton and sediment in the water. As it broad sided about 1.5 m away I saw it was a small great white - only 2 -2.5 m long - a puppy. I immediately reach out with my gun and jabbed it hard in the middle. The shark charged off with a good fright - this is what I intended - to make it get a bit of a shock - as it broad sided - it feels a hard jab. I alerted Mark and the did a few more dives back toward the earlier spot where I got the steenbras.
It is not a great though for swimmers that such a critter was seen so near(250m off) to Shark Rock Pier - at least the Pier lived up to it's name.
I intend to make further contact with great whites- hopefully the next will be about 3 m long -I want to study their responses to being jabbed [not shot - just firmly prodded with the speartip].
My theory it that they will back off and leave - the last one did so -it was about 5 m long and comming at me fast - a facial jab three inches below the eye did the trick but that one busted my spearguns muzzle!!!
Will keep you posted.
Have a great Xmas!

Video clip - hunting technique - a sneaky bank steenbras

2010-11-16T13:24:00.007+02:00

The water is clear on top today on the RIY banks but it's yukky in the middle and a bit better below at about 18 m. I dive down and eventually a spooky bank steenbras arrives - I have a clear shot but there is redbait behind so I delay for a clear background where my spear will not hit and penetrate the redbait - the fish senses my intent and spooks off, I follow stealthfully with my 1300 Freedivers speargun at the ready, the fish keeps me moving and is very jittery - I will have to use the terrain to my advantage...

I cover spearfishing technique in my courses - see www.freedive.co.za for details on the courses.

Pignose Grunter at St Francis

2010-11-02T09:40:00.003+02:00

Here is Terence Bellingan with his first white steenbras or pignose grunter.

It was 11 kg - he got it with the 80 gun.

He got it off sparse reef at Seal Point at Cape St Francis. That's a nice start.

The apparently "bad" or high shot is not so bad - the flesh is softer there and the spear can get through to let the barb hold - if he hit the spine the spear may not have gone through and the fish could have come off and been lost.

Nice one Terence!

Only in Your Dreams - Video Clip

2010-11-02T08:29:00.006+02:00

Go to this site and look at the fish on this Youtube clip. (You can clcik on the post tile to get you there)
It is entitled "Only In Your Dreams" for a very good reason.

http://youtube.com/watch?v-Zgn5oKw4ehY

Who got the nice cob at Seaview?

2010-11-01T11:10:00.005+02:00

I was out at sea on Friday - for a change been working too hard!!

We took a long drive west and I put Mark in on a good spot and saw a few spearos on the shore.

While sitting on the boat I saw one spearo pick up a big fish - I could not see clearly - it was far and some rocks cut off the lower section of my view. I guessed it to be a big cracker of 15 kg or more.

Rumour has it I was wrong and it was a cob as shown above.

These big ones are very, very scarce on the "west side" and at Seaview. More often the big ones are found near the rivermouths where the viz is very low - the cleare areas produce smaller fish that seldome exceed 15 kgs.

Who got the fish and how big was it- tell us your story.

Email it to me on freedive@freedive.co.za

perhaps this one:

Spring Spearfishing / Freediving Course

2010-10-19T15:01:00.008+02:00

I have had a few queries for people in PE wanting to do an introductory spearfishing course. THe course will run sometime in the next two or three weeks - two lecture sessions and a pool session, ocean sessions depend on conditions.
I must have at least four people for a viable course.
The cost is R795 per person.
You get a course manual manual, an electronic copy of my divebook, training excecises and tips. Depending on the level of divers I can tailor toward more advanced, or even advanced spearfishing if this is requested. Since freediving is an integral part of spearfishing you will get an introduction to freediving too.

Let me know by email, or phone (0845733085), over the next few days if you are interested.

Four more on my introductory spearfishing course (click on post title) or see:

http://www.freedive.co.za/Spearing%20Course%20layered%20pics.htm

If you are looking for Advanced Spearfishing Skills see:

http://www.freedive.co.za/advanced%20%20spearfishing%20course.htm

Spearfishing Bassas da India

2010-10-19T10:06:00.004+02:00

Here follow a couple of pics of fish Mark and a group of divers took in Basas recently. The big knigfish Mark got was 52.5 kgs - a good size. THey saw some even bigger fish but were not able to get them.

Here is black kingfish:

Mark's 52.5 ignobilis kingie - what a beast!

Here Charl Blignout shows a big 24 kg coral trout.

Basas is a good spot to find big kingis. The trip involved much travel by sea in tough conbditions with little dive time in proportion to travel. They saw few big gamefish besides the kingis.

Yellowtail Running

2010-10-18T08:46:00.006+02:00

Check out these nice tail Eugene and Diddi got on Saturday. The bigger ones were 17.16 and 15 kgs.

A soldier hunt video clip

2010-10-15T11:31:00.003+02:00

Take a look down the barrel of my Freedivers speargun as I head to the bottom at 16 m, nice viz, and I wait, wait, wait - cuckoos come to look. Eventually a fine soldier edges into view and broadsides for a brief moment - I must move quick now - they are bright fish and window of op may close soon - I squeeze the trigger...

One Fish Spearfishing DVD Available

2010-10-08T08:42:00.003+02:00

Chris and Richard have put together a great DVD with some fantastic sequences taken all around the world - you will even see a few of mine in it too - some of those clips I kept to myself.

They were quite secretive and would not even let me see all yet - but there are some fantastic hunts and fish to be seen.

Here is the trailer:

Spearfishing Marlin from ITZTV on Vimeo.

Eastern Cape Freediver Gear order

2010-10-07T09:50:00.003+02:00

Any PE guys or near to let me know if you want any spearfishing gear - I am going to place an order soon so let me know ASAP

MAN THE SEA IS UP TO NO GOOD HERE - FLAT DOWN AT SEAVIEW BUT CHURNED IN THE SHALLOWS AND PROABABLY FROZEN TOO

Late winter and spring has sucked for the last three years

2010-09-15T14:38:00.002+02:00

Man! Does the foul weather not stop. A gale is blowing now as I type and it has been essentially undivable for the last two weeks and before that it was shot for a month. Last year and the year before were equally bad.

This is lazy time for me - I am not doing any training nor diving - focussing on other stuff. It is just so frustrating!
Normally late October is good at least - so long as heavy spring plankton blooms can hold off.

I know I have been in strealth mode as blogging goes - just so many demands for my attention! Hopefully that can change in the next month or so.

Maybe I should take up gold and watching sport and diving DVDs on weekends!

Big Wahoo

2010-09-07T09:52:00.003+02:00

Jean Pierre Jordaan got this fine wahoo recently.

It was 42 kg!!!

AHHHHRRHH! Now I have the shakes - that bluefin tuna yesterday and this now....

Monster bluefin tuna taken by spearo in Newfoundland

2010-09-06T08:29:00.006+02:00

I rate this as inspirational...

Check out this bluefin taken near new Newfoundland. It is estimated to be 550kg!!!

To see the full story click on the post title, or visit the Spearfishing Motion website:

http://www.spearfishingmotion.com/news.html?news_id=25&lang=en

Wahoo Season!

2010-08-16T10:35:00.003+02:00

Seems August is up to its name as wahoo season.
I read that a big one was taken at Sordwana and I also got a pic from Koos Jordaan - his divebuddy got a 37 kg fish.

Mouth watering stuff!!!

Diving Knife

2010-08-03T10:33:00.003+02:00

I read that recently a young spearo in Durban suffered entanglement underwater while diving and was retrieved unconscious. Being a father of three I am gradually becomming more and more safety conscious - especially with a son who is keen on diving. It is especially disturbing news to me since a year an half ago I experienced a potentially hazardous foul-up in my own line. I dived and speared a fish in a wreck 10 m down and did another dive to retrieve the fish from a hole in the structure. When getting down I saw the fish come out the wreck but I went on to get my spear out the hole in wreck, planning to swim both up. The small bronze bream, apparenly spent, wrapped around my snorkel and mask while I was feeling about for the spear - I ended up pulling off my mask and leaving it and all my gear plus the fish on the bottom. Mark was 30 m off so I was essentially solo. I had to ask Mark to get my mask for me.

Try swim up 10 m in cold water with no mask - vision is blurry and it's a shock. It could have been worse for me had the fish wrapped around me with the spear still jammed in the wreck.

Here are a few pointers you can apply to reduce such risk:
1. dive with a knife that is sharp and readily accessible
2. kill the fish as step number one if going back to free up fouled spears etc.
3. have a buddy diver (competent diver) observe you - he should also have a knife.
4. simulate such situations - go down to the working depth pull off your mask and swim up with it - doing this a good few times will help you get accustomed to the shock of fuzzy vivion and cold water in the face - thus reducing panic. NB Have a buddy watch you and surface with you in such test dives. Also get the feel for the position of your knife - if you set a drill of reaching for your knife then the motion could be subconscious/automatic in event of an incident.

I have also gotten lax from time to time and on occasion I leave the knife behind - it is a risk one should rather not take. Even a big gamefish can tangle you up on the surface and pull you under, or, a shark could try get your fish and pull you under with the line through the fish. Having a knife, and a well-practised "reach for the knife" protocol should be part of your equipment and skills!

I dive with a small knife on my belt. Other knives are available that can be strapped to ones forearm or calf. Low profile knives are best in my experience and they should be easy to retrieve.

Go buy yourself a knife if you don't have one!

Lastly let's hope and pray the young diver pulls through.

Capital Cracker

2010-07-29T12:34:00.004+02:00

Check out this musselcracker Mark got recently:

Mark did not suspect it was a 20 kg fish, nor did I. It was long but had an average, standard type build. We guessed 17 or 18 kgs but it was 20.4kg.

This size fish are not common in the Eastern Cape - I guess that only on three occasions I have seen fish that would definately have made the 20 kg mark. Then again this fish did not look that big on the boat so perhaps they are more common than we know...

Packing for spearfishing

2010-07-20T09:42:00.010+02:00

I sometimes get the question - "How do you use packing in spearfishing"

My answer is - "Mostly I don't."

Reasons for this include that I generally dive well buffered for safety - i.e. not pushing it close to blackout. Sure I often dive with another person but most of the time we are away from one another and do the occasional check for the others presence - so essentially we still dive apart. Also packing is not efficient through a snorkel - the gulps (mouthfuls of air) that one can pump in are smaller that without a snorkel - they are probably only 30% of the pack without a snorkel.

I have occasionally rolled onto my back and watched the sky and as it is swept by albatrosses or gannets while packing without a snorkel. (A calm day is required or waves spill into your mouth). Once loaded with that extra air I roll over and duckdive in one motion.
With the extra air I am more buoyant and need to fin harder on the initial descent. Packing is normally accompanied by tachycardia(increased heart rate) at first so one may well feel uncomfortable on the initial descent. My observations are in agreement with research conducted on divers who packed. The researchers refer to packing as glossopharyngeal insufflation (GI). An article, Cardiovascular aspects of glossopharyngeal insufflation and exsufflation, is available in the journal of Undersea Hyperb Medicine. 2007 Nov-Dec;34(6):415-23.
web location:http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18251438

The researchers studied cardiovascular effects of packing and reverse packing(pumping out air from your lungs using your mouth as a pump). They found that during packing (GI):
- heart rate (HR) increased by 36% - that is pretty high as compared to a typical resting heart rate of 40-60 bpm. I readily felt this when having packed - normally about 5-10 seconds after the last pack.
- the divers experienced a 48% drop in arterial pressure to 50 mmHg, with that an 88% drop in pulse pressure.
- cardiac output (CO) dropped by 79% to 1.3 l/min.

So the research sheds some interesting light on my personal findings. In some persons, including myself, packing heavily(15-30 full packs)occasionally results in a semi blackout if done fast. Such "blackouts" seem to be caused by reduced blood pressure to the brain due to arrhythmia (irregular heartbeat). My experience is that these symptoms are transient and within 5-10 seconds the condition is alleviated. Samba symptoms are experienced - the shaking sensation. It is thought that the reduced flow of blood to the brain causes this apparent blackout.
At my high school some kids would take turns to hyperventilate for 30 seconds and then take a full breath - a buddy would squeeze his chest and out he would go and the other kids would laugh at the person who blacked out. Recovery was normally within about 10-15 seconds. Boy if I could go back there now I would play dead and wind them up a bit. I think packing simply does the same thing - if you pack fast enough then the blood flow is reduced to your brain.
High body temperature appears to enhance the "blackout" - some posts back I spoke of doing this in the bath when I was very hot - I was unable to complete 10 packs without the onset of the dizziness. The heat must lower blood pressure I guess.

Because packing and its side effects are not thoroughly studied and since individuals respond differently to packing it is an activity that should be treated with great caution and progress should be made in small increments rather than great leaps lest you "fall into the deep side before you can swim". Competent back-up is a must when trying out new activities.
Competent implies that the person should be able to retrieve you and administer CPR in even of trouble. Competent implies that the person should be able to retrieve you and administer CPR in even of trouble.

The aforementioned researchers also wave the flag of caution: "Because of their hemodynamic effects, these breathing maneuvers should be performed with caution, particularly in the case of GI[packing]."

Now back to a packed dive for spearfishing - the combination of the harder fining and the active heart and low blood pressure may make this exercise feel as if its use is suspect because you feel rather uncomfortable during the first part of the descent. It is temporary though and I have noticed that with practice the negative sensations are overcome and one adapts.

Another authoritative article covering the effects of packing on heart-related phenomena is:
Effects of glossopharyngeal insufflation on cardiac function: an echocardiographic study in elite breath-hold divers
website: http://jap.physiology.org/cgi/content/abstract/103/3/823?ijkey=40e45106771335a22e564d06a0ff070f563e07fe&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha

Pics at Lighthouse Reef in Zululand

2010-07-15T10:03:00.005+02:00

Here are a few pics of fish we took on our trip further south at Lighthouse Reef:
My 25 kg salmon or cob

Mark's persnoal best 38 kg cob - a beauty taken at the Jolly Robino wreck in 5 m of water:

I got a PB cuda of 24 kg - my previous best was 21kg

I also got another PB - a kock grunter - never seen one before this trip.

In all it was a great trip that produced a few good fish.

Check out this clip of a shoal of tassles(baardman) at Leven point - mouthwatering stuff for spearos!

Zululand Dive trip

2010-07-13T09:49:00.005+02:00

Mark and I had a dive trip to Zululand where we were in search of a wahoo for me and a sailfish for Mark.
We hooked up with Koos Jordaan and spent some time at Leven point and Cape Vidal pursuing our respective quests.
Koos showed what a 30 kg wahoo looks like on the first day:

Koos shot this fish at long range with his 1.4 gun and eventually the barb held just under the skin - thanks to his flexible floatline he was able to reduce the pressure on the fish and put in a holding shot in the presence of an enthusiastic zambezi shark. The shark could well have taken the fish but chose to chew up the R900 floatline instead.

The next day I saw Koos pursuing a nervy wahoo and he spoke of more fish - I swam that way and encountered a shoal of wahoo from about 12 -30 kgs. Have swum up to them they were skittish but curious and would let me almost in range but every time I closed in lining up a shot they would give a light kick and move 2-3 m off. At least I got to see them. Mark found a fish and descended and waited for a fish to approach which it did producing a shot. He had his double reel system that worked to land a 24 kg fish. He had enough time to clip on a reel belt and hang onto the belt while the fish towed him - I donated a floatline to clip on so the pressure could be taken off.

One problem with the reels is that the time it takes to sort out the line afterwards is prohibitive - this disadvantage is offset by increased ability to pursue fish without the resistance and hassles of a floatline.

Later a wahoo appeared 5 m off from my flasher and I slowly descended to its level but it veered off - I waited but the fish started swimming away - I swam gently closer and stopped the fish slowed and turned side on for a look - no approach though. It then began heading off again - "What the hell" - I thought as my air was running out and followed quickly - I lined up fot a rear shot and gave two more hark kick and squeezed the trigger - the fish was in rang but kicked as I shot and the spear hit the tail - the fish did not kick hard and flee like a dragster. I preyed the shot would but after a short weak run the line went limp and my goal died there as the spear dropped toward the sand. I did not see any more wahoo. I will just have to go back again another time.

Wahoo, I found out, are susceptible to a strange parasite called a nematode. Here is a pic of one we found in the 30 kg wahoo - it is about 2-3 inches in length.

There is more to tell of out trip as both Mark and I got some personal bests but right nbow I do not have the time to type posts - get you later!

Wetsuits effect on lung volume

2010-06-30T09:48:00.003+02:00

Yesterday I got in my pool. The temperature(16 deg C) is way down from the summer 30+ deg C as the winter sun is not energetic. Any way my mission was to measure the effect of my wetsuit jacket on my lung volume.
I filled a 5 liter bottle and a 2 liter bottle with water and inverted them in a bucket which was 1/2 full, excluding air. I put a small pipe into each.
I took a max breath and blew into the five liter bottle till air just escaped and then blew the remainder into the 2 liter bottle.
I then donned my 7 mm jacket and repeated the exercise. The difference between the exhaled volumes was about 200 mL - the lesser volume coming from the blow when I had my jacket on - this showed what I expected. I did not have time to repeat and get an average of a number of similar experiments.
The volume I blew out was about 5.8 L
What percent difference does the suit make: 200 / 5800 is 3.5% difference.

I will repeat the exercise and include packing too next time.

Some interesting observations:
1. Back in 1992 I could only blow out a max of about 4.9 liters now after some stretches I can exhale 5.9-6 liters. It is said lung volume is not changeable but I say it is. Stretching breathing muscles can improve the volumes and packing can increase breathable volumes.
2.With heavy packing I can manage about 7 liters (note that water temp plays a role in expanding the air your exhale so you cannot compare what is done in a hot bath with what is done in a pool.)
3.Packing expands one lungs - hence some validity to my use of an inflatable pump to "pack" back in the early 90's.
4. Paching while in a hot bath is very likely to promote blackouts - I scored three in a row the other nite and abandoned the process due to risk. Heat seems to alter blood pressure and is dangerous when combined with packing(which also affects blood pressure and promotes irregular heart beating).

I will probably be offline for a while over the next week as I am going on a 10 day diving trip.

Dive Reflex, Spleen Shrink and Freediving

2010-06-29T09:51:00.005+02:00

Last night I sat in the bath with my son, Zephyr after the other two kids got out. He began sticking his head in the water an holding his breath.
Soon he wanted his mask and came back with his sisters one. He did a few half minute holds with face in the hot water.
I took control as he had forgotten to breathe up, and relax. The water was hot so I had him sit next to the bath and breathe slow and deep for a while - then he did a 45 second hold. Next he was relaxing a bit and prematurely began the dive only making 30 seconds - a good reminder that stillness and calmness combined with a good slow breath-up helps. Again I took control and had him relax for two minutes with slow deep breathing. He also put his face in cold water - "I need to be cold, Dad!".
He has realized that body temperature is critical to breathholds - too cold is bad as well as too warm.
Anyway he managed 1 minute and 3 seconds.

That reminded me I wanted to post on some aspects of relevance to us spearos or freedivers.

I read many journal articles a while back - some interesting studies were done.
Spleen volume was measured during dives and breathholds - it drops up to 20% during dives releasing oxygen carriers - haemoglobin. The studies showed that divers can gain an extra 3% of haemoglobin in their blood through such spleen shrinkage -that helps extend the breath.
Typically the release occurs over about 3 dives with a typical 2 minute rest in between. This goes some way to explain why freedivers and spearos do warm-up dives.
Its more like haemoglobin release dives.
The raised haemoglobin levels would persist for some time but would usually drop to normal some 10-20 minutes after the last dive or breathhold.

I feel these effects readily in my body - the first few holds or dives are generally tougher than the 3rd or 4th. In dry training it show up too - for instance on exhale or inhale holds there I work my diving muscles I often only get to 50 to 60% of what I reach on attempt 3 or 4.
Pity I did not have this info when I did athletics - a 400 m or 200 m sprint would surely be better performed if a few breathholds were done in the 10 minutes before the event.

The dive reflex or bradycardia is deemed to be a independent of the spleen shrink though both are experienced in freediving. The dive reflex refers to blood shift from limbs to the thorax and brain combined with slowing of the heart.

Cold and breathholds
I find I need coolness to do breathholds, but my bodies core temp must not fall too far. I did some exhale exercises a while back while in the snow at Hogsback and in short order I found I was stripping off clothes quite fast even thought the temp was only around zero with wind.
Cold water in the face and on limbs helps with the dive response(slowing of heart and blood shift to thorax).
As with me Zephyr also like the coolness.

I read in one article Martin Stephaneck's warm up dives were as follows:
A dive to ~15 with a 2 minute bottom time, rest of 2-4 min
A dive to 30 m with 2 min bottom time, rest 2-4 min,
An exhale(full exhale) dive to 15 m with minimal bottom time, rest 2-4 min
A second exhale(full exhale) dive to 15 m with minimal bottom time, 8 min rest
A dive to 109 m!

See how his dives capitalize on the spleen shrink that occurs over the first few dives.
Also those exhale dives surely give a good simulation of what he will feel like when approaching 100 m.

Notice that he keeps it safe on the exhale dives which are much shorter than the inhale dives.

One important aspect we as spearos and freedivers should not overlook is feeling the signs in our bodies. Can you feel when you have overdone a dive and you are moving into suspect territory where blackout is imminent?
I did some running the other day and included a few exhale jogs. Twice I got to very close to blackout and even had a samba on my final 95 step jog on full exhale. My vision began fading back and forth and my muscles were screaming for air. My one and only samba in the sea was back in 1992. Safety is very important to me - especially with increased responsibilities of family etc. I thus always take is relatively easy in the sea and never get near the stress levels (i.e. oxygen desire of excessive CO2) at sea as on land. On land I may pass out but will recover - still it is good to train where you will be safe if you fall.

So I say it is better to push hard on land where things are safe(in the bath is not land! - Breathholders have drowned in their own baths!).
Get to know you limits and dive well away from those limits in the sea.
If you must push it then have COMPETENT back-up and systems in place especially in our dirtier current plagued waters.

Jackass Penguin in the Boat

2010-06-28T10:18:00.002+02:00

On my last sea outing a penguin swam close by - Fanus and I were in the water. The bird then headed for the boat and swam into the side as if trying to board it - unusual. It swam around and Mark put his hand in the water only to find the penguin hop on to be hoisted into the boat - no biting at all!

Zephyr was delighted to have a visitor of such intrigue - especially after watching us boat fish while he was not catching any more. I got on the boat and took the following clip:

When I returned to the boat after checking out a spot. I asked Zephyr how it was. Looks like it's sleeping dad - one look was enough to indicate the bird had moved on to happier hunting grounds. For a while I think all of us had a little lump in the throat and Zephyr did a sea burial. At least the penguinmove on among sympathizers. The clips shows a gash in the wing - I think a shark was responsible - which also explains the birds desire to get out the water. I guess ether it died of shock or bloodloss - there was slight bleeding when it was on the boat.

The dive was fun - we stayed in the deeper water 25-29 m as the swell over 2 m and ground up the bottom in shallower water.
I am suffereing a bit of sinus/eustacian tube blockages and had to bail from a few dives. I may go see a quack to get some antibiotic nasal spray.

Fishing PB for Zephyr

2010-06-25T09:33:00.003+02:00

Took Zephyr out yesterday arvie - first down with the line he took a fine roman - around 1.8 kgs. Here Fanus shows off his 7 kg copper taken in 26 m.

Fanus said he had a mild samba and got on the boat after that - good reasoning too since he could not reduce the weights on his belt. 5 kgs on a compressd 5 mm suit is too heavy for that depth - ideally he should remove one weight - but his over shoulder belt had fixed weights.

We had a great afternoon dive with crear surface water but the big swell had stirred up the bottom.

Humpback whales were passing the boat and a shark jumped about 50 m off and we even had a penguin visit us too - fun for a your boy sitting on the boat - more about that when I have time to post.

Another PE great white

2010-06-22T09:29:00.003+02:00

Mark an I were diving at Bushy Park and on a sopt Mark did a dive and advised me to get in too - later he said he saw a nice cracker and I swam about 50 m south of the boat hoping to find it there.
Down I went with a good breath - on my way down I saw a shark swimming about 12 m off. Curious as to the species I moved close and confirmed it to be a great white - it was slender and plodding along gracefully. I swam toward the shark and got an estimate it was about 3 m long. It was past me and disinteredted. Feeling ignored I swam of after it - obviously pointing my gun its way. I began grunting and making drumms like a tasslefish to try break its dreamy cold shoulder passage. To no avail; it just cruised on as if I were not there at all and it's idle was about as fast as my 3/4 throttle. Eventually I broke off the pursuit and alerted Mark who was a bit more excited about it than me. I had seen how disinteredted it was and since the vis was good and there were two of us we continued diving and still took four fish with no return of the shark.
Unfortunately the surge was heavy so I had left my camera in the boat or else you could have seen the tail wagging as I followed.

It would have been interesting to see how it/I would have behaved if it turned, or if I got in range to give it a prod. Maybe next time.