Spearfishing?

This is more a request for information than anything else.
I've checked on UK regulations as it appears that we narrowly missed a spearfishing ban due to more pathetic 'EUROcracy'

The ban in itself was against 'projectile' fishing..(whalegun for eg,) but an indistinction in clarifying terms left spearfishing in danger too.

Now this is 'modern spearfishing' I'm asking about..
Not hand thrown,whilst in a boat or standing in water,as that is fairly self-explanatory.(and blummery tricky)

Pneumatic or elastic powered spearguns,whilst freediving or snorkel and wetsuit in UK seawater type.

I'm lucky in that there's a local supplier I can enquire at,but I'm wondering if anyone's tried it in or around the UK coast and am wondering how our weather/tidal conditions affect suitability.Tides/Underwater visibility etc.

Any 'stateside' experiences/tips would be most welcome too.

It looks like a very reliable/effective/environmental friendly/sustainable form of fishing.

Thanks in advance.
T.

I have never tried the diving/snorkelling method of spearfishing with a speargun, but I have tried the standing in the shallows method with a harpoon-headed spear before when i was younger. I even had a trident with a large loop of rubber to give it some force as well. Both methods require you to know where your feet are

reply to post by Wotan


Yowch..

"HEY LOOK there's fish sand eels " DOH!!

Yeah I got bored VERY quickly with that method.
Standing quietly was never a strong point of mine..
also not practical in UK waters..
Once that North Atlantic sea hits the bottom of your shorts you frighten ALL life around you for 2 square kilometers.

I've done some spearfishing -- using conventional elastic/tubing spearguns, as well as the Hawaiian sling type. The latter is pretty simple to construct. I would guess that local laws and Marine Regulations are what curtail much of their use. I think you're bringing this up in relation to a Sit X or other survival situation, and in that case, perhaps the laws and regulations cease to matter, or matter less than acquiring food.

One thing that is advantageous about the snorkle/mask method is that you don't have nearly as much as a diffraction of the image when you're in the water with your target, as you do when trying to strike into the water while standing. I'm not saying that very well. When I was a kid, we would spear fish while standing in shallow, slow-moving places of the river. You have to aim beneath where you perceive the fish to be, because of the diffration of light makes the fish both appear closer to the surface than it is, but also a farther angle away than it is.

When you are viewing underwater with the fish, things can appear larger than they are, but the relative line of sight from your eyes to the target is straight.

This is also the manner in which we take lobster (in season) here, except that we are required to use a ten-foot wooden pole spear with no more than two prongs. I like to use short, very flexible fins for manuverabity, and the only time I use long-bladed stiff fins is when freediving for conch. If you're snorkling and on the surface for the most part, the stiffer fins can tweak your ankles a bit.

I'm not certain about your area, but here the best hunting is at night, with a light, called "torching". Many fish and crustaceans are night hunters, and also come into shallower water. How do you do this in a survival situation with the scarcity of batteries? I have two lightweight waterproof headlamps that are powered by three AAA rechargeable batteries. They cost about $20.00 as I recall (the headlights) and couple that with a $16.00 solar battery recharger and extra rechargeable batteries, and a person has a lighting system that will last a good long time.

In making a sling or kinetic-energy spear, you can use surgical tubing, thinly sliced innertubes, etc. Here's one example of the H-sling type: www.abbiller.com...

Good thread Agent_T..... good stuff to figure out and find about about before we NEED it.

something else you might want to add to your BOB or prep kit is the Cuban style yo-yo reel:


Quite a bit of local fish are caught with these, both from shore and in small craft. I wouldn't want to try and bring in a 60-lb. tuna with one, but I know it can and has been done. Hand cuts are common with them from the line, but still a very adaptive and extremely portable fishing setup.

reply to post by argentus


Cheers.
It's actually more about getting out and trying fun new stuff that could be beneficial,come a dodgy future.

Spearfishing at night is a no--no I read.. which doesn't matter for a sit-x but the thrill of heading off in the surf at night with a torch for company would have been cool.
Bad weather and rough seas don't matter when you're underwater anyway

I know you can attract fish with a torch and some tinfoil on a hook at night a dream.Rod-fishing..Maybe thats just an unfair advantage when your diving with a torch attached I dunno..but certainly worth bearing in mind for upping your catch.

I have the solar chargers and batteries too
5hrs daylight and you're up and running again.

reply to post by Wotan


Really good point. Entering and exiting the water are where I consider my primary dangers are, especially when going out at night -- poisonous-barbed bottom fish (scorpionfish etc.), stingrays, sea urchins, eels. Yep. We do the "stringray shuffle" when walking into sandy-bottom seas, to encourage them to move off rather than risking stepping on them and getting jabbed. I've been hunting at night with a spear for 14 years and have never gotten seriously injured, but have had the absolute crap scared out of me several times.

I'm really interested in what your visibility is in coastal waters there. That'd play a big part in your spearing success.

reply to post by argentus


Man awesome. what part of the world are you in? I love exotic animals/fishes.

The closest call I had was trying to chase a bunch of stingrays around shallow water in the gulf.. It was a New Zealand girl that told me..

"Emm did you know.. Stingrays.. STING."

Well that and free diving downunder I lost my goggles..when I replaced them I was about 25cm away from kissing a stonefish.


Boy you live and learn.. hopefully

EDIT ADD.

I missed the local specialists today..didn't know they were open sunday.

But I'll head up and ask the 'Dumbass Novice' questions tomorrow.
They advertise free 'IMPARTIAL' advice etc.
So hopefully they won't just try the ole hard-sell technique.. It doesn't work but REALLY bugs me.

I'll post any relevant/useful information I get.. Or give out a 'Don't go there' stamp of disapproval on the company

[edit on 12-10-2008 by AGENT_T]

Originally posted by AGENT_T

I'm lucky in that there's a local supplier I can enquire at,but I'm wondering if anyone's tried it in or around the UK coast and am wondering how our weather/tidal conditions affect suitability.Tides/Underwater visibility etc.

You're a brave man if you wanna do spear fishing in the north sea

I did a few dives off Beadnell earlier this year and even on a good day the visibility was poor....the best was about 3-5 meters and the worst was 0 lol, the weather wasn't particulaly bad that day either.

The tide is noticable, its not very strong but if its retreating you have to constantly swim into it or you start getting pulled out into the deeper water.

The fish were pretty scarce to, in 5 dives I saw a total of 5-10 fish and all of them were flatties, theres an abundance of crab and lobster though so you should be able to knock up a few gourmet dishes

reply to post by fred3110


Cheers for that Fred,that's exactly the kind of info I'm after.

How deep/far did you get and how further out do you reckon would have felt comfortable?
Was it the heavy breakers messing up visibility?

I know some of the river mouths around here have one hell of a riptide..Nearly lost a neighbour at Sandy bay some years back.

I'm very comfortable in the water as done watersports all my life..have gills lol.
Windsurfing 4 season/year round in anything above a force 4 ..ice or not.

Winter steamers have improved and got a lot cheaper too..A little too buoyant for freediving so some kind of weight counterbalance would be needed I'm guessing.

reply to post by AGENT_T


We went about 200-250 meters from the shore down to about 15 meters, the waves were affecting the visibilty even that far down there was loads of crap lifted from the sea bed floating round.

I wouldnt of been comoftable going any further but that was just me being on the safe side since I'd used about a third of my O2 to get out that far, the wet suite I had was pretty shoddy aswell and cold water kept getting down my back and up my arms and I didnt wanna risk h/thermia.

Some poor bloke died during one of the dives, he was doing a boat dive further out than us and ended up getting lost so its pretty dangerous unless you go well prepared.

If you wanted to spear fishing though it would be alot easier since you would be able to stick close to the rocks and venture away when you saw fish, or you could get a dingy sonar and hunt them that way(Y)

reply to post by fred3110


Ah ok gotcha.
Yeah a good wetsuit is the most crucial.
Seams blindstitched/taped/glued whatever.

When I first started windsurfing I was using an old 'hire' two piece.. YUK!! freezing even into Autumn only.

I only started getting better once I was using a suit I was no longer afraid to get wet.

The visibility factor is worrying.Everywhere else I've been you could see for at least 40-50m . Greece was over 100m easy.

I guess pollution and dumping has even more to answer for.

reply to post by AGENT_T


A proper fitting wetsuite is key I think, theres nothing worse than waiting for the N level in your blood to drop at 5 meters while freezing your ass off

Pollution is the major factor in our waters, I noticed alot of plastic containers and food packaging floating about, I'm not sure why the visibility's so poor, it was a bit spooky sometimes when you couldn't see anything then your'e dive buddy appears a foot from where you're floating!!