Interstate Champion

In the highstakes game of interstate cash-only, probably illicit spearfishing tournament, it's anyone's guess who ends up on top.

HOD

The term 'HOD' is thrown around spearfishing websites a lot. It is one of those 'in the know' abbreviations that if you have the ask, you won't ever know. I figured it out without asking- and then brought one home.

I'd like to present my first 'Hoop of Death', or 'Hoop of Doom!', or a big stringer of fish shot on one dive.

It was unusual in that big fish are found in deep water. We were pretty shallow, diving on an artificial reef composed of big concrete pipes. It was a perfect habitat for the fish- and for the hunter as well because you could look through or in the pipes for fish. However, the site we were on apparently had very few divers on it- because the fish were not skittish. I 'back-dove' the site after the resident flounder expert Scotty cleaned up.

I started the dive swimming into a current and spotted one of my new favorite fish- a Tautog. I shot him and put him on my stringer, then swam towards the center of the pipes when I swam over a big flounder and scared him off the bottom. I added him to my stringer and continued to the center of the pipes. I see a nice grouper and shot him in the pipe he was hiding. The line I have on my gun is in disrepair, so instead of trying to pull him through the pipe, I shoot him again with my second shaft, swim to the other side of the pipe, then push him back through. The commotion that all this did brought several fish up who were curious. As I was stringing up the grouper- a second grouper shows up and I shoot him too. Wow! So far, I've covered very little ground, as the fish seem to come to me. I start to move to the end of the debris field when I spot a really big grouper on the edge of it. He's just lazily swimming into the current. I decide to drop my stringer behind him and make some noise to get him to investigate. I hid behind a piece of pipe and wait...

Two legal grouper come to take a look and I keep waiting for Mr. Fatty. No go.

So, I figure at this point that he's oblivious to the world; leave the stringer, and figure I'll go high above him and shoot down on him. Nope. Soon as I get up and behind him, but well out of shot range, he heads off into the bare sand ahead. I look and see there are only two pieces of concrete ahead, so I figure he'll be in those. I go back and move the string back to his exercise spot, hoping if he gets spooked back to it that he'll check out my other fish. When I'm done, I swing far to the right and swim about a 45 degree angle approaching the larger piece of pipe. I swim just high enough to look over it and see him in his shining glory. I drop to the bottom and army-man to the other end of the pipe that he's on. I start blowing bubbles- I think I had been holding my breath (bad scuba diver, bad!) on the approach. Sure enough, Mr. "I forgot about the sea monster chasing me 5 minutes ago" Grouper takes a peek into his new concrete pipe and just stares at me with 'who the heck are you?'. Mr. Spring Steel to you, buddy! I put one through him and he takes off- I'm worried about my line breaking so, instead of trying to take a second shot over the piece of pipe, I swim through the pipe, out the other side- and he wasn't as active as I thought. I grab him hard by the gills, grab my gun and swim back to the stringer.

I find my way back to the anchor and shoot a black sea bass- a small, but delicious fish. At this point, I have a mixed-grill of seafood and am ready to go back to the boat when I find I lost my extra spear I carry with me. I do a lap around where I thought I had been but never found it. But, this spot was so good, I think we'll be back and hopefully I'll find that spear again. Losing the spear was nothing compared to the achievement of my personal-best HOD.