- REBREATHERS - SPORT DIVERS ... - Stingray Divers

27
NEW
Freeport,
Grand Bahama
Departure
$ 899
per
week
Twice
the Fun...
Half the Cost!
Pirate’s Lady, Sea Explorer, and Morning Star leave from Freeport,
Grand Bahama, sailing the crystal waters of the Bahamas on weekly
dive cruise adventures. New Dive Sites!
$100 Off All Weeklong Trips through end of February 2007
Book 5 and bring the 6th Free!
1-800-327-9600
www.blackbeard-cruises.com • sales@blackbeard-cruises.com
NMFS jewelry.
According to Don, before the
mid 80’s, the number of goliaths
found on these wrecks would have
been at least twice over what is it
is today. Pointing to the back of his
boat, Don described how he and
a one or two man crew could, in
one day, load up the entire cockpit
with their giant carcasses. “Back
then, we would drop in and shoot
a dozen or more on a wreck like
this without putting much of a
dent in the school,” he says. “Or
so we thought.”
“Part of the problem,” Don
explains, “is that these fish are
not the creatures urban legends
have made them out to be. True,
they are intimidating when seen
up close, but in all actuality, they
are surprisingly docile, sometimes
to the point of being a bit dense!
I can’t even begin to tell you how
many times they have just sat
there instead of running, staring
back at you the whole time my
gun was leveled at close range on
their head.”
Having killed a few myself in
my early days, I can attest to
the fact that shooting one with a
powerhead takes about as much
skill as dropping a dairy cow with
a high-powered rifle at point blank
range. Even when a goliath decides
to run, it’s seldom any farther than
the nearest hole or ledge.And once
they hole up, the outcome is often
the same - bam!
On days Don didn’t feel like
going down and pulling the trigger,
“it was just as simple as dropping
a heavy line down with a live blue
runner or jack to the bottom. A few
seconds later, you had fish. It was
insane; we were literally driving
these fish to extinction.”
Close to the Brink
The continued slaughter of
the big goliaths took its toll, and
by the late 70’s, goliath’s had
all but disappeared throughout
most of southeast Florida. By the
mid 1980’s, summer spawning
aggregations, which historically
featured some 80 to 100-plus
breeding age fish on a number of
sites in the central and southern
Gulf of Mexico between Tampa
and Key West, had fallen to less
than ten.
In 1989 the National Marine
Fisheries Service (NMFS), under
the authority of the Magnuson-
Stevens Fisheries Act, listed
goliath grouper populations as
being on the verge of collapse. The
following year, under supervision
of the South Atlantic Fisheries
Management Council, a federal
moratorium was enacted, making
the killing or retention of the
goliath grouper a criminal offense.
In 1991, goliaths were listed as
candidates for the endangered
species list.
www.underwaterjournal.com June/July 2007