First Cray Dive Advice
Submitted by Industrymanboy on Mon, 2015-11-23 12:19
Fish Wrecked People,
Myself & a Mate are planning on going on our first dive for crayfish this coming Saturday.
With no pre-determined marks or experience, our rough plan is to head out towards the FFB and spot an area worth diving using our sounder and the presence of others cray pots.
The question I wanted to pose is how close should I dive to other people's pots? is there any other unwritten rules I should know about.
Cheers
AHarman
Posts: 100
Date Joined: 22/03/12
suggest you dont dive directly within vicinity of someones pots
unlikely you will recieve a wellcome reception.....
maybe follow the reef line running N/S where pots are and dive a section without if possible? Suggest 12-14m and obviously ocean side ledges.
good luck
Auslobster
Posts: 1901
Date Joined: 03/05/08
How long is a piece of string?
To some, 50 or more meters is too close, and you risk being accused of raiding their pots. It's a fairly small percentage but because so many people are out there now, the dickhead factor increases proportionately.
sunshine
Posts: 2554
Date Joined: 03/03/09
Stay well inside FFB
Plenty of good reef in 10-15 metres which should hold good numbers presently - pm if you want some gps cords
Paj man
Posts: 359
Date Joined: 16/09/12
50 meters
You'd imagine that as the dive flag covers a 50m exclusion zone around the boat, it would be considerate to keep this distance away from pots in case the owner shows up and wants to pull them.
Otherwise Auslobster is pretty spot on, how long is a piece of string.
aka Nick
meglodon
Posts: 5981
Date Joined: 17/06/10
Keep looking over your shoulder
Sorry couldn't help myself, best advice would be to make sure you always dive with a buddy who carries a gun (spear) swap the speargun with a cray loop when required so you each can get stuck into them.
Best of luck guys
sphere
Posts: 101
Date Joined: 07/01/15
Depends on location
pending where you are diving and launching from determines the ground. As for diving around pots, whilst you may be innocent of diving around the plastic and wooden caves to avoid all doubt and backfire 100 meters as a minimum.
Unless its an an isolated bombie in a square km of sand. People might be pulling their pots late and seeing a boat with dive flag, then pulling pot questions would be asked regardless of whether crays walked into pot or not.
On the western side of garden island if you dive in 15 meters of water you'll find a few, you'll probably find many in closer and the wind on Sunday will be less closer to island.
At the end of the day you just have to poke your head under the ledges and look into the caves.
I got 7 off the shore on Sunday and a couple just under which lived to see another day/season.
Notorious
Posts: 914
Date Joined: 23/02/12
Dive where the ground is good
Dive where the ground is good - if they accuse you of raiding their pots, tell them to shove it. Innocent until proven guilty.
I have had a commercial cray boat come within 1m of my boat and within 15m of us cray diving and surounding us with his pots. We didnt care, no one owns the reef.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/174055815943047/?fref=nf
Notorious
Posts: 914
Date Joined: 23/02/12
ps I have never raided a pot
ps I have never raided a pot - I dive to have fun and for the challenge of looping crays - if I wanted easy crays - I'd set pots too. But thats not much fun.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/174055815943047/?fref=nf
MandurahMatt
Posts: 613
Date Joined: 18/09/13
Can be hard to find anywhere
Can be hard to find anywhere with out pots ATM, my theory is i put a flag up that says please stay 50m away from my boat so i dont anchor within 50m of pots.
I always use a SMB/saftey stop anchor if im surfaceing further away from the boat and can hear theres a bit of traffic about.
As Notorius mentioned Grumpy potters are always grumpy so they are used to being told where to go too lol.
Bewdey Fellaz