Posted by Walt on May 24, 2005 at 21:41:31:
In Reply to: Re: Great Escape will stop the taking of small, or illegal fish. posted by Ban the spear on May 24, 2005 at 17:21:46:
OK, selfish thinking I know, but its about the only thing missing from the G.E.! (well, that and the soft ice cream machine ;-)
Back to reality... I know you ALWAYS stress in your Captain's briefing that no one is to shoot anything they don't clearly recognize as legal. That works for divers who listen, aren't morons, and give a darn. As for the idiots out there, they will always be idiots and nothing you SAY to them will change that. You would be in your right as Captain to ban them from further spear fishing or even diving. I've seen you do something similar before to an arogant idiot who went out the gate last with doubles, got lost, stayed down too long, had to decompress and cost the 30+ others on that charter a dive or two while we looked and waited for him. You simply said 'you're done diving on this boat'. We haven't missed him in the years since.
Same goes for anyone who shoots undersized catch - especially after being told on the previous dive the catch was short. That person has no right to continue to hunt and I for one would back you 100% if you took his gun away from him. Plus, for God's sake, it was a sheepshead! They're so tame you could take a tape measure underwater and measure them!