In Reply to: Has anyone ever fed Lingcod? posted by Eric S on July 10, 2005 at 19:09:03:

A few years ago, after giving a presentation to some historical society folks at Catalina, my son and I were invited to a very nice buffet. There was a tremedous platter of shrimp that for some reason was not touched. At the close of the evening, I asked the host if I might take a zip-lock baggie of the shrimp. I was planning a couple of dives at the Casino before heading home and wanted to make nice with the local park residents.

The next day, the results were truly awesome. I had barely gotten the baggie out of my BC pocket when I began drawing a crowd. By the time I got the first shrimp out I was in a dense piscatorial cloud of new friends. To get to where I could actually see beyond fins and gill plates I had to keep swimming backwards, while all the time attracting more and more friends. If I was slow in letting go of the offered shrimp (and I'm talking nanoseconds here) my fingers were gnawed on too. I was having a great time and so were most of the aquatic population in the park. When I got down to the last shrimp, I moved the bag out to remove the shrimp, but before I could offer the final treat, a brute of a calico rocketed through his more polite bretheren, and grabbed the shrimp. unfortunately it was still in the zip-lock. I swear, the look on that bass's face was amazing. He spit it out and sucked it back into his mouth three times before he got tired of the meal that wasn't and gave up. I recoverd the bag, removed the shrimp and offered it to a very polite female sheephead. It was a heck of a dive and if I can ever afford the shrimp I'll do it again. ;-)

Stay wet.