Sea world and south - A Fascination for Fish: Adventures of an Underwater Pioneer - page 72

ber of the team was Leo Navarro, a retired tuna fisherman who, among
his many skills, was an excellent cook and prepared delicious Italian meals
for us. He was also an expert net mender and many a time repaired our
damaged hand nets.
We made our share of mistakes, but we learned from them and de-
veloped some successful methods for catching the elusive reef fishes, in-
cluding Milt Shedd's coveted moorish idols. Drawing on my past expe-
rience collecting for Marineland of the Pacific, and especially observations
of fish behavior I'd made while diving for lobsters, I chose the combi-
nation of night diving and hand netting as the most e¤ective way to col-
lect diurnal, or day-active, fishes. Butterflyfishes, angelfishes, parrotfishes,
and moorish idols are all much too active and wary to approach during
the day. At night they become semi-dormant and are easily confused—
and collected—when a bright dive light is shined in their eyes.
We each carried a small mesh-nylon hand net, a plastic bag under
the crotch strap of our wet suit, a dive light, and a number of di¤er-
ent-sized hypodermic needles tucked under the wrist cu¤ of our wet
suit. The hand nets were our most prized possessions; they couldn't be
purchased, so we each made our own, with our own details of design
and construction that we swore were better than anyone else's. (Of course,
my design really was the best of all!) The hypodermic needles were to
release the expanding air from the swimbladder of fish brought up from
water deeper than thirty or forty feet, relieving buoyancy and stress.
As more and more night dives were made we developed skills and
techniques that increased our e¤ectiveness. We learned to hold our
breath when approaching a fish so as not to startle it with exhaled bub-
bles. Fish may not be able to see in the dark, but they can certainly
hear and sense sounds and vibrations quite well.
Our buddy system was simple, although it would be deplored by
current occupational safety standards. The absolute rule was this: we
were together in the boat before the dive and we were together in the
boat after the dive. While in the water, though, we each pretty much
went our own way. Sticking together in pairs would have cut our catch
rate considerably, especially in the dark. We would have wasted too
much time looking for our buddy in the dark instead of concentrat-
ing on catching the fish. And catching fish was our primary concern.