We are just back from our second dolphin tagging expedition in the Bahamas. While the weather was cold, windy and the fish scarce, we did manage to tag 40 fish and recapture one dolphin that was tagged 3 days earlier by us. We started out off Chub Cay and found zero fish... A year ago there were thousands of dolphin there but this year we could not find the fish. We moved about 100 miles to the Southeast to Highborne Cay after a week and found some fish but then another cold front blew in for 3 days and pushed them South.
Probably the most interesting part of the trip was the recapture of a 38" bull dolphin 15.5 miles from where we tagged him 3 days earlier. Fish this size are tagged in the water then released almost always with a circle hook still in the jaw of the fish. The recaptured fish had shed the circle hook and was in great shape. So this is another good indicator for using circle hooks. We were fishing the Eagle Claw circle hook and it seemed to work better than others we have used. We did not miss a lot of fish and we always had corner jaw hook sets even on the yellowfin tuna and billfish caught. It could be just that we are more experienced on feeding the fish and setting the hook. More on that in the future.
I am still upset from the sight of the conch cemetery on the Berry Island flats. I would like to think that we can extract wealth from the sea and do it sustainably. But seeing that pile of conch shells is like seeing an abandoned strip mine somewhere in the West... The idea is to leave no trace of our presence... And maybe the conch and the fish don't care but I do...
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