![]() The story seemed preposterous.Īs my career shifted to science writing, I let Flower Garden Banks slip from my imagination. All of this just a few hours off the Texas coast. A place where behemoths roamed: all those manta rays and whale sharks, as well as giant grouper like the ones you might see in faded photos on the walls of tackle shops, and schools of hammerhead and blacktip sharks. A spectacular dive site with waters as crystalline as those at the most sought-out locations in the world, like the Indo-Pacific’s Coral Triangle or Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, with visibility that stretched a hundred feet or more. Not a flimsy, raggedy reef, but one bursting with life. The first time I heard of Flower Garden Banks-years ago, when I was an ocean scientist-it sounded like a Texas-size tale: a collection of seamounts rich in coral, rising from waters hundreds of feet deep, about a hundred miles southeast of Galveston. But for me, these grand corals were the true giants. Some scuba divers venture to this place for the manta rays as big as living-room carpets and whale sharks the size of school buses. To explore a grove of these ancients, possibly dating back 1,500 years, felt like hiking among the redwoods in Northern California. Spinning slowly in a circle, I took in the matriarchs and patriarchs that surrounded me: enormous amber colonies as well as limestone thrones overlaid in jade-green clusters. I crossed a sandy area toward an emerald hillock, pushed my flippered feet downward, and hovered vertically-the coral before me was massive and majestic. Old School Fish Story: Giant Grouper Mauls Spearfi.Almost one hundred feet under the sea, I was flying. I glided through a seascape of vibrant corals and tropical fish, inspecting the reef’s caves and nooks with childlike curiosity.With Taiwan in the distance, a lifelong chase for.If you're curious, the world record Goliath grouper weighs in at 680 pounds and was caught off Fernandina Beach, Florida. But after seeing the fish, Withers said the grouper that attacked him was even bigger. He was sure it was the same fish that attacked Withers. Gulley's fish had an estimated weight of about 650 pounds. 'And he circled around the pipe I don't know how many times with me hanging on. 'He jerked me out of my fins,' Gulley said. In a blur, the powerful jewfish turned and bolted. Gully pivoted, aimed and fired in a single motion, plunging the barbed projectile deeply between the fish's eye and gill plate. "The big-eyed grouper backed up and maneuvered slowly to one side of a motionless Gulley. A few days later Gulley and his dad found monster fish. Beard was prepared to proclaim Withers a lost diver when he spotted his partner bleeding and sitting on the stern nursing his wounds."Īfter this story was reported to local news outlets, another young spearfisherman named Brian Gulley set out to catch the man-eating Goliath grouper. Unable to see and therefore unable to help, Beard ascended to the boat, where the wives of the two divers awaited. Silt and sand stirred from the bottom by the strike clouded Beard's view of what happened next. 'He just inhaled him,' Beard told the reporter. ![]() That's when the Goliath turned, opened its gaping maw and engulf part of Withers, head first. As we came around we headed toward the bottom beside the fish.' "He raised up and I got the hell out of there. " 'He was so big he looked like the bottom," said Withers' diving partner John Beard. The story revolves around a massive Goliath grouper that attempted to eat then 25-year-old spearfisherman Steve Withers. David Sikes of the Corpus Christi Caller has uncovered a classic fish story from the 1970's that's worth checking out.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |