Little Cayman Day 4 - The Hunt

Now that the vacation turned into what it was suppose to be, I was ready for my secret wish to happen, seeing a shark. Though I knew Little Cayman was hardly the shark capital of the ocean, I had read reports that an occasional reef, hammerhead, or whale shark were sometimes visible along the walls. It just so happened that on our first dive of the morning at about ninety feet, I was able to give Becca the official signal for shark (hand to the top of the head, for fin out of the water JAWS made famous). Of course the reef shark was probably at a hundred and thirty feet, so a good forty feet below us, and hardly a man eater seeing as he'd probably choke trying to fit even a small extremity of mine in his six to eight foot body, but still our first official shark! Sure, we have seen a number of nurse sharks, but they don't count. Nurse sharks are just like my cats, they find a nice place to lay down and all they do is sleep. It wasn't up close and personal and it wasn't very big, but I'm calling this my first official shark dive.

One would think that seeing a shark would be the most memorable event of the dive, it wasn't. The king of the jungle (or is that deep in this case) is the Lion, okay make that Lionfish. The Lionfish are an invasive species that have the potential to change the reefs for the worse. Though actually very beautiful, they have a tremendous appetite and unfortunately don't have any natural predators, well besides Dottie and Phil (our dive guides). On this dive Dottie was with us and ended up catching and killing four of them. I was lucky enough to get video of her netting one and I believe Becca is the one who spotted it. Not to be outdone by Becca, I found my own and although I don't know if it's the one Phil caught, I'm pretending it was. For the day, our boat ended with seven confirmed kills, which by sounds of the complaining coming from the other (faster) boats, I think it was a record.

It was satisfying to think that I helped do my part to help keep the reefs safe. In the end, I know it didn't even scratch the surface of the problem. Although my resume shows lack of experience, I would like to make it known that any resort or island in the Caribbean willing to pay my way and fill my tanks, I'll gladly hunt Lionfish on every dive.