S.E. Fl. Coral/Diving/lobster Report

[scubadude]

I was in Dania/Ft. Lauderdale area diving most of the reefs offshore this past couple of days, as it was lobster MiniSeason and remember from some previous post someone saying about how they have dove this area and seeing turned over brain corals from boats anchoring or pressure from divers, I really saw alot of damage now that I think about it....the Reef is still beautiful....but there are parts that appear to be obvious neglect which is scary becuz I saw 2 very large brain corals that I couldnt flip over as they where upside down...and one smaller one I think I may have saved the bottom half it starts growing again If you are diving out in this area or any area for that matter and you see a brain coral that is upside down please flip it right side up! The lobstering was great....lotta females w/eggs though must release them because its the law, however this law has kept a very adequate surplus of lobsters! I almost limited out....I was allowed 24...I got 18 But that was out of 12 dives in 48 hrs.....My computer started flashing and beeping on the 12th dive halfway through it!...Time to get out! The vis was about 15' at its worst...and close into shore...and about 25'-30' at best in deeper water 2nd or 3rd reef. Couple of deaths...divers just came up floating the next morning after a 3 hrs search. One boat capsized and was on the news.....there seem to be alot of ppl that go out as the "only dive" of the year...This seems IMO very dangerous!

[icemark]

Good thing you pay attention to your dive 'puter.. too many people don't and have accidents.

The biggest problem we have here is poachers. we don't have the same kinds of reefs. You are limited to 4 abalone a day, and you get these people (not to use derogatory terms, so lets just say people from an Asian country that we lost a war in), but anyway they pull like 18 or 20 a day.

They know they are past the limit and they pull them anyway to sell off to the restaurants. They make like $25 a lb, so they don't care what they are doing to the population.

But now there is talk of outlawing the catch all together, all because of these poachers.