Fishing Q&A
collecting one's own fish and coral in the florida keys...?
if I wanted to go to florida and get my diving certification... how long would that take? I want to get a 3 day salt water license to collect my own fish and coral. I know the rules on this.... what I can and cant take out of there... I know how to get it home... how do you know where to GO to do the dive without hiring a charter for $400 for 4 hours? regular dive charters that I assume don't promote taking anything are like $75... why so MUCH $$$? are there groups of people who do this regularly that I could tag along with? any advice? as I said... I know the rules and laws... please know YOURS before posting that it's illegal... reference the law here if you like under the application for a 3 day salt water license... you may take a certain amout of speciaman's a day save a few protected ones. and they must be within a certain size... you may not take the live rock. http://myfwc.com/marine/recreational/recharvestmls.htm for that matter, they offer charter boat services to go GET the stuff http://www.sealective.com/cgi-bin/web_store/web_store.cgi?page=collecting.shtml&cart_id=
Public Comments
- You may not collect or harvest corals in the state of Florida.
- It's illegal to collect ANY live coral in the Keys. It's all protected
- Do NOT touch coral. You will kill it....jeeez.... Go buy the stuff for your aquarium (through legal channels).
- Its so expensive because of the fact that its such a touristy area (I go there a few times a year, and I normally bring back SOMETHING for my tanks) Its legal to collect SOFT corals as long as they aren't attatched to rocks, so be sure to get a pocket knife and I would suggest a good one. As far as fish, good luck because I have tried and tried and caught ONE blenny in the canal where I was staying. If you want to email me at dreaminofthetropics@yahoo.com I can give you the name of someone who would probably take you for less and I bet could certify you and knows where to go and probably how to catch the fish. I rented from them before and they have their own boat and dive.
