The Remora Fish

[oneighty]

The fish has a sucker device on top of his head. He sucks on to large marine creatures, gets free ride. One of them came after CPO/Master Diver--- He was my diving partner. We were coming up from a pretty deep dive, rising slow, decompressing. The Remora seemed to have designs on the Chiefs fat belly hovering ever so close looking for a free ride. The Chief whipped out his trusty (Rusty) diving knife. In the process he cut his hand open. The Chief's blood begins to flow, We are deep enough his blood looks sorta greenish. The Chief is having a bad day. On our first dive of the day a big loggerhead turtle tried to mount him. The second dive a large Hammerhead Shark amused us for a few minutes. Now on the third dive he is dueling with the harmless Remora fish. I am thinking with the blood in the water he will soon be dueling with a shark. That does not happen.

Some years later in Aztec Blue water off Charleston SC a big Remora got after the diving officer I was working with. The officer seemed quite disturbed. I got between the officer and the Remora. The fish was much attracted by the rich blue of my Voit Viking swim fins and followed them and me all the way to the dive boat. The expression on the Remora's (face) is happy, looks like they are grinning all the time.

Many years later I am fishing off the Shrimp Trawler anchored up in twenty fathoms of water off Georgia. I hooked into a good size fish, fought him to the boat. He is a large Remora, his grin is colored, broken by the bleeding caused by my wicked treble hook. I try to remove the hook with out further damage. I am not successful. I release the Remora, he leaves a trail of blood as he trys to swim away. I am thinking. "Why did you do that Eddie?"

180

[mmm]

1. How big is a Remora?

I have never encountered one.
Come across some honkin' big Morays.
They looked scary but turned out to be quite friendly.

[oneighty]

5. Size?

Largest I have seen about eighteen inches. They are really comical. They look so happy and excited when they find their free ride. I never heard of one attaching to a human on purpose.

[Droopy]

2. Diving is not for me

Hell if I'm going to jump into water where the fish are bigger than me.

[Kolesar]

4. I just remember getting salt water up my nose when snorkling in Pennecamp

John Pennecamp is a beautiful reef off of Key Largo, FL, but what I really remember is the parrot fish and the barracuda lurking under the dive boat--other dive parties would usually feed it (!).

[fishnfla]

3. Hey 180

good stuff as per usual. Ever read the book "working the edge" by spike walker?
king crab fishing in the bering sea.awesome stuff

[oneighty]

6. No fishnfla

Firts part os story off Fort Lauderdale. We were doing some wor for Naval Ordnance Labs..Beautiful waters, plenty of fishes.

Bering Sea Crabbing terrible dangerous job. I will get the book. Thanks.

Ed.