All hunting does not have to be done on land. You can also hunt for lobster, fish, pictures and a good time underwater as well.

These pictures were taken last summer when my wife and I were in Fort Lauderdale snorkeling off of the beach. We used one of the disposable cameras, and it did a pretty good job. It has been sitting in my car since then, and while I was in town the other day, I finally got it developed. So I thought that I would share a few of the shots here.

The neat thing about diving in Fort Lauderdale is that you do not need a boat or air tanks. You can literally just swim a couple of hundred yards off of the beach to one of the reefs and see some amazing things. And while having an air tank would allow you to stay under longer, since it is only 10-20 feet deep, you don’t really need one. Plus it is a great workout!

The reef runs parallel to the beach, so once you get out to the reef, you can just swim along with the current until you are ready to get out. Then you swim back to the beach and walk back to you car. It truly is one of the easiest and neatest dives I can recommend. And depending on the experience of the diver and their physical fitness level, there is a reef for you.

There are generally 3 reef lines that you can reach from the beach. The first one is only about 75 yards offshore. This is the easiest and the closest, so it is perfect for beginners. The average depth is normally about 8 feet, so you don’t have to work very hard to get down, and since it is so shallow, you don’t even have to… you can swim along and see pretty good. This is perfect for beginning divers!

The second reef is about 200 yards offshore and tends to be a much better dive. However since it is a longer swim with an average depth of 15 feet, it tends to be a little tougher for those not comfortable in the water. You can still see lots of stuff right from the surface, so being able to dive down is not mandatory, but it helps when you want to get a closer look at some of the coral or what’s under it (notice the lobster hiding). Expect to see lots of sea fans, tropical fish, sea turtles, tarpon and nurse sharks.

Then you come to the holy grail of beach diving, the third reef. Unless you have a boat, this one is not recommended for inexperienced beach divers due to the difficulty and the distance. It is about 700 yards offshore and averages 20-25 feet deep, so it is definitely not for the weak at heart since you must first swim all of the way out there. Then once there, to really enjoy it, you must be able to dive down to truly see the wall of corals and the abundance of sea life that live in and around them. But if it is clear (and it normally is), you can still see from the top, so it is not a wasted trip even if you can’t get down. Here you can expect to see an even greater abundance of tropical fish, lobster and grouper as well a more diverse landscape of corals.

The best way to do this dive is to tie a raft to your dive flag so that you have something to hang on to while you rest. Like I said, it is a pretty good swim (usually against the current) to get that far off the beach, so if you have a cramp or something, a raft really comes in handy. And since the life guards can’t see you if you have a problem, you are on your own.

Diving in Ft. Lauderdale is truly one of my favorite underwater excursions due to the cost – nothing. You don’t need any special gear, just a mask, snorkel and fins. Most people already have those, and you can rent them from a local dive shop if you don’t. And if you live anywhere in Florida, you can do this dive on a day trip, so no lodging is needed. However if you have just a few bucks, you can get a basic room right on the beach strip for around $75 and walk to the beach to dive. And by staying, you can then go a little more hardcore by doing a night dive! There is truly nothing like swimming offshore hundreds of yards in to the black night to see the reefs come alive after dark…

I may have to do another post on this!

Since I am in Florida this weekend, I thought that it would be appropriate to showcase some great trailcam pictures from here. My friend C.J. hunts west of Palm Coast and gave these to me a while back. He says that they have more bears than coyotes!!! I would hate to find that big one waiting patiently by the feeder for me to show up with a fresh refill…

They also have quite a few coyotes running around too. And I just thought that it was funny that he got a picture of one peeing in the corn pile. I also have caught them doing that, so it must be fairly common for them to mark it. This behavior is also not surprising since they love to go at high-traffic areas.

Knowing how many of our readers live and hunt in Florida, I thought I would do another post on nice Florida bucks.

The top picture is one of our members, Chip, with one of the biggest bucks to come off of their club in many years. He was killed in front of dogs in Central Florida. And the mount will go perfectly on his wall with the SC velvet buck that he killed here in August… Too bad he doesn’t have the two lowcountry monsters he missed this season to go with them Hopefully C.J. can get his dad to the range this summer! LOL

And my good friend Mike is pictured with his son in one shot with a decent FL buck that he killed during muzzleloader season. The other shot shows him with a good one taken during rifle season. Both were killed on his lease about 15 miles outside of Gainesville, so if you are looking for an in-state college that your kids can attend and keep hunting, UF looks like the place to be… and hopefully he already has a turkey blind set up for me for this spring. Otherwise the next shot shown here will be a nice pic that I have photoshopped to show him hunting in a pink nightie!

Mike also sent me this shot of Bobby Whitney with an almost entirely white deer that he killed in Cross Creek Fl. What a neat trophy, for anywhere, but especially the sunshine state!

If anyone else has pictures of good FL bucks that were taken this season, please email them to me. I just love to show what proper Quality Deer Management and a little patience can get you!

Therefore I am going to do a series of posts on the great hunting some of our members and friends have in the Sunshine State starting with my friend Mike. He hunts just outside of Gainsville (only 15 minutes from UofF, believe it or not) and has a great lease with lots of deer, hogs and turkeys. My friend Will and I even went down this spring to check it out and had an amazing time – I killed a nice Osceola and Will missed a good piney woods rooter – a future post for sure.

Mike is pictured here with a coyote he killed with his bow last week… a truly great accomplishment, and what a monster song dog! That should also help answer the question one of Moose’s readers had about if there are coyotes in Florida.

His other picture is with the great buck he killed on opening day of bow season last year. That buck is the smaller of the two (and facing away) in the trailcam shot. And while he did not kill it, he did get another shot of the big one later that fall. Now we want to see him this with this year’s rack!

Stay tuned, in my next “Great Hunting in Florida” post, I will have some neat trailcam photos of nice bucks, big bears and wiley coyotes from the Mickey Mouse state.