If you?re interested in spearfishing, you?ve chosen a great sport. When you scuba dive, the sounds of your regulator scares away fish, and the enormous bulky equipment marks you out as an alien. With a spearfishing freedive suit and a speargun, you become a true part of the underwater world. If you’re just starting, here?s some spearfishing aiming tips and advice about spearfishing equipment that will turn you into a pro.

Make Sure Your Gear Fits

You?ll be buying freediving gear, but you need to make sure everything fits perfectly before you start thinking about what speargun to buy or spearfishing aiming tips. The mask is most important of all. Don?t put the strap over your head right away. Just put it on your face and suck in air through your nose. The mask should stick hard to your face. If it falls off or there?s air coming in at any point along the mask, it doesn?t fit. Don?t buy it.
Your spearfishing fins are also really important bits of gear. Make sure that the footpockets perfectly fit your feet, and remember that your feet swell a bit when wet, so get something a little loose rather than a little snug. Finally, your dive suit should be open cell and have no nylon covering or zippers. If you can only afford one suit for the whole year, go for a 5mm one. If you can, get a 3mm for warm waters, 5mm for average, and a 7mm for when it?s really cold.

Make Sure Your Weight is Perfect

Freediving suits are very boyant, which means you?ll need lead belts to keep you under the water. You need just the right amount of weight, though. If you have too much, you?ll sink too far. You may even run into trouble if for some reason you lose consciousness, as the belt will take you right down. But if the weight is too small, you?ll struggle to swim and make every shot. A fairly good rule of thumb to start with is a belt with one tenth your body weight. When you put on the belt and jump in, hold your breath and remain perfectly vertical. You should sink to about halfway up your mask. That?s the perfect amount.

Get the Right Gun

Spearfishing aiming tips will depend a bit on which type of speargun you have, and different guns are suitable for different fish. Here?s where you want to check with the locals and professionals in the area you hope to fish, and use what they recommend. One of the biggest mistakes people make is to buy guns that are too small for the intended targets. The smaller guns may be easier to swim with and take less strength to load, but they won?t do the job you came here to do: spear fish.

Keep Yourself in Great Shape

Spearfishing is physically arduous, and you?ll need the strength, flexibility, and stamina to swim all day, expend bursts of energy when needed, move as necessary underwater, get yourself out of a tight spot if you need, and load and shoot a heavy gun. Spearfishing will be a lot more fun if you are in good physical shape.

Spearfishing Aiming Tips: Above the Water

A quick shout out to those of you who bought spearguns to shoot fish from outside the water. If that?s you, the primarily spearfishing aiming tips are simple: don?t forget refraction and aim low. Refraction will make the fish seem to be where it isn?t. For every foot of depth between you and the fish, aim about six inches lower than the target.

Spearfishing Aiming Tips: Everyone Else

You won?t like the first bit of advice: practice. Practice, and then practice some more. Spearguns are hard to aim, and getting a natural feel for it will be your best bet. Aim down the barrel or down the shaft, but remember that sometimes you won?t be able to do that. Look past the end of the gun at your target, and keep trying.

Try it for yourself! Spearfishing is fun, good exercise, and will let you forget all about the real world for a while. It?s a fantastic sport.