Farewell to John Roberts

John Roberts (aka "Big John"), commercial snapper fisherman of Panama City, Florida, recently passed away at the age of 52 shortly after being diagnosed with cancer. Big John was a Gulf of Mexico snapper fisherman from his early teens, and he was keenly interested in conservation which is how we came to know him and work with him in our studies of reef fish ecology in and around Madison Swanson Marine Reserve. He was always our choice for working on the deck, as we ran huge fish traps; he could handle them as if they were toys, wielding them around and dumping the fish into holding tanks, then setting them up again for re-deployment. He also performed other tasks including measuring fish, gonad biopsies, and tagging with equal skill. No one we know had his strength and agility, and he never stumbled, not even in a heavy sea on the rolling and pitching snapper vessel. He was always good natured, kind, and considerate. Big John will be deeply missed by our research team; he was a cherished friend.