Our Story.
The HydroScaler was an invention of necessity as most are. I was a back country captain fishing out of World Wide Sportsman in Islamorada, Florida. Scaling fish was a common request among clients when keeping various species of snapper. Scaling a fish, as opposed to filleting them, keeps more of the fish usable for cooking and creates a different flavor experience.
THE PROBLEM
TESTING IDEAS
OUR SOLUTION
Scaling fish was for lack of better words is a pain. I tried every method in the book, spoon scaling, various devices for sale in local stores, knives, forks, you name it, it was still a pain.
One day after a successful day of snapper fishing, my clients requested all snapper to be scaled. There were 30 nice sized snappers in the cooler. After what seemed an eternity of scaling fish, an old man noticed that I was having some difficulty and becoming frustrated with the task. He came over to me and suggested to use a hose on high power to essentially blow the scales off the fish. I watched as he showed me the quicker method. I finished scaling the remainder of the snapper this way. It was efficient, but there was one major problem: I was soaked and covered with fish scales. Any boat or person within a 20-foot radius was also soaked and covered in fish scales. It was a dirty job.
I went home later that afternoon and thought there had to be a way to scale fish as quickly as using a high-pressure hose without the mess. After a couple hours tinkering with items in my backyard, I constructed the first ever Hydro-Scaler. I was excited to try this device out, so I went to the dock in the backyard and caught a Mangrove Snapper. I turned the hose on to full blast and began to scale the fish. The device worked exactly like I dreamed, easy and efficient. There was one problem though, it was still messy. I was about to call it quits when my dad showed up to see what I was doing. He asked me, “have you ever peeled a hard-boiled egg?”. I looked at him puzzled. With his wisdom he explained to me when peeling a hard-boiled egg, it works best to let water run over the shell. The water makes the shell shed off in larger chunks. A light went off in my head, “so you’re saying to turn the pressure down?” He looked at me and smiled. I turned the water pressure down and began to scale the other side of the fish. Viola. No mess, efficient, and easy. We caught another snapper and scaled it. Ittook a grand total of 10 seconds to scale the entire fish. I looked over at my dad and said, “call a patent attorney”. Thus, the HydroScaler was born.