Dive at The Leap, Kurnell, NSW on Tuesday 26 January 2016

Dive Details

Location

Date

Tuesday 26 January 2016

Time

8:36am - 10:06am

Details

It was quite rough at The Leap but that made entry easier as we didn't have as far to jump if we waited for a wave. We descended and headed to the sand line at around 60° arriving right near Pygmy Rock. Visibility was around 10 metres.

We headed towards The Steps swimming along the sand line. There was a lot of kelp on the sand and between the rocks. We saw a medium sized giant cuttlefish in the kelp. The kelp was so deep that I missed Seahorse Rock. I only realised after we got to the large rocks past it.

I looked for the weedy seadragons in the gap between the two rocks but I couldn't find either one. I did find one just past the rocks, it was a new one (PT2016012601). I found another before Southern Cross Rock (PT2015081601). There was male weedy seadragon with eggs (PT2014051701) just past Southern Cross Rock.

In Seadragon Alley we saw 4 weedy seadragons: the female with the cut on her first appendage (PT2013122201), a male with eggs (PT2014030803), a new male (PT2016012602) also with eggs, and one of the large juveniles (PT2015051001).

We saw two more weedy seadragons just past Seadragon Alley: A male with eggs (PT2014091301) and the female with deformed body (PT2014030901). We saw another one (PT2015072501) just before Big Rock.

We didn't go up the reef to look for the other pygmy pipehorses and kept along the sand line to the basket star. I had a quick look for the pygmies on the rock just after the basket star but couldn't see either.

We swam on to Diversity Rock and caught up to the group from St George Scuba who were there. "Daniel", the male pot-bellied seahorse, was low down on Diversity Rock and "Arnold" and "Noel" were in the sponges on the rock behind Diversity Rock. I couldn't find the angler. I initially couldn't find "Rosie" until I looked at the big rock above and to the left of Diversity Rock. I found the two pygmy pipehorses (IL2015123101, IL2016011002) in the Carijoa on top of Diversity Rock.

We headed to "Di"'s rock but could not find either "Di" or "Mikhail". We then headed to the boulders, started our safety stops as we headed to the exit. We exited at The Steps which was a little hairy die to the swell but not too bad.

Buddy

Bia Hoffman, Fred Hoffman, Chris

Seas

Slight with surge

Visibility

10 metres

Duration

89 minutes

Maximum depth

21.6 m

Average depth

14.5 m

Water temperature

18.9°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEDT

Note that tides at dive site may vary from above location.

Low

4:19am

0.45m

High

10:44am

1.77m

Low

5:14pm

0.33m

High

11:15pm

1.40m

Camera gear

Camera

Nikon D7000

Lens

Nikon AF Micro-Nikkor 60mm f/2.8D

Housing

Ikelite 6801.70

Lens port

Ikelite Flat Port 5502.41

Strobe

2 x Ikelite SubStrobe DS161

Photographs

Depth information, where present, indicates the depth of the camera when the photograph was taken and can be used to approximate the depth of the subject.