Dive Details

Location

Date

Sunday 12 November 2017

Time

1:13pm - 2:33pm

Details

For our second dive Malcolm and I did The Steps again. We could head to Big Rock and spend more time there with the pygmy pipehorses.

We jumped in at The Steps which was very easy due to the tide still being quite low. We met on the surface before descending to the sand line. Visibility was probably around 8 metres and the water temperature was around 19°C. We turned right and headed to Big Rock.

There was a bit of current that we had to swim into but it wasn't too hard. We hadn't gone far before we came across a male weedy seadragon with eggs. It was the same one I'd seen on Thursday. We got to the red widebody pipefish and took some photos before moving on.

We swam to Little Big Rock and the two anglers behind it. They had hardly moved from the previous dive, although the orange painted angler had changed its orientation. We then swam directly to Big Rock staying a bit up from the sand line to stay a bit shallower.

At Big Rock I found my red male pygmy pipehorse and I pointed him out to Malcolm. I then found the new dark male before going down to the Okenia mellita nudibranch. I had a look for Roney's male pygmy pipehorse but couldn't find him. I spotted the new yellow male pygmy but couldn't find his partner. When Malcolm moved off to one of the other pygmies I went back to my red male and looked for his partner who I found nearby. I then spotted a small female pygmy near the darker male. Malcolm and I took multiple photographs of the pygmies until our air was getting low and we then headed off.

We swam to the base of the boulders and swam along the reef there for some time before ascending to 5 metres and starting our safety stops. We swam to Split Rock and then exited at The Steps.

Buddy

Malcolm Nobbs

Duration

80 minutes

Maximum depth

13.9 m

Average depth

11.5 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.

High

4:28am

1.33m

Low

10:10am

0.64m

High

4:28pm

1.56m

Low

11:09pm

0.40m