For my second dive of the day I chose The Monument. I dived here last Saturday but because of the conditions got in at the flagpoles and only got as far as the end of the East-West wall. Today I wanted to dive the north-easter side as well as seeing if the pygmy pipehorses I'd found last week were still there.
I got in at the protected area around one third of the way to The Steps and waded out. I descended at the drop off and swam to the sand line. On my way I came across a large zebra lionfish. The visibility was around 5 metres and the water temperature was between 15 and 16°C. I turned left and headed towards Sutherland Point.
I followed the sand line to Block Rock and then moved up the reef and looked for anglerfishes on the sponge covered rocks. I continued to the wall and checked out all the usual places for interesting animals.
Towards the end of the wall and headed up and over the wall. As I got to the top of the wall a large female grey nurse shark was swimming by. She was only a couple of metres from me. I turned on my GoPro as quickly as I could but only managed to video her as she swam away. I'm pretty sure she's the same one I saw near The Steps yesterday. I hope she hangs around for a while. p>
I checked out the rocks at the top of the wall before continuing towards Sutherland Point. I looked in the area of Slope Rock for pygmy pipehorses but found none.
A little farther along the reef I looked in the orange finger sponge and found the brown White's seahorse that has been there for a few months.
I swam up to the rock where the seahorse used to be and found a Nembrotha sp. nudibranch on the sand. There has been 1-3 of these nudibranchs there for some time. I came back down and visited the seahorse again before continuing on.
I headed past Split Rock and on to Four Pygmy Rock. Just past Four Pygmy Rock I was looking at the rock with the orange sponge where the grey red-fingered anglerfish has been for some time when I spotted a juvenile velvetfish behind a sponge. It was only on Thursday that Mike was saying how rarely we see velvetfish.
I swam along the next wall and down to the rocks on the sand. I had a look for the Volva volva cowrie and found it at the other end of the rock from where I'd last seen it.
I continued along the reef to the corner and then cut up and over to the large Carijoa covered rock. I swam east to the next rock with Carijoa and found my orange red-fingered anglerfish. It was in the same spot as last Saturday but was facing the other way. I looked around the area for the anglerfish I'd seen nearby a few weeks ago but couldn't find it.
I headed west along the East-West Wall to the spot I'd seen the 4 pygmy pipehorses last week. I found both males straight away and then the pink female and finally the white and gold female. It was very surgy which made photography difficult. I stayed for a while and managed to get photographs of each pipehorse.
I was getting cold due to all the water in my left sleeve so I headed south east to get out at the little bay area. I stopped by the orange anglerfish and then ascended to 5 metres while swimming south east along the rocks. I overshot the exit by a long way and ended up surfacing close to where I'd descended at the start of the dive. I waded out over the rocks. |
