Dive at The Steps, Kurnell, NSW on 21 June 2014

Dive Details

Location

Date

21 June 2014

Time

12:45pm - 2:09pm

Details

For my second dive I decided to do The Steps. This would give me more time to look around The Steps for anglers, especially "Big John", than I get at the end of a dive from The Leap. It was still almost flat and conditions looked great.

I jumped in at The Steps and descended to the sand line. Rather than going all the way to the sand line I stayed around the sponge cover rocks which was beneficial as I came across "Big John", the orange form undescribed angler almost immediately. I was surprise how easy it was to spot. After making sure I could find it again, I continued on my way.

I headed back to the sand line proper and followed it all the way to Big Rock, with a slight detour to the pygmy pipehorse. On my way, I bumped into Noel and Di. Noel was photographing a dwarf lionfish. Along the way I was looking for pygmy pipehorses and anglers but found none.

At Big Rock I looked for pygmy pipehorses and then I headed to the top of the reef and carefully checked out the sponge covered rocks. I found a painted stinkfish on the sand between the rocks. I followed the sponge covered rocks all the way back to the pygmy pipehorse and then followed them back to where I'd seen "Big John" looking for other anglers but didn't find any. After taking some more photographs of "Big John", I headed to the Plesiastrea colonies and did my safety stop. I exited at The Steps.

Seas

Slight

Visibility

10-15 metres

Duration

84 minutes

Maximum depth

15.1 m

Average depth

11.5 m

Water temperature

18.8°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEST

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

High

2:56am

1.49m

Low

9:17am

0.47m

High

3:45pm

1.59m

Low

10:05pm

0.64m

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.