Dive at The Leap, Kurnell, NSW on Sunday 20 December 2015

Dive Details

Location

Date

Sunday 20 December 2015

Time

11:53am - 1:17pm

Details

All three of us got in from the low platform as it was still pretty close to low tide. The visibility at the surface did not look all that good. We descended and swam at around 60° to the sand line hitting it just to the south east of Pygmy Rock. Visibility here was 10 to 15 metres but it was cold. We headed north west.

I had a very quick look at Pygmy Rock as we swam over it and then we continued along the sand line. Along the way we saw a lot of debris from the tornado. Most too large to be picked up by a diver. At Seahorse Rock there was a huge school of striped catfish. I assume it was the same school I'd seen 8 days earlier. We played in the school for a bit before moving on.

I went into the gap between the large rocks for the large juvenile weedy seadragons that have been there on recent dives. I only found one (PT2015081601) hiding in a sponge. We continued on to Seadragon Alley. Here we saw 3 female weedy seadragons (PT2015011102, PT2013122201, PT2014030901), and a male with eggs (PT2014030803). The last of the females was the one with the deformed body.

We continued along the sand line. Between Seadragon Alley and Big Rock we saw more weedy seadragons: a male without eggs (PT2014051701), a large juvenile (PT2015051001), another male with eggs (PT2014123002), a female (PT2015072501) and yet another male with eggs (PT2014091301).

We headed up the reef to the pygmy pipehorses. I found both the female (IL2015072601) and the male (IL2015121201).

We descended to the sand line. Here we found another male weedy seadragon with eggs (PT2015061401). We swam past the basket star and I found the new male pygmy pipehorse Kim spotted on Tuesday.

We swam on to Diversity Rock where I found "Noel" low down on the rock. The angler was on the rock to the left as it has been for the last few weeks. "Arnold" was in the sponges on the rock behind Diversity Rock and "Daniel" was on the rock to the right of Diversity Rock. I was not able to find "Rosie". Duncan and Charlie were running low on air and left me to continue my search for seahorses.

I swam on to the other seahorses where I found "Di" and "Mikhail". I then swam to the boulders, did my safety stop and exited at The Steps.

Buddy

Duncan, Charlie

Seas

Slight

Visibility

10 to 15 metres

Duration

83 minutes

Maximum depth

21.1 m

Average depth

13.8 m

Water temperature

16.5°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEDT

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

High

4:23am

1.50m

Low

10:29am

0.56m

High

4:33pm

1.45m

Low

10:54pm

0.37m

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.