Dive Details

Location

Date

Friday 27 January 2017

Time

9:01am - 10:35am

Details

The purpose of this dive was for Mike to show me the pot-bellied seahorse he and Roney saw on Wednesday.

We got in at Sutherland Point, waded and then surface swam to the shallow wall. We descended the wall. Visibility was around 5 metres, there was no surge and it was around 21°C. While Mike was getting his bearings, I found 2 pygmy pipehorses on a rock just off the end of the shallow wall.

Mike then went searching for the area where the seahorse was. I followed and along the way I spotted (and Mike missed even though I called for him) a wobbegong under a rock, two rock flathead together on the sand and a Nembrotha purpureolineata. We ended looping back to the base of the shallow wall and the pygmy pipehorses.

We set off again and this time Mike spotted a weedy seadragon. I stopped to photograph it and lost Mike. I caught up to him again on the north-east wall. He indicated there was something on the sponge covered rock but I wasn't sure what I was looking for until I spotted a grey red-fingered angler.

We swam on towards The Steps. We bumped into Roney and took him back to the angler before resuming our course. Just before Split Rock I found a small pygmy pipehorse on the rock I often see them. I showed Roney as Mike was a ahead. At Split Rock I found the yellow White's seahorse on the same sponge as two weeks ago. I showed it to Roney.

We continued and caught up to Mike. Roney pointed out a velvetfish in a sponge and we took some photos of it. I then took Mike back to Split Rock to show him the seahorse.

We visited the velvetfish again before continuing along the deep wall. We looked there and all the way to Block Rock for seahorses but found none. At Block Rock Mike spotted a little black angler (probably a painted angler).

We were both low on air so we headed back to The Monument. I did a shortened safety stop and got out at the bay around the corner from the flagpoles.

Buddy

Mike Scotland

Seas

Slight

Visibility

5 metres

Duration

93 minutes

Maximum depth

13.1 m

Average depth

10.6 m

Water temperature

20.7°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEDT

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

Low

2:17am

0.49m

High

8:50am

1.75m

Low

3:27pm

0.35m

High

9:18pm

1.36m