Dive Details

Location

Date

Thursday 9 February 2017

Time

11:40am - 1:32pm

Details

We jumped in at my usual spot to the west of the ramp on the nothern side of the island and surface swam out towards the outboard motor. We descended to the sand and the visibility was at least 5 metres. The temperature was a balmy 24°C and it was calm.

We swam past the outboard motor and up over the ledge to the boulders. We hadn't gone far when I spotted a pygmy pipehorse (IL2017020901) which I stopped to photograph. I looked for more before the top of the slope but didn't find any.

We headed down the slope, looking for critters along the way. I looked at the rock above Pygmy Rock for pygmies but saw none. Kim found a pygmy (IL2017020902) on the rock above the rock with the Coscinaraea mcneilli colony and pointed it out to me and then I found one (IL2017020903) on the C. mcneilli rock itself.

Kim found a pink female pygmy (IL2017020904) on the next rock (above where the upside-down pipefish were) and then I found a male (IL2017020905) with it.

As I got near Juvy Rock, Kim was photographing a white male pygmy ((IL2017020906) on the rock before it. I went to Juvy Rock and found the female great seahorse in the sponge at the bottom. After Kim moved on from the white pygmy I took some photos and found a female (IL2017020907) near by. We were now up to 7 pygmies for the dive.

I went looking for the male great seahorse and after a bit of searching found him in some kelp. Kim pointed out a red indianfish.

Kim started up the slope ahead of me and I took some more photographs of the male seahorse, that had now moved to a sponge. I then took some photos of the white pygmy (IL2017020906) and its mate (IL2017020907).

As I headed up the slope, Kim beckoned me to follow her to the rock above the rock with the C. mcneilli. She'd found a rather large striped angler. While taking photos of the angler I realised I still had the camera on f/11 (from the seahorse) so I went back to the other pygmies (IL2017020906, IL2017020907) to photograph them at f/16. I also took some photos of the other pair (IL2017020904, IL2017020905 )we'd seen.

I swam to the top of the slope and along in front of the boulders and found the first pygmy (IL2017020901) again. After taking photos I started my safety stop as I headed to the exit. I got out at the entry point.

Buddy

Kim Dinh

Seas

Slight

Visibility

3 to 5 metres

Duration

112 minutes

Maximum depth

13.0 m

Average depth

10.1 m

Water temperature

21.0°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEDT

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

Low

1:20am

0.42m

High

7:51am

1.84m

Low

2:32pm

0.26m

High

8:30pm

1.42m