Dive Details

Location

Date

Friday 19 May 2017

Time

11:52am - 1:23pm

Details

This was a dive for the Australian Museum to collect two reaper cuttlefish, Sepia mestus, for a researcher who is looking at DNA to understand the phylogentic relationships in Sepidae. We had planned to dive at Fairy Bower but it was too rough so we went to Shelly Beach instead.

We got in on the left side of the beach and swam along the reef towards Fairy Bower. We looked under ledges and in crevices for cuttlefish. I first found a common Sydney octopus, Octopus tetricus, and shortly later a medium sized giant cuttlefish, Sepia apama. We then spotted some large southern calamari squid, Sepioteuthis australis. Eventually, I found a reaper cuttlefish in a ledge and managed to catch it without too much trouble.

We still had a second one to find so we continued on towards Fairy Bower. At around the pool (I think) we headed out to some of the larger rocks on the sand. As I looked up from one of the boulders, I saw a small (1-2m) dusky whaler swimming away. I was wondering if we'd see any. I saw it (or others) 4 more times on the dive. It appeared to be coming in to check us out.

About a third of the way back I found a second reaper cuttlefish in a ledge. I think this one was smaller and was more difficult to catch as it kept going deeper into the ledge. With persistence I eventually caught it. We made our way back to the beach and got out where we got in.

Buddy

Mandy Reid

Seas

Surgy

Visibility

10 metres

Duration

86 minutes

Maximum depth

5.8 m

Average depth

3.6 m

Water temperature

20.1°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Sydney (Fort Denison) AEST

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

High

1:41am

1.55m

Low

8:36am

0.59m

High

2:48pm

1.33m

Low

8:26pm

0.80m