Dive at The Monument, Kurnell, NSW on Saturday 13 January 2018

Dive Details

Location

Date

Saturday 13 January 2018

Time

2:25pm - 4:01pm

Details

With big seas forecast for Sunday and Monday and then working Tuesday through Thursday this was going to be my only dive for a few days. Monday's dive with Mike at The Monument was so good I decided to do it again and hopefully find the displaying velvetfish and the 6 red-fingered anglerfish.

I walked in to the water at the protected area a third of the way to The Steps and waded out to the drop off. I descended to the sand line. Visibility was around 10 metres and the water temperature was around 20°C. There was very little surge and just some current from the incoming tide. I turned left and headed towards the point.

I followed the sand line to Block Rock keeping one eye out for weedy seadragons and my other for the velvetfish. I cut in at Block Rock and found the spot we'd seen the velvetfish on Monday. It wasn't there. I looked around the area and couldn't find it. The visibility dropped to around 5 metres and there were thermoclines coming through with the temperature changing quite rapidly. I assume it was the incoming tide bringing in dirty water. I went looking for the orange red-fingered anglerfish. While I was looking I found an Okenia mellita nudibranch. I then spotted the anglerfish a few centimetres away.

I continued along the wall and on to Carijoa Rock. I couldn't find anything of interest on Carijoa Rock but I did find a small giant cuttlefish nearby.

I swam up to Slope Rock and surrounding rocks. It was getting quite dark now, either because the sun was lower in the sky or it was going behind clouds. I found Dama's red male pygmy pipehorse on its usual rock. I checked out one of the nearby rocks where I have seen pygmies and found a male. I'm not sure if I have seen it before.

I headed past Split Rock and on to the rock where the white female pygmy has been. I saw her on Monday but Mike didn't a few minutes after me. Instead he saw a brown pygmy. I couldn't find the white female but while I was looking I found two males (including a brown one) and a juvenile female.

I continued on my way and started looking for the anglerfish. I had another look for the pale yellow one Mike and I saw with John bit had no luck. I went to the rock with the orange sponge and the grey one was still sitting in the orange sponge. I tried to locate the second grey red-fingered anglerfish I'd found on Monday but the lower light levels and poor visibility made it harder to see the whole reef to work out where I was exactly. I don't think I even found the right rock. I then looked for the rock we saw the dark orange red-fingered anglerfish on Monday and I couldn't find that either.

I followed the wall to the corner and then started looking for the white red-fingered anglerfish. I was a bit too deep and missed it the first run and oriented myself from the flat rock with pygmy and came back and found it. It was where we saw it on Monday. It was getting very dark now.

I went back to the flat rock with the pygmy and found the pygmy. I then looked for the other pygmy when I noticed a small tube crawling around on sponge. On closer inspection I realised it was an amphipod in the tube.

I swam up to the large rock with the large orange red-fingered anglerfish on the side. The anglerfish was still there. I took some photographs before moving on to find "Sunshine", the female pot-bellied seahorse. I found her rock despite the increasing darkness but after searching all around the rock and surrounding rocks I could not find her. This is not the first time I haven't been able to find her so perhaps she was hiding.

I headed back to the large orange red-fingered angler and then continued in that direction so I could exit in the bay area to the south-east of the point. I ascended to 5 metres and did my safety stop as I swam to the exit. My navigation was pretty good and I only missed the best exit point by a few metres. I got out at the bay.

Seas

Slight

Visibility

3 to 10 metres

Duration

96 minutes

Maximum depth

12.6 m

Average depth

10.1 m

Water temperature

18.7°C

Dive Profile from Citizen Hyper Aqualand

Tides at Botany Bay AEDT

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

Low

12:10am

0.56m

High

6:51am

1.56m

Low

1:31pm

0.56m

High

7:15pm

1.23m

Camera gear

Camera

Nikon D500

Lens

Nikon AF-S Micro Nikkor 60mm f/2.8G ED

Housing

Ikelite 6812.5

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.