Palm Beach Dive Thread

[NothingClever]

Out early this morning with Captain Chris, Amber, Niccole and Delaney from PVD.

Mid-reef was a great dive. I love seeing sharks but got rather absorbed this morning looking under nooks and crannies for the little stuff. I did see a really mature GG with vibrant brown and black coloring.

Governor’s Wreck Trek was next. Niccole (DM) and I were up front and were the only ones who saw a healthy lemon shark before getting to the first wreck. He was replaced by a large school (~75) of super healthy barracuda. Next wreck was a GG. Last wreck was a huge school of beautiful Caeser grunts and another species of schooling fish. I was the last off this wreck as I found a hiding spot on the leeward side that afforded me a great vantage point to watch the lemon shark that returned to run laps around the first wreck.

Strong current ate into everyone’s air so most folks surfaced around 40 minutes.

Amber and Niccole ran their standard pre-dive safety check. I dive twinset almost exclusively these days so of course I’m hands on with my kit. No matter, I appreciate the reminder and it’s not an intrusion or insult.

ETA: 54* F / 12* C when I woke up this morning. Brrr! A few months back I got to dive with @Divin'Papaw . While my teeth were chattering, he looked plushly warm in his boat coat while rattling off all the species we saw. Today was my turn…sorta. My fish ID skills still suck but at least I’m a warm, sucky diver in my new boat coat.

 

[MrChen]

I went out Palm Beach on Sunday. We went south in an area north of breakers for our first dive. We caught some lobsters and several eggers. I shot a wahoo on my safety stop, but it tore right off, which is probably a good thing since I don't have a reel but did it have connected to DSMB.

Dive 2 we went south of Black Rock. We caught a lot of lobsters, but 75% of them were eggers. I caught 6, all with eggs.

Water temp was 75. Dive 2 had a stronger current. The morning was overcast and fairly calm. Later in the day, the sun came out and winds kicked up. We had some bumpy seas, but nothing too bad.

Visibility on both dives was probably around 60ft, if not more.

 

[Johnoly]

Strong current .....ETA: 54* F / 12* C when I woke up

Water temp was 75. Dive 2 had a stronger current. Visibility on both dives was probably around 60ft, if not more.

.
Thank you for the conditions reports !!

 

[Pipehorse]

Went out on Pura VIda's Marin today. This was my first time at the new location. Hardly ideal, but it still works. Showed up at 0900 only 2 other people on the boat showed up after me. How early do you have to get to a boat that leaves at 1000?

We had Captain Chris, with Nicole and Quinn as DMs. Sea conditions were benign, just a slight breeze with less than one foot waves, slight north current and visibility a hazy 35ft, sea temp at 74f

First drop was on Flower Gardens. Found more than a few Slender FIlefish and Fringed Filefish. Observed a pair Black Durgons. Durgons are in the Triggerfish Family. I see them here occasionally, usually only a couple at a time. Did a REEF fish survey of 60 species in the 60 minute dive, a little rusty on the fish id, haven't been in the water much lately. Nicole tried to manifest a Sawtooth Shark for the dive during the site briefing, but no such luck. Counted 14 Northern Gannets during the surface interval.

Second drop was the north end of Flower Gardens/Trench. At about 25 minutes into the dive we reached the trench and due east down same. There was a smaller Goliath Grouper near the end of the trench. And a large Goliath Grouper at the end near the pipe. The large Goliath quickly disappeared down the pipe, the smaller one stayed around to ham it up for photo opportunities. I observed one large Nurse Shark, others in the group briefly observed a Bull Shark, and Lemon Shark. Did a REEF fish survey of 65 species for the length of the dive.

Ran into a little engine trouble right in front of BHB. Dropped anchor, and tried to fix the problem but no such luck. Seatow came and brought us back to the marina. So glad it happened on the way back and not on the way out.

Respectively, Fringed Filefish, Diver with Goliath, Goliath, Porkfish, and Tomtates.

 

[Pavao]

Last chance to dive this morning probably till Monday.
It was pretty nice, 1-3’ seas, more like 1-2 with occasional 3’, moderate N current, 75° temp and 70-80’ viz blue water, I think we heard over the radio some report of 40’ ish viz elsewhere, maybe south by Breakers(?)

Tons of eggers, I’d find holes with 3-5 bugs where only 1 had no eggs.

Had a nice Tiger encounter swam right up to me, unfortunately GoPro had a dead battery and it only captured a tiny bit of video before dying.


Btw, is this the only/best way to post vids, upload to YouTube and paste link here, can’t post directly here like pictures, correct?

 

[Divin'Papaw]

Btw, is this the only/best way to post vids, upload to YouTube and paste link here, can’t post directly here like pictures, correct?

Correct

 

[MrChen]

It's been so long since someone posted here that the thread was on page 2! Let's never let that happen again

I went out Saturday on a private boat. We did all dives north of the inlet with the goal of finding lionfish.

It was a beautiful day. Forecast was for 3 ft seas. We had a strong westerly wind to start the day, and seas were a tame 2ft. Visibility was 50ft and there was a strong north current all day.

Why do we talk about wind direction from the direction it comes from, but when talking about current, we say the direction it's going?

Water temp on all dives was 78 to 79! I had my 5mm on and am glad I wasn't hot, but it's time to wash and hang that baby up until much later in the year.

We did 3 tanks.

We dove the cable spools, but with the current, even the lionfish were struggling and hiding under the spools. It was too much work and I left looking for some ledge structure. The last time I dove this spot we were looking for a lost speargun that we didn't find and there were some nice mutton snapper on it, but not this time. I saw a small goliath grouper and some small hogs. The rest of the fish weren't the kind you would spear.

I've been diving for 13 years and I'm sick of people asking me, "Did you see the hammerhead shark?" My answer has disappointedly been no. Well, that's now broken. Not only did I see one, but saw 2! I was looking around at the sea floor looking for fish when something caught my eye, and within 10 ft of me a hammerhead was swimming by on my right and then another swimming by on my left. They came out to check me out and just as quickly swam away. But I FINALLY saw a hammerhead!

For dive 2, my buddy hyper focused on lionfish said I should definitely see some nice porgy, mangroves, or yellow jacks. He didn't lie, but in the ripping current, it was a challenge. I did land a nice a porgy and yellow jack. One fish I hear is good but never shot was a spade fish. I tend to leave them alone as they are swimming in schools. They are also usually smaller than I'm interested in, but then I see a really big one swimming in a school of chub, and he made for fish #3.

I float my fish using the toothless smb with stringer. They are great. You can use the stringer spike to brain the fish, then string, and float. You get the fish off of you in less than a minute. The problem is, especially on strong current days with seas, the boat doesn't always see them. Unfortunately, they didn't see my yellow jack float up. We drove up and down the ledge and couldn't find it. Out of the 6 I bought, 3 are now missing. I have had 3 returned, but I'm still down 3 at this point. If you see one, enjoy the fish, but please call me so I can pick up or pay you to ship it to me . I could be bribed into trading a lobster tail or 2 to get it back. My name and number are on them.

As the day progressed, the winds shifted to northerly winds.

Dive 3 was a bust for lionfish and spearfishing. I did see a nice mutton, porgy, and a pair of large mangroves, but I couldn't get in a position with the current. On the dive, I was also towing the flag and seas were easily 3-5ft by this point. Even with my Tusa scooter, I was no match for the current, seas, and wind dragging on the flag. We ran into a small loggerhead turtle.

On the surface, for as rough as it was, it actually wasn't that bad, and no one got sick.

 

[MrChen]

It's been a while since I did 3 tanks. When diving on a private boat, there's no crew to ferry your gear on and off the boat. You are the crew and the divers. It's critical to help everyone out, getting geared and getting back on the boat. I'm getting older (in my 50's) and the physical exertion on a long day takes longer for me to recover from. I got home around 5:30pm and went straight to bed for a nap. My daughter woke me up at 11:30pm because she needed me and didn't think I'd still be sleeping. I ended up falling back to sleep at 2:30am and woke up at 8:30am. I'm sore head to toe! We do 2 tank trips all the time. It surprises me how exhausted I am by just adding a 3rd dive. I regularly only sleep 6-7 hours a night. I still have to filet my fish (they are on ice), offload my truck, and rinse my gear.

 

[johndiver999]

Why do we talk about wind direction from the direction it comes from, but when talking about current, we say the direction it's going?

Because the cold, north, wind blows from the north and a north current carries you north. Pretty simple.

 

[NothingClever]

@MrChen

Big congrats on seeing the two HHs!

Sorry about the missing stringers. I hate losing kit so I can empathize.