Jupiter in December

[heydn62]

Thinking about driving down from Atlanta for a couple of days the weekend before Christmas. Where's the best place to check on conditions before coming down? It's a long way to drive not to dive.

Do the lemon sharks start to come through this early? Are the goliath grouper still around? What else are we likely to see in December? I dove Jupiter for the first time in June and saw reef sharks on all 3 dives that day and this will be my first trip back. Viz was good then. Current was strong, making for good drifts on two dives, but tended to pull us off the reef (W <--- E) on the third.

 

[sportxlh]

Forecasts that are any more than a couple of days in the future are probably going to be inaccurate. Here are the two sites I use:

http://weather.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/fmtbltn.pl?file=forecasts/marine/coastal/am/amz650.txt

Jupiter, Florida Surf Forecast and Surf Report

There are usually a handful of resident Goliath Groupers on the wrecks, but not the huge aggregations. The reef known as Tunnels also seems to have 6-10 year round GG residents as well. I think the Lemons won't come in large numbers until the water temps drop; you might see an individual lemon but are not likely to see a big gathering. Turtles and reef sharks can be found year round. The bulls are also here year round, but I don't tend to see many of them. A whale shark was seen in Palm Beach County a few days ago (very rare).

Current changes daily and sometimes hourly. You might hit days with screaming 3 knot currents or hit days with no current. I dove Saturday morning and there was almost no current: I had to fin a bit to head north. Viz was 50-75 feet on the sites where we dove.

 

[heydn62]

Thanks for the reply. I'll probably decide on a Friday if I'm driving down on a Saturday to dive on a Sunday. This helps.

 

[sheeper]

heydn62 check out www.jupiterscubadiving.com great boat and crew and their "Lazy Sunday" dives are the bomb!

 

[danvolker]

JIm Abernethy Scuba Adventures is now doing Shark dives off Juno/Jupiter....and as many here should know, Abernethy is the top shark Dive Operator in the Bahamas with his liveaboard Shearwater....this is the operation the Nat Geo , Discover Network on TV, BBC Wildlife, and virtually every major Media looking for the best Shark images/experiences goes to...I believe it is also safe to say he is the top Shark Behaviorist on the planet...See Swimming With the Shark Whisperer | Video - ABC News

[video]http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/video/swimming-shark-whisperer-20800019&nbsp; [/video]


and see Wet Temptations New Palm Beach Shark Dive

 

[Shcubasteve]

Op asked about CONDITIONS, not your favorite operator, Sheeper and Dan.

water temp was 79 last weekend with good vis

 

[Zaixon]

Just dove jupiter this past Sunday. Lots of Lemons around water temp was about 77-78.

Video from dives : Shark Diving Jupiter FL Emerald Charters (HD) - YouTube

 

[sportxlh]

Just dove jupiter this past Sunday. Lots of Lemons around water temp was about 77-78.

Zaixon: nice video.... it looked like a majority of the sharks were lemons judging by the fins: at least it looked that way to me. How many would you say were on the dive? Its always hard to tell if there are shots of many different sharks or only a few that were circling. What site does Randy take you to for the non-feeding shark dives? What sort of depth? Again, nice video.

 

[DiverAmy]

Best resource ever!

Jupiter Inlet Surf Report, Surf Forecast and Live Surf Webcams

 

[sheeper]

Op asked about CONDITIONS, not your favorite operator, Sheeper and Dan.

water temp was 79 last weekend with good vis

Captn SL8R's videos (daily dive report) will give you a good idea of conditions. hence the plug.