Urchin cull approved for Monterey reef

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

Hi, I was out there doing the course this weekend with the Aquarius group. Maybe you saw me walking around, I was wearing a yellow drysuit.

We had a 2-hour PowerPoint class the night before. There was content on the project itself: logistics, goals, how to properly cull without damaging the reef or other life, etc. There was also a history of the issues at hand, and an overview of what else to look for, like invasive species. Some course work I knew already, plenty was new to me, and some of the stuff that I thought I knew was actually incorrect. So overall I found it to be pretty helpful.

Dive 1 was off-grid, near the SW buoy. Our instructor demonstrated a few culling techniques, students demonstrated & received feedback. Once each student demonstrated each technique satisfactorily, instructor gave us a "goodbye" hand signal, and we split off in buddy pairs to go get some culling done. I lost count of how many I culled on dive 1, but my buddy logged 80; my count was probably close to that. I definitely injured one strawberry anemone that was hiding underneath a purple urchin, which I should have noticed but missed (if you're reading this, I hope you're doing alright, little buddy). Lesson learned to double-check. 59 min total dive time, 35 min cull time, 32' max, 27' avg, min temp 57F.

Dive 2 was on the grid, lane E West starting at 50m marker. I logged 169 urchins, buddy logged a comparable number. Almost zero urchins from 50m until 70 or 75m marker, where there were plenty of them. For a little while, I really got into the rhythm of it, and was going through the urchins pretty quickly. Buddy had a kinda short fill, so we turned this one a little earlier (the fill was from an out-of-town shop, don't remember which one). 55 min dive time, 26 min cull time, 36' max, 30' avg, min temp 57F.

The water was warm, the vis was good at 15 to 20 feet, the swell and chop were good in the morning, manageable in the afternoon. The site is pretty far, roughly 1/4 mile out with a current trending toward shore (more current in the AM, less in the PM). For our class of 2 instructors and 8 students, each of the instructor used a DPV and towed 4 students out. I had doubts about this, but honestly, it worked surprisingly well. Even with us using snorkels through the chop. From the Zodiac, Keith snapped a little video showing my group descending as the second group arrived, it's on the G2KR FB page for the curious. DPV ride took about 20 minutes, from the shore closest to the parking area, so a further distance than a direct surface swim would've been.

@wnissen did your group swim out on the surface? It looked doable, just long and tiring. I think i'll bring a of kayak next time and dive off of that. There is a mooring buoy with a pretty good-size concrete block for small vessels. Also, I heard a rumor that MaryJo will be offering a taxi service for culling volunteers aboard the BeachHopper II at a steep discount vs normal dive trips. I have yet to call her about this, but my understanding is that it will be Thursday mornings. That seems like far and away the best solution for anyone who can make it.

I did use my drygloves, and was a little worried that the urchin needles would poke a hole through them. This ended up being a non-issue; yes I did handle some of the urchins with my hands, but their spines really aren't that sharp, more of a pencil than a needle. Being head-down in my drysuit for so long, it was a little stiff in the chest/shoulder area. Maybe as I get better at this, I'll be able to do it in flatter trim while being certain I don't accidentally bump the bottom with my knees/fins. But a wetsuit might be easier, and between the shallow depth and the work, I'm sure I'd stay warm enough.

If folks here would like to participate, but are hesitant to cough up the money for the class, fair enough. You can absolutely participate, and you can do it in a way that contributes to the scientific efforts as well. There is an area near the grey buoy, East of the the NE corner of the grid, for untrained divers. You just need a CA fishing license ($50 or so online), and there is a quick form to fill out to assign you an area to cull near the buoy, and a second form to record your number of urchins and/or culling time. I believe that both forms are optional, but they're quick to do and are helpful to the project.

PSA: Please do not cull in any part of Monterey/PG/Carmel besides Tanker's Reef. And please know that the East side of Tanker's Reef is being left untouched as a scientific control group. This is really, really important, because we do not want the various research and/or government bodies to get the sense that people are taking this experiment as a license to do whatever they want. This is kind of a 2-level experiment, where of course we want to figure out of this intervention improves biodiversity outcomes. But there's a social aspect as well, where we want to know if training a bunch of volunteers results in local divers generally culling in the way that's approved of and legal. If people start going rogue, or even if the pool of volunteers dries up, the experiment will likely be interpreted as a failure.
I’m proud of you guys!
You know, I take back what I said about the $300 class. I don’t personally agree with it, but by you guys taking the class it does show and prove a level of commitment by you and others to this cause. It’s a little out of my price range and logistics to pay that, and at first I was a little miffed because it seemed like somebody profiteering off of a crisis. But it is what it is. At least people are getting involved.
Keep it up! I know it’s hard work to do it and requires an unselfish commitment to something much bigger than just going out and having a fun recreational dive.
 
Just in case people didn’t catch my other thread about the California rules and regs regarding purple urchins, I’ll cross post this here here to clear up any confusion. It’s pretty cut and dry.
I got this email back from the person in charge at CDFW.

Hi Eric,

Thanks for your interest and questions. Below I've provided some information that might be useful.

- In December 2020, the California Fish and Game Commission adopted a regulatory amendment to the sport harvest regulations for sea urchin ( https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=184900&inline ).

- As of April 1, 2021 this amendment allows divers with a valid California sport fishing license to take unlimited purple sea urchin and red sea urchin, including via underwater culling (i.e. crushing urchins underwater using hand tools) at Tanker Reef in Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. See Section 29.06 of the 2021-2022 California Recreational Ocean Fishing Regulations (California Recreational Ocean Fishing Regulations).

- The amendment also allows divers with a valid California sport fishing license to take unlimited purple sea urchin, including via underwater culling, at Caspar Cove in Mendocino County. See Section 29.06 of the 2021-2022 California Recreational Ocean Fishing Regulations. ( California Recreational Ocean Fishing Regulations ).

- Urchin culling is legal at these two locations ONLY. Urchin culling is not legal anywhere else in California

- Divers who wish to cull purple and/or red sea urchins must obtain a valid California sport fishing license, available at Sport Fishing Licenses and Report Cards

- Divers who wish to harvest purple and/or red sea urchin outside of Tanker Reef or Caspar Cove should be aware that the daily bag limit is 35 individuals of each species per day, except for Humboldt, Mendocino, and Sonoma Counties, where the daily bag limit for purple sea urchin is 40 gallons (of whole urchins) per day. There is no possession limit for sea urchin. See Section 29.06 of the 2021-2022 California Recreational Ocean Fishing Regulations (California Recreational Ocean Fishing Regulations)

- A valid California sport fishing license is required and divers must observe marine protected area (MPA) regulations, which are available at California's Marine Protected Area (MPA) Network

Please let me know if you have any other questions.

Regards,
James

________________
James Ray
CDFW | Marine Region
Office: (707) 441 5755
 
Sounds like you guys had a good time. It’s a lot of work, but I think work is fun plus the added benefit of knowing you are doing something to help. Walk the talk not talk then walk.
I just got a 20 gallon Brute trash can and another large tote. I also ordered a 60 lb lift bag and I’ll get a second big green bag. I’m just waiting for the conditions to calm down enough to get out and see exactly what it takes to gather 40 gallons of purples, how many tanks, how many bags full, etc.
and how many individual urchins that averages out to be.

Awesome, Eric! Hard plastic is going to be much better than my mesh bag, which was basically a spine magnet. I think it was about a dozen in a liter, so my guess is you could fit hundreds in a trash can. Hope you post pictures.

Hi, I was out there doing the course this weekend with the Aquarius group. Maybe you saw me walking around, I was wearing a yellow drysuit.
Hah, I am probably going to get my drysuit in yellow. Safety first and all. I don't think I saw you, I think I would have recognized you from your profile picture. But we were on a different schedule since we did our lecture onsite.

We had a 2-hour PowerPoint class the night before. There was content on the project itself: logistics, goals, how to properly cull without damaging the reef or other life, etc. There was also a history of the issues at hand, and an overview of what else to look for, like invasive species. Some course work I knew already, plenty was new to me, and some of the stuff that I thought I knew was actually incorrect. So overall I found it to be pretty helpful.
We didn't have any auxiliary materials, having those ahead of time would have been good. Things are fresh in my mind now but will fade with time. Did you get a map of the grid with the colors of the buoys?

Dive 1 was off-grid, near the SW buoy. Our instructor demonstrated a few culling techniques, students demonstrated & received feedback. Once each student demonstrated each technique satisfactorily, instructor gave us a "goodbye" hand signal, and we split off in buddy pairs to go get some culling done. I lost count of how many I culled on dive 1, but my buddy logged 80; my count was probably close to that. I definitely injured one strawberry anemone that was hiding underneath a purple urchin, which I should have noticed but missed (if you're reading this, I hope you're doing alright, little buddy). Lesson learned to double-check. 59 min total dive time, 35 min cull time, 32' max, 27' avg, min temp 57F.
Interesting, we started on the grid. But we were also only 3:1 with our instructor, and the vis was good so he could have intervened.

Dive 2 was on the grid, lane E West starting at 50m marker. I logged 169 urchins, buddy logged a comparable number. Almost zero urchins from 50m until 70 or 75m marker, where there were plenty of them. For a little while, I really got into the rhythm of it, and was going through the urchins pretty quickly. Buddy had a kinda short fill, so we turned this one a little earlier (the fill was from an out-of-town shop, don't remember which one). 55 min dive time, 26 min cull time, 36' max, 30' avg, min temp 57F.

The water was warm, the vis was good at 15 to 20 feet, the swell and chop were good in the morning, manageable in the afternoon. The site is pretty far, roughly 1/4 mile out with a current trending toward shore (more current in the AM, less in the PM). For our class of 2 instructors and 8 students, each of the instructor used a DPV and towed 4 students out. I had doubts about this, but honestly, it worked surprisingly well. Even with us using snorkels through the chop. From the Zodiac, Keith snapped a little video showing my group descending as the second group arrived, it's on the G2KR FB page for the curious. DPV ride took about 20 minutes, from the shore closest to the parking area, so a further distance than a direct surface swim would've been.

@wnissen did your group swim out on the surface? It looked doable, just long and tiring. I think i'll bring a of kayak next time and dive off of that. There is a mooring buoy with a pretty good-size concrete block for small vessels. Also, I heard a rumor that MaryJo will be offering a taxi service for culling volunteers aboard the BeachHopper II at a steep discount vs normal dive trips. I have yet to call her about this, but my understanding is that it will be Thursday mornings. That seems like far and away the best solution for anyone who can make it.
I am jealous! We did our first dive swimming the direct route from the beach access and it was even longer. I definitely recommend walking along the beach to the closest point. A kayak does seem like a good alternative, it wouldn't take nearly as long as swimming with full kit. Honestly, a one-way service would be almost as good, because you could just hang out and let the current carry you back.

I did use my drygloves, and was a little worried that the urchin needles would poke a hole through them. This ended up being a non-issue; yes I did handle some of the urchins with my hands, but their spines really aren't that sharp, more of a pencil than a needle. Being head-down in my drysuit for so long, it was a little stiff in the chest/shoulder area. Maybe as I get better at this, I'll be able to do it in flatter trim while being certain I don't accidentally bump the bottom with my knees/fins. But a wetsuit might be easier, and between the shallow depth and the work, I'm sure I'd stay warm enough.
I was worried as well, brought my 5mm which I hate for dexterity, but basic 3mm neoprene wet gloves were fine. As someone else noted, they do put urchins in the touch tank. I was in an 8/7mm semi-dry and was getting a bit cold on the first dive, but just fine on the second. I found that my air consumption was actually better than on a typical slow sightseeing dive, so clearly I wasn't moving as much.

If folks here would like to participate, but are hesitant to cough up the money for the class, fair enough. You can absolutely participate, and you can do it in a way that contributes to the scientific efforts as well. There is an area near the grey buoy, East of the the NE corner of the grid, for untrained divers. You just need a CA fishing license ($50 or so online), and there is a quick form to fill out to assign you an area to cull near the buoy, and a second form to record your number of urchins and/or culling time. I believe that both forms are optional, but they're quick to do and are helpful to the project.

PSA: Please do not cull in any part of Monterey/PG/Carmel besides Tanker's Reef. And please know that the East side of Tanker's Reef is being left untouched as a scientific control group. This is really, really important, because we do not want the various research and/or government bodies to get the sense that people are taking this experiment as a license to do whatever they want. This is kind of a 2-level experiment, where of course we want to figure out of this intervention improves biodiversity outcomes. But there's a social aspect as well, where we want to know if training a bunch of volunteers results in local divers generally culling in the way that's approved of and legal. If people start going rogue, or even if the pool of volunteers dries up, the experiment will likely be interpreted as a failure.
All excellent points. That reminds me, I need to put in my data for the other dive. We did the first one as part of the cert.
 
I’m proud of you guys!
You know, I take back what I said about the $300 class. I don’t personally agree with it, but by you guys taking the class it does show and prove a level of commitment by you and others to this cause. It’s a little out of my price range and logistics to pay that, and at first I was a little miffed because it seemed like somebody profiteering off of a crisis. But it is what it is. At least people are getting involved.
Keep it up! I know it’s hard work to do it and requires an unselfish commitment to something much bigger than just going out and having a fun recreational dive.

Thanks, man. And I do appreciate the work you're putting in up North as well. I haven't dived up there, but in the future I would like to live in a world where it's as good as it ever was, and every little bit helps. As for the cost, yes, it's a little steep. I get that like anything, the instructors, the dive shop, the agency, and (hopefully, I'm not actually sure on this last one) the G2KR project itself all take a cut. And, you know, most of those are things that I'm willing and able to support, so that's how I rationalized it to myself. I get that it's a turn-off for some, but I hope that for others, the agency and the card and all that give it a sense of legitimacy or something, and maybe it brings them in. I could certainly see fact that large agencies are backing this to be a plus for the Sacramento pencil-pushers who have needed considerable nudging to get on board...

Hah, I am probably going to get my drysuit in yellow. Safety first and all. I don't think I saw you, I think I would have recognized you from your profile picture. But we were on a different schedule since we did our lecture onsite.

Well, maybe we'll bump into each other some other time. The yellow suit comes from SeaSkin by the way, and I can't say enough nice things about it. But stuartv's thread in the Exposure section just crossed 100 pages, so I'm not gonna try to evangelize anybody here, and I'm probably biased as it's my first one. That day I was also diving orange fins, a pink BP/W, and a blue mask -- truly a rainbow goofball clown.

We didn't have any auxiliary materials, having those ahead of time would have been good. Things are fresh in my mind now but will fade with time. Did you get a map of the grid with the colors of the buoys?

At the very least, the g2krlink.com website has a couple of diagrams. The slide deck from the class materials were a lot more detailed, though. I have not received a copy of the slides, and if I do, am not sure whether they'd be OK with sharing them publicly. I'll ask about both and report back.

Interesting, we started on the grid. But we were also only 3:1 with our instructor, and the vis was good so he could have intervened.
I agree with your assessment that starting on the grid for dive 1 would most likely be fine, and that if you do it this way, then it could be a 1-dive course. I did get something out of both the 1st and the 2nd dive though, and I betcha that some good fraction of people will need a dive to sort out buoyancy / trim / task-loading issues. Also, the visibility and surge was better this weekend than in what feels like the last 2-3 months straight. In crappy vis and a swell, a dive's worth of padding making sense to me.

I am jealous! We did our first dive swimming the direct route from the beach access and it was even longer. I definitely recommend walking along the beach to the closest point. A kayak does seem like a good alternative, it wouldn't take nearly as long as swimming with full kit. Honestly, a one-way service would be almost as good, because you could just hang out and let the current carry you back.

I know! Reason number #46 to nab a DPV. But those things aren't messing around, cost-wise... some day. I figure with the kayaks I can park by McDonald's, or even by the Breakwater, and get out there quicker and with less hassle than trying to park, cross Del Monte w/o a crosswalk, hike along the beach, and then surface swim into the current for a quarter mile. Y'all are champs for doing it that way, honestly.
 
At the very least, the g2krlink.com website has a couple of diagrams. The slide deck from the class materials were a lot more detailed, though. I have not received a copy of the slides, and if I do, am not sure whether they'd be OK with sharing them publicly. I'll ask about both and report back.
Thanks! That is exactly what I was looking for. I guess I was expecting that the white buoy would have some kind of counterpart.
 
Is there any reason to pay $10 to get the cert card? I have no plans to go pro, though maybe, someday, I would like to become a volunteer scientific diver. $10 for a virtual card is nothing in the grand scheme of things but seems like a ripoff.
 
Is there any reason to pay $10 to get the cert card? I have no plans to go pro, though maybe, someday, I would like to become a volunteer scientific diver. $10 for a virtual card is nothing in the grand scheme of things but seems like a ripoff.
The experience culling, counting, and being task focused underwater will be good to great for either Reef Check or AAUS Scientific Diver. But the card will not matter for Scientific Diver. I was a teaching assistant for that at UC Berkeley, and went through the program there. I'm also Reef Check trained and I'm fairly sure they would want you to go through their program anyway as it has lots of info and in-water testing on species identification and sampling methods.
 
The experience culling, counting, and being task focused underwater will be good to great for either Reef Check or AAUS Scientific Diver. But the card will not matter for Scientific Diver. I was a teaching assistant for that at UC Berkeley, and went through the program there. I'm also Reef Check trained and I'm fairly sure they would want you to go through their program anyway as it has lots of info and in water testing on species identification and sampling methods.
Thanks, that's kind of what I figured. I will start with Reef Check, if I can hack it there then I may try the AAUS route. Appreciate the advice.
 
I completed my "Kelp Restoration" specialty yesterday. There was a reasonably extensive pre-dive lecture from our fine instructor Nicholas as Bamboo Reef. At the end we knew how to navigate the grid and what data we were expected to collect. Then it was off to dive. Conditions were good overall, 1 meter swells at the biggest, with 5 meters of visibility. It definitely took some doing to get coordinated enough to hit the urchins as the gentle surge pushed us forward and backward. It's a lot easier to lay eyes on something than lay a hammer on it. Honestly, I think the required second dive is not needed. Maybe if people are struggling or damaging the reef they might need a second dive, but @TMast and I were in the hang of things pretty well after the first. On the second I took down a bag (yes, I was carrying my license) and brought up some urchins, but they were all empty of gonads, even the larger ones. What was there did not taste good. One unexpected benefit was that the sand dabs, especially, went nuts when we smashed them open. A savvy cormorant came down and hunted around us, too. The character of reef on the shale is quite different from the granite you see in other Monterey sites. Never saw a sea hare before and here we saw three, each about 30cm long. By the end of the second dive, I had put holes in 500 urchins and saw some neat behavior.

On the negative side, there was no parking at 7 a.m. so we had to park across or down the street. The closest bathroom is 400 meters away at Monterey Bay Kayaks. There's no great place to stage gear if you don't get a parking spot. I left mine on the side of the bike path, and a gentleman found my dive log, texted my cell, called my dive shop, and called the police. It's a decent walk down the beach to get to the closest point on the grid, and about a 25-minute swim out from there. Add maybe 10 minutes to get to the 0-meter mark on the far end. Much faster coming back because of the swell direction. So not a quick or easy day of diving. I am glad we were able to participate in the cull. Not something I would want to spend every dive day doing, but I'll be out again.

I'm not clear on what you needed the bathroom for, other than the usual. Frankly, I've always believed that a "personal" tent and a bucket and or bottle could be enough for personal business, regardless of parking area. It doesn't need to stay up all day whilst you're away from your vehicle. Don't forget a tarp for staging, that way you'll be more likely to see your log book beside the bike trail, when putting your tarp back in your vehicle.

https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0053QUAAG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_i_1FK4339VEAQVRDB2BRWG

https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01N25D7K4...t_i_6XVNRZ741PYVZCXJS13V?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1
 
Tried to go kayaking out there yesterday for some culling. Ran into a bunch of problems, didn't end up diving at all once the situation was FUBAR. Y'all can read about it here if you like: Type III fun while kayak-diving

I've got friends in town next weekend, so I think I will try this again the following weekend.
 

Back
Top Bottom