Sunday, August 4, 2002, off Panama City, FL
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Sunday, after the initial Gulf Open Water qualification dives for our students (who all did quite well, by the way) the Reef Runner tied into Bridge span #12 for the second dive, the "fun" dive.
When the bubbles cleared from the giant stride, I knew we'd enjoy this one - through swirling schools of Spanish Mackeral and Bonito, Amberjack and rivers of baitfish I could see the top of the span clearly, forty feet below. As there was no current at all, we dropped off the line and floated slowly down, just watching the show - on through the superstructure and down to the roadbed. Turning left, I followed the right edge of the road, looking for the telltale signs of an octopus hideout... no octopus, but I began to notice an unusual number of juvenile High-Hat Drum flitting here & there, and several dozen Cardinalfish - both usually quite scarce in our part of the Gulf. Easing along under the watchful eye of the duty Toadfish and Soapfish, wary Grouper and Snapper, we turned down the outside of the roadbed and drifted slowly, watching a profusion of small crabs, gobies, Damselfishes and other denisons going about their routines... the whole structure was literally alive with critters. And all about us swirled an ever-present cloud of baitfish, young Tomtate and Snapper, Cigar minnows and a myriad unnamed species of Silversides... thousands upon thousands upon thousands, flowing around and through the structure, splashing against the beams like some weightless waterfall, then suddenly darting in unison away from an attacking Mackeral or Bonito. It was difficult to choose what to watch!
Reaching the end of the span, we began working up the gentle arch of the cantilevered steel superstructure, checking the many crevaces and hiding places where the beams joined, watching the lurkers, the ambushers - Blue Crabs and Soapfish and small Grouper hanging in the shadows waiting to snare an unwary prey. All along these beams I know there are decorator crabs. I know because at night they come out and I can find them - but it is daylight now and even the keenest eye leaves them undetected.
Richard waved me over - he'd found a most beautiful multicolored Scorpionfish. It is remarkable to see the brilliant red and blue and black and green specks and flecks that yet somehow taken as a whole render this fish nearly invisible against the sponges and algae where he is nestled.
Working slowly across the top of the span, my eye was drawn to an unusual sudden frenzy among some of the baitfish, so I went to investigate. There I stumbled upon one of nature's dramas, as a pair of Belted Sandfish were trying to spawn, rushing upward in their mating spiral, discharging gametes in a cloud that the baitfish attacked with abandon, eating the just laid eggs as fast as they were spewed into the water by their desperate parents. What a show! Sad in a way, yet the way of the world, after all. A few of the eggs escape, and a few of those hatch, and a few of those make it to adulthood... a very few.
Alas! Time to go - as I made my safety sweep of the site - looking for divers now, not fish - to make sure everyone was headed back up, I was greeted with yet another rare (for this part of the Gulf) piece of eye candy as a huge Scrawled Filefish swam by, just for me it seemed, his irridescent blue lines shimmering in the distance as he swam on out of sight...
Even the safety stop was filled with so much to watch it was hard to choose - whether to watch the continuing drama of the hunting Bonito and Mackeral below or to play with the tiny strange planktonic creatures drifting by, who suddenly come to life with a touch - tiny swimming bananas and gelatanous butterflies and chained tunicates, delicate ciliated Comb Jellies and Venus' Belts and a dozen varieties of medusae. Marvelous, fabulous, wonderful... this is Scuba Diving writ large!
As I reluctantly ascended to the ladder and climbed back aboard, I thought "Just another day in the Gulf!" Right!
Rick
-----------------------------------------------------------
Sunday, after the initial Gulf Open Water qualification dives for our students (who all did quite well, by the way) the Reef Runner tied into Bridge span #12 for the second dive, the "fun" dive.
When the bubbles cleared from the giant stride, I knew we'd enjoy this one - through swirling schools of Spanish Mackeral and Bonito, Amberjack and rivers of baitfish I could see the top of the span clearly, forty feet below. As there was no current at all, we dropped off the line and floated slowly down, just watching the show - on through the superstructure and down to the roadbed. Turning left, I followed the right edge of the road, looking for the telltale signs of an octopus hideout... no octopus, but I began to notice an unusual number of juvenile High-Hat Drum flitting here & there, and several dozen Cardinalfish - both usually quite scarce in our part of the Gulf. Easing along under the watchful eye of the duty Toadfish and Soapfish, wary Grouper and Snapper, we turned down the outside of the roadbed and drifted slowly, watching a profusion of small crabs, gobies, Damselfishes and other denisons going about their routines... the whole structure was literally alive with critters. And all about us swirled an ever-present cloud of baitfish, young Tomtate and Snapper, Cigar minnows and a myriad unnamed species of Silversides... thousands upon thousands upon thousands, flowing around and through the structure, splashing against the beams like some weightless waterfall, then suddenly darting in unison away from an attacking Mackeral or Bonito. It was difficult to choose what to watch!
Reaching the end of the span, we began working up the gentle arch of the cantilevered steel superstructure, checking the many crevaces and hiding places where the beams joined, watching the lurkers, the ambushers - Blue Crabs and Soapfish and small Grouper hanging in the shadows waiting to snare an unwary prey. All along these beams I know there are decorator crabs. I know because at night they come out and I can find them - but it is daylight now and even the keenest eye leaves them undetected.
Richard waved me over - he'd found a most beautiful multicolored Scorpionfish. It is remarkable to see the brilliant red and blue and black and green specks and flecks that yet somehow taken as a whole render this fish nearly invisible against the sponges and algae where he is nestled.
Working slowly across the top of the span, my eye was drawn to an unusual sudden frenzy among some of the baitfish, so I went to investigate. There I stumbled upon one of nature's dramas, as a pair of Belted Sandfish were trying to spawn, rushing upward in their mating spiral, discharging gametes in a cloud that the baitfish attacked with abandon, eating the just laid eggs as fast as they were spewed into the water by their desperate parents. What a show! Sad in a way, yet the way of the world, after all. A few of the eggs escape, and a few of those hatch, and a few of those make it to adulthood... a very few.
Alas! Time to go - as I made my safety sweep of the site - looking for divers now, not fish - to make sure everyone was headed back up, I was greeted with yet another rare (for this part of the Gulf) piece of eye candy as a huge Scrawled Filefish swam by, just for me it seemed, his irridescent blue lines shimmering in the distance as he swam on out of sight...
Even the safety stop was filled with so much to watch it was hard to choose - whether to watch the continuing drama of the hunting Bonito and Mackeral below or to play with the tiny strange planktonic creatures drifting by, who suddenly come to life with a touch - tiny swimming bananas and gelatanous butterflies and chained tunicates, delicate ciliated Comb Jellies and Venus' Belts and a dozen varieties of medusae. Marvelous, fabulous, wonderful... this is Scuba Diving writ large!
As I reluctantly ascended to the ladder and climbed back aboard, I thought "Just another day in the Gulf!" Right!
Rick
