SuPrBuGmAn
Contributor
Patrick Davis and I headed out around 6AM this morning to get a jump on traffic and get to the springs in time to get back somewhat early(it is Father's Day afterall). Couldn't have asked for a more perfect day with a cool morning and nothing but sunshine from sun up until now, and I'm assuming till sundown. 
We got to the boat lauch on 277 in Vernon around 8:45AM and the parking lot was about halfway full of vehicles with and without trailers. We overheard some of them talking about going to the springs. Luckily, they were just beach dwellers out to enjoy the sun and their drinks so we had the spring to ourselves(atleast UW). We unloaded the Miss Jellyfish(my Zodiac), set it up, and loaded her down.
Cypress was as clear as ever with over 100' of visibility and prominent boils over the basin. We ventured into the cavern to a depth of 62' until we reached our thirds and then explored the basin. All in all, we logged ~ an hour of bottom time. Several boats were coming in and out to visit the beach, load and unload people coming and going. There were several swimmers and lots of lounging around. We saw some of the normal fauna including bream, bass, rock bass, sanddivers, slider turtles, freshwater eels, minows of all sorts, and several types of snails. Had a great dive, a first at this site for Patrick.
After Cypress, we motored over to Becton Springs(called Magnolia by some). I had only been to Becton once, last Dec, when the creek was flooded out pretty badly. The water levels were down in the 6-6.5' range so we figured we'd go check it out. There was a small, but noticable boil on the water above the vent and there was a blue/green circle of water visibile from the surface about 20' in diameter around the boil. The rest of the basin was still tannic, but apparently its trying to clear(the water is still kinda high). We descended down the basin and started exploring the vents, there was alot more limestone than I had thought(there was less than 2' of visibility last time I dove the site). You could tell the limestone had been pulled from the vent and piled up on the sides. It created quite a few homes for the bream, bass, and anything else that wanted a place to hide. Visibility was fairly good directly around the vents all the way up to the surface, but it decreased to about 10' when you were about 15-20' from main boil. Any further away than that and you were in 3-5' of visibility in really milky tannic water. We managed to hit 33' at the bottom of the larger vent and spent nearly a half hour at this site. The site suprised me, there was more to it than I had thought, even though that still didn't account for too much
All in all, we had a great two dives. Can't wait till next time around, we may even start visiting Becton springs more often to kill off the remainder of our tanks
Happy Father's Day for all you Pap's on the board!
http://www.suprbugman.com/gallery/album21 <-- for more pics
We got to the boat lauch on 277 in Vernon around 8:45AM and the parking lot was about halfway full of vehicles with and without trailers. We overheard some of them talking about going to the springs. Luckily, they were just beach dwellers out to enjoy the sun and their drinks so we had the spring to ourselves(atleast UW). We unloaded the Miss Jellyfish(my Zodiac), set it up, and loaded her down.
Cypress was as clear as ever with over 100' of visibility and prominent boils over the basin. We ventured into the cavern to a depth of 62' until we reached our thirds and then explored the basin. All in all, we logged ~ an hour of bottom time. Several boats were coming in and out to visit the beach, load and unload people coming and going. There were several swimmers and lots of lounging around. We saw some of the normal fauna including bream, bass, rock bass, sanddivers, slider turtles, freshwater eels, minows of all sorts, and several types of snails. Had a great dive, a first at this site for Patrick.
After Cypress, we motored over to Becton Springs(called Magnolia by some). I had only been to Becton once, last Dec, when the creek was flooded out pretty badly. The water levels were down in the 6-6.5' range so we figured we'd go check it out. There was a small, but noticable boil on the water above the vent and there was a blue/green circle of water visibile from the surface about 20' in diameter around the boil. The rest of the basin was still tannic, but apparently its trying to clear(the water is still kinda high). We descended down the basin and started exploring the vents, there was alot more limestone than I had thought(there was less than 2' of visibility last time I dove the site). You could tell the limestone had been pulled from the vent and piled up on the sides. It created quite a few homes for the bream, bass, and anything else that wanted a place to hide. Visibility was fairly good directly around the vents all the way up to the surface, but it decreased to about 10' when you were about 15-20' from main boil. Any further away than that and you were in 3-5' of visibility in really milky tannic water. We managed to hit 33' at the bottom of the larger vent and spent nearly a half hour at this site. The site suprised me, there was more to it than I had thought, even though that still didn't account for too much
All in all, we had a great two dives. Can't wait till next time around, we may even start visiting Becton springs more often to kill off the remainder of our tanks
Happy Father's Day for all you Pap's on the board!
http://www.suprbugman.com/gallery/album21 <-- for more pics
