Dances with Seals ...

[MXGratefulDiver]

Tonight Jimmie (Kalvyn) and I decided to do a dive at Les Davis. We splashed at about 7 PM ... surface swam out a coupla hundred feet, and dropped into the worst siltout I've seen in quite some time. At first I thought "great ... two damn divers in the water ahead of us and look at the mess they created". Nope ... wasn't them.

Vis was so bad you could just about see your outstretched fingers ... we hadn't been down more than a few seconds when suddenly this mottled grey wall of blubber flashes so close in front of my face I can feel the wake created by its passing. Wow ... that was close. Quicker than I could think, it flashed us again ... trailing silty whirpools in its wake.

What could we do except get our bearings and head down deeper ... hoping to lose our new-found dive buddy in the structure. No such luck ... it stayed with us for the duration, often putting on tremendous displays of speed while chasing just about every fish that was unfortunate enough to get caught in our light beams.

For all of that, we did manage to see quite a few cool things tonight ... Les Davis is always hit-or-miss when it comes to wildlife, but tonight we found three GPO's, a tiny red octo out in the open, and quite a variety of nudibranchs ... including my ol' frilly friend dendronotis rufus. And, of course, ample happy meals for our new-found friend.

Meanwhile, our robust companion got too darn friendly, if you ask me. This fellow was quite used to divers, apparently, often coming up underneath us at a startling rate of speed ... which wasn't easy considering that we were staying quite close to the bottom. Sometimes he would brush up against us as he buzzed past. Once he passed so close to my face that he brushed the bolt-snap attached to my second stage hose ... causing the bolt-snap to flip up and smack into the side of my mask! A couple times I actually reached out and fended him off. Now, if you've never had the experience, imagine pushing on a very energetic 300-lb sack of jello ... that's about what it feels like.

He finally left us at our safety stop ... when he realized we were just hovering there and not shining our lights on any more tasty snacks.

Interesting dive ... 65 minutes ... almost all of it as a two-person, one-seal buddy team ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[crab]

With one notable exception in Hawaii, I have only encountered seals (or sea lions) on the surface. They always seem to make themselves scarce underwater-- although I am sure they are nearby. About a year ago I spent about ten minutes hanging out with a monk seal in Hawaii. I was pulling out all the stops-- face to face stares, playing in the bubbles, etc... it was, without a doubt, one of my favorite dives.

 

[Quarrior]

NWG, ya know, when I was up there you were seeing those Seals all the time and I never saw a one. Think there might be more to it other than just coincidence?

Tonight Jimmie (Kalvyn) and I decided to do a dive at Les Davis. We splashed at about 7 PM ... surface swam out a coupla hundred feet, and dropped into the worst siltout I've seen in quite some time. At first I thought "great ... two damn divers in the water ahead of us and look at the mess they created". Nope ... wasn't them.

Vis was so bad you could just about see your outstretched fingers ... we hadn't been down more than a few seconds when suddenly this mottled grey wall of blubber flashes so close in front of my face I can feel the wake created by its passing. Wow ... that was close. Quicker than I could think, it flashed us again ... trailing silty whirpools in its wake.

What could we do except get our bearings and head down deeper ... hoping to lose our new-found dive buddy in the structure. No such luck ... it stayed with us for the duration, often putting on tremendous displays of speed while chasing just about every fish that was unfortunate enough to get caught in our light beams.

For all of that, we did manage to see quite a few cool things tonight ... Les Davis is always hit-or-miss when it comes to wildlife, but tonight we found three GPO's, a tiny red octo out in the open, and quite a variety of nudibranchs ... including my ol' frilly friend dendronotis rufus. And, of course, ample happy meals for our new-found friend.

Meanwhile, our robust companion got too darn friendly, if you ask me. This fellow was quite used to divers, apparently, often coming up underneath us at a startling rate of speed ... which wasn't easy considering that we were staying quite close to the bottom. Sometimes he would brush up against us as he buzzed past. Once he passed so close to my face that he brushed the bolt-snap attached to my second stage hose ... causing the bolt-snap to flip up and smack into the side of my mask! A couple times I actually reached out and fended him off. Now, if you've never had the experience, imagine pushing on a very energetic 300-lb sack of jello ... that's about what it feels like.

He finally left us at our safety stop ... when he realized we were just hovering there and not shining our lights on any more tasty snacks.

Interesting dive ... 65 minutes ... almost all of it as a two-person, one-seal buddy team ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

NWG, ya know, when I was up there you were seeing those Seals all the time and I never saw a one. Think there might be more to it other than just coincidence?

Actually, on our "where's the ferry" swimaround dive, what I saw was a bull sea lion ... that's another animal altogether ... :11:

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[OE2X]

The harbor seals like to come out at night and feed in the beams of the HID's. Occasionally I'll see one during the day, but not as often as at night.

A week or so ago we had one that waited in the shallows for us to start our dive. One of our buddies was having light issues, so we waited, floating on the surface. One of the seals would hover belly up, off the bottom just a couple feet beneath me. At one point I was able to extend my hand within about two inches of scratching her head. She was cute, but I wish she would learn to frog kick. The rest of the dive was like having a black lab chasing after a ball.

 

[puckvirus]

Those things scare the hell out of me at night more then any thing else. Because of their speed and playfulness. Their uncanny ability to just come out of no where and go after their snacks.

 

[opiniongirl]

We used to dive off a boat outside Vancouver, which had a famous seal which would always come diving.

Once he got really close, and bit my mask (I got a full view of his lovely tonsils), so I gently nudged him away.

I think he got the idea I was playing, as he became exactly as was stated earlier - a frisky pup - kept bolting towards me, grabbing my arm, not biting hard, but tugging gently, biting my fins, poking his nose everywhere.

But the more I touched him, the more excited he got, until (as I was teaching at the time) he got a little too rambunctious, and I had to call the dive..

I dunno - seems like they're pretty similar in behaviour to sealions - they're cute, so its easy to forget that they can still kick the crap out of you if they wanted to..

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

We used to dive off a boat outside Vancouver, which had a famous seal which would always come diving.

Once he got really close, and bit my mask (I got a full view of his lovely tonsils), so I gently nudged him away.

I think he got the idea I was playing, as he became exactly as was stated earlier - a frisky pup - kept bolting towards me, grabbing my arm, not biting hard, but tugging gently, biting my fins, poking his nose everywhere.

But the more I touched him, the more excited he got, until (as I was teaching at the time) he got a little too rambunctious, and I had to call the dive..

I dunno - seems like they're pretty similar in behaviour to sealions - they're cute, so its easy to forget that they can still kick the crap out of you if they wanted to..

Was that in Howe Sound? I was out there once with James Mayall from B.C. Dive Adventures, and this seal came and played with us like that. He put his flippers on either side of this one gal's head and stuck his face right up like he was trying to see inside her mask. He grabbed ahold of James's arm and tried nibbling on his fingers. And he nipped my fins a few times. After we got back on the boat, he kept popping his head up and looking at us, like he wasn't done playing yet.

Then he followed us all the way back to the boat dock and watched as we offloaded ... wistfully, if I'm any judge of seal expressions ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[kalvyn]

Interesting dive ... 65 minutes ... almost all of it as a two-person, one-seal buddy team ...

He definitely wasn't a Navy SEAL... not stealthy enough. He did startle me the first time he came right under me, but it got to be old hat after that. I got rammed a couple times by fish trying to escape, that was cracking me up!

The best part of the dive for me was the entire dive. It was the first dive since the Bretton that I felt "normal", and my SAC last night reflected that comfort.

Jimmie

 

[donclaypool]

Was that in Howe Sound? I was out there once with James Mayall from B.C. Dive Adventures, and this seal came and played with us like that. He put his flippers on either side of this one gal's head and stuck his face right up like he was trying to see inside her mask. He grabbed ahold of James's arm and tried nibbling on his fingers. And he nipped my fins a few times. After we got back on the boat, he kept popping his head up and looking at us, like he wasn't done playing yet.

Then he followed us all the way back to the boat dock and watched as we offloaded ... wistfully, if I'm any judge of seal expressions ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I wish I had that again. Diving in Unalaska they were always around. I'd be working on getting line out of a crabber's wheel and notice a harbor seal looking over my shoulder. And we had the big stellar sea lions that were often playful and ocassionally agressive rocketing around. The females and juveniles especially. I never had any physical contact but they were a joy to watch and interact with.

don