Dive Report: St. Andrews State Park 23 April 2011

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MRXRAY

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Location
Pensacola, FL
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Joined Recharge and Hetland for a trip to St. Andrews State Park in Panama City Beach, FL. High Tide was at 1:30PM and we hit the Packed parking lot and got a Cherry parking spot at about 10:30AM. A quick peak at the conditions confirmed the rumor that they are in fact dredging right in front of the Jetties we dive at, however they are on the opposite side of the channel. The kicker is that they are pumping the cuttings onto the beach just North of the Kiddie Pool and the water wash out is drining right into the jetties. Although this didn't appear to be a huge problem with the tide coming in, I can tell you that when the tide flipped the viz dropped a lot more than normal and QUICKLY!

With a picture and a good idea of the viz we quickly suited up and headed through the waves of scampily clad sunbathers through the kiddie pool and then South toward the pass, we took our time and pushed our way through the stong current taking photos as we went. The marine life was very nice albeit a bit more timid than usual. The dredging and large amount of boat traffic definately deminished the peacefulness of the dive as it sounded life times square underwater which may be why the fish seemed a "Uptight". We called the viz at about 25 feet and we ended the dive at just about 1 hour with a max depth of about 45 feet. I think the temps were about 76*.

Hetland and I hurried back to the car to change tanks as we were quickly approaching high tide, recharge decided to sit #2 out. So Hetland and I headed back to the water and this time elected to turn North toward the shallower water as the tide had slacked quite a bit. We got a few nice shots of some sea Hares mating and some Mantis Shrimp and some other "Stuff" before turning the dive and heading back to shore after about an hour. The viz definatley dropped to crap just after high tide and we both called the viz at around 10-15' during the dive but it dropped off to about 5-10 toward the end.

After the dive we hit a couple of the LDS's and then went to Liz's (?), Asian food for some Sushi, not my favorite place but we had a good debriefing.

Here are a couple of my better shots:

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Some great shots - love the arrow crab on the anemone and the mantis shrimp. Thanks for the report!
 
Thanks for the report! What was the marine life like out there now that its getting warmer? Still mainly sheepshead or are you seeing other things?
 
Thanks for the report! What was the marine life like out there now that its getting warmer? Still mainly sheepshead or are you seeing other things?

Sheepshead, porgies, redfish, gag grouper, mullet, damsels, flounder, blue anglefish.

On our hour-long dives, I was hot with a 3mm jumpsuit and 1mm hood. If I peeled the hood back, I got cool after about 45 minutes.


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Anyone know what this critter is? Looked like a Flamingo Tongue....
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Hot Snail-on-snail action :eyebrow:
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The litle orange gastropod is most likely a West Indian Simnia.
 
Nice critters!
 
I'm on an uphill curve on learning the new camera but I'm not real excited yet.

Very nice shots, you enjoying the camera? Hope we have great viz for Spring Fest.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/teric/

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