Dive reports with beach/weather conditions

[J_Green]

7-29-2013
Location: Alhambra
Kayak Dive .5 miles out
Depth:22-27ft
Viz: 3-4 feet mostly, 8 feet after tide started coming in, 1.5-2 feet in at 22'
Finds: 3.25" beat up meg, 2.25 " golden beach meg, 1.25 " beat up meg, 1.5" gumline of a hemi

Video: VeniceDive7 29 2013 - YouTube

Kayak track: Bike Ride Profile | Beach Dive near Venice | Times and Records | Strava

 

[2TH DIVR]

8/1/13
South Brohard
3:45 pm
Wind W@ 10
Seas 1'
Water Temp 90
Vis 5'-10'
Current present running N
Quick dive around the blocks to test new reg
Finds 2 masks and a bunch of mono.

new reg

 

[Aristakat]

08/03/13 report coming from boat
Sat 10am
Depth 28 ft venice beach area
water temp 85
Vis 15-20 ft with sun out
Flat seas winds 2-3 knots
Saw a few moon jellyfish so in next few weeks could start
To show up maybe
Good weekend to dive

 

[dkramer]

Had a great 2 tank dive with TwistedBones & Chuck at S.Brohard. Pretty good north current, water temp 91 at the surface & 86 on the bottom. Viz 10-15 ft. Water is green & a bit eerie but viz is good! We also saw a few moon jellies.

 

[CalicoJack57]

Location: Alhambra yak dive 28 feet of water out 1 mile
ditto on Aristakat and dkramer Great vis all day
when I first went down it was a very eerie dark green off In the distance
but vis out to 20 feet was amazing for August

finds whale ear bone 2 small meg frags and a beat up 2 1/2 meg Had a blast with the new Yak!

 

[Twisted Bones]

Was an awesome day for a dive. Thanks chuck and DKramer for hangin out with me. Had a great moment with a rather large school of jacks followed by a sizeable baracuda. Great viz and all.


Matt

 

[J_Green]

Location: Alhambra Yak dive about .5 mile out
Time: Hit the water around 2 PM
Viz: Was surprisingly good I would say 15-20 most the dive. It did have that weird green tint to the water. Bottom water was pretty clear. Seemed to be a hazey layer between 8-10 feet off the bottom. Was kinda overcast when I got there so it wasn't particularly bright, but very clear.
Finds: Got a 3.5" and my wife got a 2.5"

Other notes: We don't have a tandem and I was too tired to bring my other yak. So we put both sets of gear on the one and my wife paddled while I basically kicked with the fins. Took a little longer going out especially with the wind kicking up some. I wasn't unhappy with that. On the way in I decided to let her take the yak in while I swam it all. I saw some of the smaller jellys and didn't think much of it until I was looking down and got a nice sting right across my upper lip that shot across my face. Made my lip swell up a bit, must have been one of the bigger guys that push their way through the water and have the short tentacles around the edges. I saw quite a few pf them on the swim in. At one point I thought I was in Finding Nemo (probably about 10 or so within a 8 foot wide window) it got so thick I wasn't sure I could make it through them without getting stung again, but I manged. Ended up swimming in over the blocks and you could make them out from the surface.

Saw one of the those spider shrimps I think is what they are called, maybe it was a crab, but it looked more like a shrimp body with super long legs chilling and cleaning fish.



Yak Track : http://app.strava.com/activities/71950993#

 

[Dive4LifeSW]

Dive 8/4

3 dives...

1 off Alhambra (on Yak... 1/2 mile out or so).
1 closer to Boneyard
9:50 ish to 1'ish?.... Been diving for a number of years and NEVER saw anything like this... in response to other posts on Dark Green water and clear viz. Word cannot explain. To those reading post: GREAT diving but really weird. If you can, go out (but seriously recommend charter)... Winds were moderate (West'ish up to 10 knots?... Viz top to bottom (28 ft) and side to side (if you dive you will get it.. black wall beyond 30'ish feet). It was like diving in a cavern or the Blue Hole of Belize. Weird... did I say Weird?

Lot of life (nudibranch, a REALLY "friendly" Barracuda and more schools of fish than I have ever seen off Venice, Florida.

But after 1'sh conditions were bumpy... Move to blocks of Alhambra for last dive. Bit bumpy/choppy (1-2 foot). Water was 10 to 15 on viz. Some Jelly (only place I noticed them).

Nice finds (about 4 Megs over 3 inches (will post on my FB page later), mammoth tooth (good section), whale and somethings I need help ID'ing (will clean and post later).

Winds were West, can't predict viz... if you dive, please post. This was today... Wishing you all good days (Diving!) going forward!

 

[sharkboy1515]

Had two extremely productive dives on the Aristakat this weekend. Got out on Friday and Saturday in the boneyard. Conditions were about the same both days:

Flat Seas
Greenish/black looking water
Very clear at the bottom 15-20 feet viz. Could see the boat from the bottom. Still kind of dark and eerie though.
Water temp 84

First day finds: Nice (slightly worn) 3 5/8 inch meg - found before I was even done getting settled at the bottom. Plenty of frags and smaller stuff.
Second day: Area was very spotty and had a quite a bit of silt. The silt wasn't a problem because the visibility was so good. You could swim ten feet off the bottom and find spots to hunt. Found a small patch way out in the silt and saw the outline of a 5 1/8 inch meg.. couldn't believe it! Kept swimming over silt and eventually found a spot and picked up a nice piece of mammoth tooth. Kept swimming on the compass bearing and only found silt for a long time. I decided to head a different direction and eventually came upon a large reef with tons of life. Didn't find much around the reef.. not even small teeth. I ended up finding a broken 4 1/8 inch tooth before I left the reef to head back to the boat. I swam towards the sound of the boat until my flag line suddenly got snagged on something and tugged me back. I looked up and saw that I had swam right under the boat and goat my flag stuck on the other side. I looked down at my gauges and saw I had 700 psi.. but also noticed a root sticking out of the sand. I pulled up an extremely nice 4 5/8 inch lower tooth.. directly under the boat! Surfaced right up at the ladder. Perfect dive. When I got up on the boat I noticed a tiny ding in the side of the 4 5/8 inch meg. Bummer. After cleaning it I discovered it was actually a pathology. It looks like the shark slightly damaged the tooth and it began to repair the small nick. There are serrations inside the indent.

Sorry for the novel.. it was an eventful weekend of diving!
Thanks to Captain Jaime for putting us on awesome spots!

 

[gytwypt]

Yak track is awesome