Mike
Contributor
Just returned from 10 days in Roatan diving on the north side out of West Bay. Brazen, huge lion fish on every single dive, these lion fish there are huge, I measured one against my fin and it was 18 inches.
I did one and only one night dive. Saw what I thought might have been 1 octopus for about 2 seconds, 3 lobster and 11 huge lionfish combing the reef like those advanced terminator robots for the movies of the same name, hunting for anything they could find hiding in the coral, which wasn't much based on the fact the reef was an absolute ghost town at night. Anything that accidently would have shown itself would have been converged on and swallowed immediately.
Apparently there are some dive masters who kill lion fish there, I was told that some from Anthony's Key kill them, but not a single one I dove with did anything. It was sad cause the reefs are very noticeably different then they were the last time I was there in 2009. I even checked my log entries just to make sure I wasn't imagining it, even my log entries from two years ago noted there were thousands of tiny fish all over the coral gardens, lots of groupers, large angel fish of all varieties, sea horses, spotted eels, you name it. This trip, the exact opposite, couldn't find a sea horse, one spotted eel the whole time, just a lot of coral with no fish to speak of around. Someone needs to send out an APB to find all the missing fish of thier reefs cause they have disappeared. Diving was actually getting boring and we skipped the afternoon dives everyday, and left about 12 pre-paid dives unused between the two of us.
Unfortunately I started sounding like that girl from American pie talking about band camp all the time while I was there, except it was -" in Cozumel they do this"," in Cozumel they do this", I just find Cozumel is the best example of the contrast between reefs that lionfish are actively being removed and theirs which they are not....I had to shut my mouth after awhile, but the lack of any concern from them and the continuous diving on reefs painfully barren was bizzare to me... many of the divers diving with us were newbies so they had no previous experiences to compare their dives to and were happy to see any fish at all. But it's painfully obvious that Roatan's reefs on the north side have been heavily devestated by lion fish, and from what I saw the dive shops there are totally unaware. I guess since they dive it every day, it's a death of a thousand cuts, a few fish missing today, a few tomorrow, they go slowly un-noticed, but over time it's painfully obvious to somebody coming back with long times inbetween, you notice the difference immediately. It's really a shame. But just wanted to say great job to the dive masters in Cozumel, keep killing the lion fish, you're really keeping the diveable reefs beautiful and creating job security, giving divers a reason to return over and over again to Cozumel. The dive masters in Roatan where I dived didn't seem to think anything of their deserted coral reefs, I guess they aren't concerned with it, I'm not sure I'll be going back to Roatan any time soon, maybe the south side around Coco view and Fantasy island is being managed better, but believe me, Cozumel is pretty healthy compared to Roatan.
I did one and only one night dive. Saw what I thought might have been 1 octopus for about 2 seconds, 3 lobster and 11 huge lionfish combing the reef like those advanced terminator robots for the movies of the same name, hunting for anything they could find hiding in the coral, which wasn't much based on the fact the reef was an absolute ghost town at night. Anything that accidently would have shown itself would have been converged on and swallowed immediately.
Apparently there are some dive masters who kill lion fish there, I was told that some from Anthony's Key kill them, but not a single one I dove with did anything. It was sad cause the reefs are very noticeably different then they were the last time I was there in 2009. I even checked my log entries just to make sure I wasn't imagining it, even my log entries from two years ago noted there were thousands of tiny fish all over the coral gardens, lots of groupers, large angel fish of all varieties, sea horses, spotted eels, you name it. This trip, the exact opposite, couldn't find a sea horse, one spotted eel the whole time, just a lot of coral with no fish to speak of around. Someone needs to send out an APB to find all the missing fish of thier reefs cause they have disappeared. Diving was actually getting boring and we skipped the afternoon dives everyday, and left about 12 pre-paid dives unused between the two of us.
Unfortunately I started sounding like that girl from American pie talking about band camp all the time while I was there, except it was -" in Cozumel they do this"," in Cozumel they do this", I just find Cozumel is the best example of the contrast between reefs that lionfish are actively being removed and theirs which they are not....I had to shut my mouth after awhile, but the lack of any concern from them and the continuous diving on reefs painfully barren was bizzare to me... many of the divers diving with us were newbies so they had no previous experiences to compare their dives to and were happy to see any fish at all. But it's painfully obvious that Roatan's reefs on the north side have been heavily devestated by lion fish, and from what I saw the dive shops there are totally unaware. I guess since they dive it every day, it's a death of a thousand cuts, a few fish missing today, a few tomorrow, they go slowly un-noticed, but over time it's painfully obvious to somebody coming back with long times inbetween, you notice the difference immediately. It's really a shame. But just wanted to say great job to the dive masters in Cozumel, keep killing the lion fish, you're really keeping the diveable reefs beautiful and creating job security, giving divers a reason to return over and over again to Cozumel. The dive masters in Roatan where I dived didn't seem to think anything of their deserted coral reefs, I guess they aren't concerned with it, I'm not sure I'll be going back to Roatan any time soon, maybe the south side around Coco view and Fantasy island is being managed better, but believe me, Cozumel is pretty healthy compared to Roatan.
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Punta Dalila was another super cool light current fish dive with tons of little cracks and crevices to poke your head in! These sites were new to me and every bit as good as the usual sites that I've visited a bunch of times over the years!
