Marine Room 03/08/15 - Finally get to dive again!

[thez_yo]

The ocean has been conspiring against us since early in January with near constant high surf, or rainstorms, with a break finally this weekend! Not letting the opportunity go, we headed in and had a 1:25 long dive today!

Temps were 60-62ºF, max depth 17fsw, average 8fsw, and as flat as a pancake. There was some surge, of course, but nothing terrible, and I swear viz was at least 30'. It was so good, I don't even know how far it was! We saw all sorts of great critters, and I'm super excited to have gotten to jump back into the kelp, because it's been far too long.







And I tried to get some good shots of buddy today, because there was actually viz!


Juvie Garibaldi


Blacksmith


Adult Garibaldi




Now, all of a sudden we swam into a big school of sea bass. They were everywhere, and I swear the whole school of them just followed us for the rest of the dive, photobombing as much as possible. I look up from the lobster, and what do I see?


Occasionally they did clear




But not for long..


This guy was at the bottom of the last shot!


Not only did buddy find that skate, he also found 2 horn sharks.


yup, more sea bass time


for scale

 

[thez_yo]

and the next horn shark


nice horns, buddy




yup... nope. It was either my school of sea bass bothering it, the surge picked up tossing the kelp around more, or I was more conspicuous than I was hoping..


I'm guessing it was the sea bass though. Look at this picture, then notice that's the guy staring me down in the video:




I saw a couple nice big abalone on this dive too


the occasional non-sea bass


Senioritas


And buddy found a Giant Kelpfish too!


here's that second nice big abalone


schools here and there


And the darkest, I swear downright black, ray I've ever seen. If it didn't have those lines around the edges like a stingray, I'd guess it's a batray.


And for those who don't dive here, here's what a stingray looks like before you step on it. (Don't step on the rays! Shuffle your feet on the way in and out!)


zoom!