Shore diving from Caribe Blu?

[gcawad]

blu angel shore dive

23 days and counting.

 

[espantoon]

The shore dive pics are awesome! I cant wait, 14 days to go...

 

[DandyDon]

Okay here are a few I shot south of Blue Angel on a night shore dive. Can't blame my camera, as I have a pretty good one. I do have Operator problems, tho.... :silly:

Spiny urchins used to be common across the Caribe, now rare after something wiped almost all of them out years ago, so it's always exciting to see one - more so if the pic works?

 

[ggunn]

Okay here are a few I shot south of Blue Angel on a night shore dive. Can't blame my camera, as I have a pretty good one. I do have Operator problems, tho.... :silly:

Spiny urchins used to be common across the Caribe, now rare after something wiped almost all of them out years ago, so it's always exciting to see one - more so if the pic works?

What is the deal with that? Only a few years ago, the area out behind (in front of) Caribe Blu was nearly paved with urchins, now, there are only a scattered few here and there. What happened to them all?

 

[DandyDon]

What is the deal with that? Only a few years ago, the area out behind (in front of) Caribe Blu was nearly paved with urchins, now, there are only a scattered few here and there. What happened to them all?

The last time I saw a large concentration of them in my travels was Puerto Rico in 1988, I think. From one article... http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1200/is_8_160/ai_78545497

Wanted: Reef Cleaners - sea urchins in Caribbean being killed by plague, so coral reefs do not get clean - Brief Article
Science News, August 25, 2001 by Janet Raloff

For millennia, hordes of delicate, nocturnal sea urchins grazed the Caribbean sea floor. By dining on shag carpets known as turf algae, these spiny herbivorous urchins, often referred to as lawn mowers, kept most area corals clean as a whistle.

That all ended in 1983 with the arrival of a mysterious plague.

Over the course of 13 months or so, a still-unidentified germ swept through the Caribbean basin, beginning at the Atlantic side of the Panama Canal. It proved lethal to just one species--Diadema antillarum, the corals' primary housekeeper. Infected urchins lost spines, grew lethargic, and exuded mucus. Any reef hit by the epidemic would be devoid of living Diadema within 2 weeks.

Hammering the entire Caribbean and tropical West Atlantic--more than 3.5 million square kilometers--this die-off was "the most extensive ever reported for any marine animal," notes Haris Lessios of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Balboa, Panama. Overall, more than 97 percent of the area's Diadema perished, he says.

One theory I have heard is that the infection was blown across the Atlantic from the growing Sahara dessert - and I was seen those sands arriving in the Caribe.

 

[Diver Kat]

20 days & counting .......... exactly 3 weeks from now, I should be underwater doing my first dive with Blue Angel .........

Nice pix guys .... makes me even more impatient to get going!!!!

As for the urchins, I remember quite a few on the shoreline before the last few hurricanes, but since then haven't noticed too many .....

 

[ggunn]

One theory I have heard is that the infection was blown across the Atlantic from the growing Sahara dessert - and I was seen those sands arriving in the Caribe.

The article you quoted says that they think that the point of origin for the plague was near the Atlantic end of the Panama Canal. That seems to point to a water-borne organism brought through the Canal.

 

[DandyDon]

The article you quoted says that they think that the point of origin for the plague was near the Atlantic end of the Panama Canal. That seems to point to a water-borne organism brought through the Canal.

I'm not so sure about that article, but there's not a lot available about these little animals named for hedgehogs. They're certainly not as popular as some other endangered animals like certain whale species and the piebald eagle, but their loss seems to be a large part of the coral reef problem across the Caribe.

With the cleansing Cozumel current, perhaps they have survived more there than in less circulating waters - I don't know? A seemingly better article was found, but required paid membership. I hope the storms only swept the local population deeper and that we'll see a re-population to eat the algae on the reefs, but I just have not seen large populations on my dives across the Caribe in the 6 years I've been into scuba.