SuPrBuGmAn
Contributor
TheAwesomeFish got a promotion and would be moving to So FL shortly, so on one of her last weekends in the panhandle, she wanted to get a dive in. Rox@ucf also happened to be trying to organize a dive at the St Andrews Jetties on the same weekend and the tides were on our side for getting a decent dive in without having to leave at the buttcrack of dawn. A couple of Ms Awesome's buds would come along to get reaquainted with diving in the kiddypool, while the three of us would go for a dive on the channel side. Ms Awesome and I made it on time, her friends were a bit late, and rox@ucf sprinted to the water just after we waded in - it was friggin hot and the parking lot was full at the jetties. I was happy to jump in the salt with just my trunks and the Nomad(monkey diving with a single LP72). Since the oil leak fiasco, we hadn't done any saltwater stuff, so it was good to be back.
The three of us planned to cross the jetties, drop down and head towards the bay, then turn around the jetties and follow them back around on the kiddy pool side. Even in the kiddy pool, we were surrounded by bait fish, and even a few pompano, and little jacks were around. We'd be seeing a ton of marine life on this dive! Needlefish hung to the surface and jumped at the occassional bait fish. Once over the side, we saw spades, sheephead, blue angels, mangrove snapper, bluefish, grunts, scampy, porgy, and black grouper. We were schooled on several occassions by some very large bull red drum, mullet, and lookdowns. Looking closer would give you access to soapfish, damsels, blennies, flounder, wrasse, boxfish, puffers, cowfish, highhat, butterflyfish, scorpianfish, toadfish and some large southern rays. Blue crab, hermit crab, stone crab, and mantis shrimp were easily found as well. Once around the end of the jetties we came face to face with two of the resident Goliath groupers, which slowly turned tail and meandered away. Once on the kiddie pool side, we were continuously schooled by baitfish, trying to get away from the bull reds which kept darting in and out of the bait balls. The baitfish would knock our relatively good visibility(25-30' at times) down to just a few feet as they were just a wall of fish everywhere. It was pretty awesome. There first few feet had a slightly tannic color and was warm, but just under 15-20', you dropped into cooler(78F) saltwater - refreshing compared to the lukewarm surface water.
It was an awesome dive and a great way to get back in the Gulf.
The three of us planned to cross the jetties, drop down and head towards the bay, then turn around the jetties and follow them back around on the kiddy pool side. Even in the kiddy pool, we were surrounded by bait fish, and even a few pompano, and little jacks were around. We'd be seeing a ton of marine life on this dive! Needlefish hung to the surface and jumped at the occassional bait fish. Once over the side, we saw spades, sheephead, blue angels, mangrove snapper, bluefish, grunts, scampy, porgy, and black grouper. We were schooled on several occassions by some very large bull red drum, mullet, and lookdowns. Looking closer would give you access to soapfish, damsels, blennies, flounder, wrasse, boxfish, puffers, cowfish, highhat, butterflyfish, scorpianfish, toadfish and some large southern rays. Blue crab, hermit crab, stone crab, and mantis shrimp were easily found as well. Once around the end of the jetties we came face to face with two of the resident Goliath groupers, which slowly turned tail and meandered away. Once on the kiddie pool side, we were continuously schooled by baitfish, trying to get away from the bull reds which kept darting in and out of the bait balls. The baitfish would knock our relatively good visibility(25-30' at times) down to just a few feet as they were just a wall of fish everywhere. It was pretty awesome. There first few feet had a slightly tannic color and was warm, but just under 15-20', you dropped into cooler(78F) saltwater - refreshing compared to the lukewarm surface water.
It was an awesome dive and a great way to get back in the Gulf.
