TWARS (This Week at Reef Seekers) - September 22-29, 2024 - STILL LIVE FROM YAP!!!!

[Ken Kurtis]

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Things have improved in Yap (please scroll down for details)​

And the fun has begun . . . THE DIVING HAS COMMENCED - We've had a grand eight days so far in Yap. Tomorrow is our last diving day. We have a dry day Tuesday because we fly out in the early A.M. hours of Wednesday. The first three days here were so-so, as the tropical storm system that has plagued this part of the Pacific finally moved on. But once Wednesday rolled around, we had clear skies, great viz, and really nice dives. Throughout, the staff here at Manta Ray Bay has been nothing short of totally accommodating (as they always are). They can't control the weather but they can make sure you have the best possible time during the good days, and a similar time in spite of the bad days. One thing we noticed is there aren't as many mantas as we had hoped. We got skunked on two manta dives, had a single manta on another, and had two on a dive today. Bill Acker's theory (he's the Manta Man in these parts) is that the rays don't like the lousy weather any more than we do and they head off to deeper water and don't come back until things have cleared up. No real way to test the theory but it makes sense and the empirical evidence seems to support it. But as you an see from the shots below (and the shark feed shot above), we've been seeing some pretty cool stuff.​

OFF TO THE PHILIPPINES NEXT - Once we're done here in Yap, I'll escort the group to Guam and then send them on their way home. I will be off to the Philippines for a few days, staying with Atlantis Dumaguete, so look for some photos on FaceBook and for TWARS to come from there next week. SPEAKING OF PHOTOS - If you're not following us on FaceBook, you should. We post Daily Top 10 photos every day along with a little synopsis of the day so you can enjoy the trip with us vicariously. Pix are posted on both the Ken Kurtis and Reef Seekers FB pages. SCUBA.COM LOOKING FOR A NEW LOCATION - Just got word that Scuba.com seemingly lost the lease on their Costa Mesa location so they're in the process of looking for a new place to settle. I got e-mail confirmation from their manager about this. They hope to settle "soon" but that's obviously a flexible term. Bottom line for those of you who frequent their store is that they don't intend to disappear and hope to reopen in the same general area. SHARKS EATING SHARKS - One of the highlights of our trip to Yap is always the shark feed we do at Vertigo. The sharks hit the frozen bait and do not eat each other. That may not be the case in the wild as scientists have some evidence of large sharks devouring other large sharks. You can read about it here: YUM, YUM SHARKS. WE CAN CAN ELIMINATE THE GREAT PACIFIC GARBAGE PATCH - This is no idle task and it's about twice the size of Texas, estimated at 79,000 metric tons of plastic waste and growing every day. A Netherlands-based group says they can do this in five years and at about half the projected cost of previous estimates. You can read more about this here (and hopefully this is not behind an L.A. Times paywall): CLEANING UP THE GARBAGE PATCH. LOBSTER SEASON OPENS THIS COMING SATURDAY AT 6:00AM - If you're partaking in the opening season mad dash, be careful. No lobster is worth your life. Many times the culprit is someone focusing so much on finding lobsters that the diver neglects to monitor air supply, runs out, and doesn't make it back to the surface. Don't let that be you. The only things that should be dying this coming weekend are the lobsters. That'll do it for now. Have a great week and hopefully we can take YOU diving sometime soon!!! - Ken​