Hi, I was out there doing the course this weekend with the Aquarius group. Maybe you saw me walking around, I was wearing a yellow drysuit.
We had a 2-hour PowerPoint class the night before. There was content on the project itself: logistics, goals, how to properly cull without damaging the reef or other life, etc. There was also a history of the issues at hand, and an overview of what else to look for, like invasive species. Some course work I knew already, plenty was new to me, and some of the stuff that I thought I knew was actually incorrect. So overall I found it to be pretty helpful.
Dive 1 was off-grid, near the SW buoy. Our instructor demonstrated a few culling techniques, students demonstrated & received feedback. Once each student demonstrated each technique satisfactorily, instructor gave us a "goodbye" hand signal, and we split off in buddy pairs to go get some culling done. I lost count of how many I culled on dive 1, but my buddy logged 80; my count was probably close to that. I definitely injured one strawberry anemone that was hiding underneath a purple urchin, which I should have noticed but missed (if you're reading this, I hope you're doing alright, little buddy). Lesson learned to double-check. 59 min total dive time, 35 min cull time, 32' max, 27' avg, min temp 57F.
Dive 2 was on the grid, lane E West starting at 50m marker. I logged 169 urchins, buddy logged a comparable number. Almost zero urchins from 50m until 70 or 75m marker, where there were plenty of them. For a little while, I really got into the rhythm of it, and was going through the urchins pretty quickly. Buddy had a kinda short fill, so we turned this one a little earlier (the fill was from an out-of-town shop, don't remember which one). 55 min dive time, 26 min cull time, 36' max, 30' avg, min temp 57F.
The water was warm, the vis was good at 15 to 20 feet, the swell and chop were good in the morning, manageable in the afternoon. The site is pretty far, roughly 1/4 mile out with a current trending toward shore (more current in the AM, less in the PM). For our class of 2 instructors and 8 students, each of the instructor used a DPV and towed 4 students out. I had doubts about this, but honestly, it worked surprisingly well. Even with us using snorkels through the chop. From the Zodiac, Keith snapped a little video showing my group descending as the second group arrived, it's on the
G2KR FB page for the curious. DPV ride took about 20 minutes, from the shore closest to the parking area, so a further distance than a direct surface swim would've been.
@wnissen did your group swim out on the surface? It looked doable, just long and tiring. I think i'll bring a of kayak next time and dive off of that. There is a mooring buoy with a pretty good-size concrete block for small vessels. Also, I heard a rumor that MaryJo will be offering a taxi service for culling volunteers aboard the BeachHopper II at a
steep discount vs normal dive trips. I have yet to call her about this, but my understanding is that it will be Thursday mornings. That seems like far and away the best solution for anyone who can make it.
I did use my drygloves, and was a little worried that the urchin needles would poke a hole through them. This ended up being a non-issue; yes I did handle some of the urchins with my hands, but their spines really aren't that sharp, more of a pencil than a needle. Being head-down in my drysuit for so long, it was a little stiff in the chest/shoulder area. Maybe as I get better at this, I'll be able to do it in flatter trim while being certain I don't accidentally bump the bottom with my knees/fins. But a wetsuit might be easier, and between the shallow depth and the work, I'm sure I'd stay warm enough.
If folks here would like to participate, but are hesitant to cough up the money for the class, fair enough. You can absolutely participate, and you can do it in a way that contributes to the scientific efforts as well. There is an area near the grey buoy, East of the the NE corner of the grid, for untrained divers. You just need a CA fishing license ($50 or so online), and there is a quick
form to fill out to assign you an area to cull near the buoy, and a second
form to record your number of urchins and/or culling time. I believe that both forms are optional, but they're quick to do and are helpful to the project.
PSA: Please do not cull in any part of Monterey/PG/Carmel besides Tanker's Reef. And please know that the East side of Tanker's Reef is being left untouched as a scientific control group. This is really, really important, because we do not want the various research and/or government bodies to get the sense that people are taking this experiment as a license to do whatever they want. This is kind of a 2-level experiment, where of course we want to figure out of this intervention improves biodiversity outcomes. But there's a social aspect as well, where we want to know if training a bunch of volunteers results in local divers generally culling in the way that's approved of and legal. If people start going rogue, or even if the pool of volunteers dries up, the experiment will likely be interpreted as a failure.
