Red Diving Hood

So far the summer has been amazing. The water temperatures warmed up and it has been sunny and calm in the weekends. What more can you ask as a diver?

This Saturday we did our GAFC (Great Annual Fish Count) dive at Loblolly Point. First dive was so good that I didn’t even question doing the second one, despite the fact that I needed to head home as early as possible.

For the first dive we took sort of  a 120 degree bearing. That takes us towards the Thatcher Island. After a while if you keep bearing right you will be going up and down over big boulders, and that’s one of my favorite things on this site. At strict 120 degree we get to the sand and eventually the reef. The sand is always fun and you never know what surprises it may bring. This day it was a bigass searobin. I don’t see these guys in Cape Ann that often, and this one was one of the biggest I have ever seen. One fish encounter may make a good dive a great dive. And now it became great dive 🙂

Second dive we hit north bearing (0 degrees). Passed over some shallow reefs and then found a sandy patch in between. Agitated by the diver fin kicks bunch of sand lances started shooting up and soon after pollock showed up, it was a feast for pollock and for our eyes. We were just sitting and watching the survival war going on in front of us. The dive was over and I wasn’t ready to get out. I signaled the buddies getting out that I am just going to hang out near the shore. I am so glad that Todd joined me (he is a great buddy that he never leave anyone alone) and we had another 35 mins of bonus dive

Such great day, with amazing encounters with bunch of fish and also some nudibranchs unexpected this late in the season. Now I can’t wait for next dive…

Buddies: Todd B, Mike S, Jason E, Amy N

Dive 1: 44ft, 64min, 53 F, 20ft viz

Dive 2: 30ft, 85 min, 56 F, 20ft viz

doto coronata Palio dubia Flabellina verrucosa searobin searobin searobin searobin grubby pollock crab sand lances searaven onchidoris muricata frilled anemone rock gunnel

We couldn’t get enough of Loblloly Point last week so Dan and I went back for another dive this Sunday. You know what, I wouldn’t mind going back there next week, again. That dive site is just beautiful.

We were there for one dive, hoping to get lobsters for Dan and also hoping to find the big lumpfish the guys found last weekend. Dan got some lobsters but we couldn’t find the lumpfish, what a shocker! 🙂

The visibility was amazing, maybe more than 25 ft, but the water got even colder, I saw 46F. I was properly shivering at the end of the dive and even after it was over.

We had a great dive, enjoying all kinds of terrain this site provided us. We saw two searavens, one of which was one of the bigger ones I saw, maybe 2 ft in length; one juvenile sculpin, one baby rock gunnel.

In terms of “creatures” I saw two decorator crabs and more nudis than I would expect. Earlier in the dive there was a pretty shag rug nudi (Aeolidia papillosa). Later around 30 ft depth I could see bunch of F. verrucosa (two were totally doing it! You can see the protruding genitals still out there after I interrupted their activity :/), D. fragilis and P. dubia. I have been wondering where all the Eubranchus exiguus were gone, since I have been seeing them everywhere last year but none this year, and finally I saw a wall full of them and I am sure two of these were also doing it ;).

In addition to all the nudis I am familiar with, I came across with a new one I saw for the first time. For last few weeks I have been searching for Cuthona gymnota on tubular hydroids and I thought I found it, finally. But when I come home and look at the photos I realize that what I found was a different nudi. I still don’t have positive ID on the species but it looks like a Tenellia gymnota, based on the photos my friend, Timur, has in his website. However, he had found that nudi during his trip to Norway.  So, as of now I am not sure if this is a local breed or came from the other side of Atlantic. Recently, there have been sightings of another kind of nudi, which was supposed to be from eastern Atlantic. Maybe something happened lately to bring some creatures over?

So, it was a pretty cool dive at Loblolly Point. This week, this time, I forgot half of my camera equipment and had some condensation so the photos are much worse than I would want them to be. I couldn’t even have decent photos of most of the things we saw. Oh well… Maybe next time I will finally have full equipment back on. 🙂

36 ft, 46F, 83 min, ~25 ft viz

Buddy: Dan

mystery nudi

First dive after the warm waters. But still looking forward to it because it is July now and all the marine life should be in. This is a great time, we get to find nudibranchs as well as all kinds of fish which like patrol New England waters. This time we wanted to mix it up a little and decided to hit Loblolly Point.

Diving at Loblolly Point is quite amazing. We just tend to forget about it, I guess. It provides a variety of different diving, sand, reef, wall… You can bear right and dive among never ending big boulders which provide all kinds of cracks and holes for different marine life, which also means lobsters. You can take 120-150 bearing and go over the shallow reef and reach the sandy bottom. I think if you keep going on that route over the sand you reach another reef, again full of life and lobsters. The depth ranges from 20 ft, if you stay by the big boulders, to around 40-50 ft, if you decide to head to the middle reef.

We carried stuff over to the rock near the entry, walking over uncomfortable rocks, drove back to pebble beach to park the car, walk back to the dive site, suit up and then I realize I did not get my camera from my car!!! What a bummer! I generally don’t know what to do with myself without a camera. It has been a long time since I dove without it and I must admit the purpose of the dives have sort of became to take photos. Oh well, back to Asli @2012, no camera and dive just for enjoying the solitariness and aquatic life.

I must say one thing made it easier to cope with the disappointment of not having my camera. I recently finished Jerry Shine’s book, “A Year Underwater“, and I was amazed with the kind of experiences he had underwater. I felt I was quite consumed with taking photos then actually observing things. So I had already decided to look up more and take more in. And this was my opportunity. 🙂

And after all it was a great dive. I did see quite a few things I would want to shoot but I had great experience of immersing into big schools of pollock, which is always amazing. The visibility was amazing and the sun was reaching us even at 20 ft. I found plenty of nudibranchs, a baby searobin, a small school of stripers and a few big schools of pollock, among one was a juvenile school. Quite disappointed that I missed the ginormous lump fish but then I know if I did see I would be more disappointed not to have my camera with me. So I am fine with it, I had a great dive.

Another thing that I should admit that, when I got separated form the group, I got quite scared. There have been great white pinged in the vicinity. I am generally not scared of sharks and I always say great whites also don’t care about us. But the reality of it got over me, i guess. :/ need to get over that…

Buddies: Bert, Dan, Jason, Todd, Suzanne, PJ.

48F, 30ft, 72min, ~25 ft viz