Very good dives off Butterfly House and on the Inner Pinnacle August 25, 2018

Guy Foster, his daughter Tessa, and I went out with the Sanctuary dive boat out of Monterey Harbor for two dives in Carmel Bay yesterday.  Conditions were quite calm, very light breeze, no wind chop, only a small swell running.  Because of light winds for the last two weeks there is little to no upwelling from canyons so the surface water was quite green but visibility opened up nicely once you got under the plankton bloom.  Surface temperatures with no upwelling were up to 59 degrees, it was 52 degrees down 60 ft.  We saw some Humpbacks in the distance while traveling to and from the dive sites.  I was pleased to see continued recovery of the kelp beds, they are back to maybe 50% of normal.

Our first dive was off the Butterfly House.  It's an area with tall rock ridges running out from shore toward deeper water.  Depths of 30 - 40 ft on the top of the ridges, 65 -75 ft in between.  Below are some pictures from this first dive of the day, for more, please go to:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/FCok2x1bWCzN7mpLA

On this dive I went ahead and splashed first, Guy and Tessa took their time as she was making her second open water dive with her new dry suit.  Visibility was 10 to 15 ft near the surface, up to about 35 ft on the bottom.

                                San Diego Dorid nudibranch with a red sea urchin.  Still too many sea urchins but the kelp is starting to recover, at this site, the kelp is growing from the heights of the ridges.  Happily I'm steadily seeing more sea stars and more variety of sea stars, but I've still not seen a Sunflower Star since 2014, I'm afraid it is locally extinct.

                               Gopher Rockfish and China Rockfish.

                                Juvenile China Rockfish

                               San Diego Dorid nudibranch devouring a sponge.

    I'm quite pleased with this zoomed in closeup of the San Diego Dorid eating a sponge.  Shot with my wide angle fisheye Tokina 10-17 mm lens.

 We have a few California Sheephead in Carmel Bay.  They are quite shy and you usually just get a fleeting glance of them.  This one was about 16-18 inches long and I think it is still a female which is just beginning its transition to a male.

                                Monterey Nudibranch

                                Black Rockfish

Our second dive was on the Inner Pinnacle near the NW corner of Carmel Bay.  We had 10-15 ft of visibility at the surface and 25 ft at the bottom.  Guy, Tessa, and I enjoyed the newly grown kelp stands and the very large schools of hundreds of blue rockfish schooling in them.  I swear the blue rockfish were smiling to be sheltering in kelp beds again!  Below are some pictures from this dive, for more, please go to:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/Uf8BP8L25ZmR2L3d6

 You can see the water was quite green but visibility at the bottom was still pretty good.

              Hydro Coral is common on the Pinnacles.  It likes high water flow at the edge of kelp beds.

                            Yes, I would say there was a plethora of happy Blue Rockfish!

                                Kelp Rockfish

                                                Guy in his new drysuit.

   Monterey Dorid nudibranch and still too many red and purple sea urchins, though the kelp is recovering.

It's nice to have kelp to hang with during our three minute safety stop.

 Now for the surface swim back to the Sanctuary

Very good dives at the Inner Pinnacle in Carmel Bay and off Pt Joe August 17, 2018

Greg Hoberg and I took his RIB zodiac down to Carmel Bay to dive at the Inner Pinnacle and then, due to a forecast for rising winds, which never developed, went back to dive in the recovering Bull Kelp bed off Pt Joe where we had observed good water clarity on our way down to Carmel.  During our cruise from Monterey to Carmel Bay we were pleased to see lots of kelp recovery, dominated by Bull Kelp.  The kelp beds are the most extensive that they've been since the hordes of sea urchins mowed them down during 2014.  We also saw whale watching boats and whales, at least some of which were Humpbacks, in Carmel Bay (they've been seeing Blue Whales recently, too).  Again, because of the forecast for rising wind we did not spend a lot of time whale watching but commenced with diving.  Not wanting a long slog against a wind chop, we dived the Pinnacles rather than going further into Carmel Bay.

Our first dive was on the Inner Pinnacle, closer to Carmel Bay's north shore than usual for diving the pinnacles.  Visibility was only 20 ft at the surface but opened up to at least 30, perhaps 40 at times down at 70 ft.  Water temp was 52 degrees, very standard for this time of year.  We were pleased to see lots of rockfish enjoying the recovering kelp bed on the Pinnacles.  Below are some macro photos, shot with my Canon 60 mm lens, to see more, please go to:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/Q7aCpm9JHcuVsALD8

                           Enthusiastic pair of nudibranchs making sure there will be more in the future.

                               Almost a good picture of a very cool juvenile China Rockfish

                A beautiful Opalescent Nudibranch, Hermissenda crassicornis, about 3 inches long.

The density of life on the 25 ft high wall we spent our dive on was truly astonishing.  Here's a Painted Greenling on top of an encrusting tunicate and sitting partially under a Feather Duster tube worm.

A Blue rock crab patiently allowed me to take his closeup.  It was about 8 inches across.

                                      Gopher rockfish becoming tense at my close approach.

                              A hermit crab perched on hydro coral.

                              Brown Cup Coral, about 3/4 inch across

    Painted Greenling with violet hydro coral

                                Painted Greenling with Strawberry anemones

Our second dive was halfway back to Monterey Harbor, off Pt Joe.  Finally, after several years with almost no remaining kelp, the Bull Kelp is recovering in a major way as the Spiny Sea Stars recover from the sea star wasting disease and as the ravenous sea urchins grew large enough to draw the attention of sea otters.  Below are some photos from this dive, for more, please go to:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/GL2dXTcjhLN6vmKA8

                           Monterey Dorid Nudibranch, about five inches long

                               Beautiful Lingcod.  Greg got some shots of lingcod and a curious but caution Vermilion rockfish, it was far too shy for me to get pictures of it with my macro lens.

                                 Black and Yellow Rockfish