It's a funny thing to look back through this blog and see how much has changed from the beginning to now~  confidence level, gear, dive buddies, types of diving, and moving into the professional status (DM).  It's been one heck of an adventure, that's for sure.. and I certainly cannot say that it's been dull     ...  Made some awesome dive buddies over time, lost some of the not-so-awesome ones.. but have learned from them all.

My beach diving days have become a rarity, with the exceptions of Divemaster duties which sometimes require beach dives at LJ Shores & also some shore dives with the dive club when we have a club function..  Any other time, my happy little butt is on a boat out in the ocean.. 

Boat diving opens a lot of doors~ you get to see places that you'd never see on a beach dive, plus you don't have to deal with walking, crowds, surface swims, surf zones, etc..   So, since the addition of a boat to my family (plus my dive buddy has 2 boats), things have changed considerably.. The majority of my dives consist of wreck dives now, with some occasional reefs (Pt Loma), Coronados, and Scripps Canyon dives... Yukon, Ruby E, El Rey, NOS tower, P-38,  High Seas, & the Hogan (http://www.cawreckdivers.org/Wrecks/Hogan.htm). It's pretty awesome to be diving ships, planes, etc that have been underwater for decades... but it's the P-38 that's my absolute favorite by far.. The plane has been down there since 1943 and is in great shape for the amount of time it's been down there.. http://www.cawreckdivers.org/Wrecks/P38.htm  

Anyways, here's a little summary & a few surface pics from the Hogan dive this past Friday (I don't have my pics of the wreck itself online yet).

A WICKES (LITTLE) Destroyer launched in 1919. 314' long and 31' wide, she boasted four 4" guns and two 20mm anti-aircraft guns. In WWII she served as a minesweeper and convoy escort. She took part in the invasion of North Africa as well as the battle of Iwo Jima. In 1945 she was slotted as a bombing target and was sunk off San Diego. She lies in 125 feet right on the Mexican Border. Currents are common in the area and visibility can be reduced. There is not much in the way of penetration; most of the structure is collapsed. Skill Recommendations: With a 130 foot maximum depth and unpredictable bottom visibility, this dive is for experienced divers only. Currents are common in the area and all divers are required to have a surface visual signaling device and well as an audible device. )

Watching the sunrise as we're anchored at the Hogan (which lies on the Mexican/US line):

Sean helping Nate get all set up...

Tyler running over me (ok well almost, hehe) with the scooter~

Saturday's dive had nothing to do with anything wrecked or historical, lol.. Sean & I took his rib (rhib, whatever) out in Oceanside for a night dive.. Vis was almost non-existent and surge was at least 5 ft~ lol~ but it was still a pretty cool dive since I'd never been diving in that area before.

Dive Report: Avalon Banks, 5 miles off Avalon, Catalina.
 
Depth:          48/ 62 ft (bottom depth 1,500 ft)
Dive times:     50/ 53 min
Viz:  A hazy 30-40'
Temps:          ~62 degrees
Currents:       light

Went out with Scuba Luv on the King Neptune Monday to see what their shark dives were all about. We motored out 4-5 miles off Avalon out over the Avalon Banks with a bottom depth of 1,500 ft. Filmed Avalon Mayor Bob Kennedy and the rest of the crew setting up the shark cage, as well as a diver or two who inspected the "flimsy" aluminum cage with some concern.

Laura, a third year law student, was the first one in the water and in the cage. I guess she is just used to swimming with "sharks." She was out of the cage quickly and all the divers swam free with the cage as a depth reference or resting point.

A five foot blue arrived first on the scene. After checking us out from a distance, it made several close passes allowing me to get some good video footage from which to extract stills for my newspaper column (archived on my web site at http://www.starthrower.org/products/DDDB/DDDB_200-249/DDDB_212%20blue%20sharks%20pt%201.htm and http://www.starthrower.org/products/DDDB/DDDB_200-249/DDDB_213%20blue%20sharks%20pt%202.htm). In fact, it accidentally bumped my housing as I was descending to film it from above and it decided to ascend directly beneath me. Read more in my column.

Also had two smaller (about 3') blues and a 4-5' mako appear, but they kept their distance.

I'm not a big fan of blue water diving, but this dive was lots of fun and the group of divers on board were great, too.

Especially when it spills all over    .  Anyway, I know I need to start adding more entries on here, and I'll get to that this week hopefully..

Diving a lot lately, and I'm up to 300 or so dives... Of course having a boat helps.. heh... and I am LOVING the boat... It's still nameless though, but somethings bound to click one of these days..

Pics of recent dives can be found here- http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c283/SoCalDiveGirl/  The wrecks (Yukon, Ruby, El Rey) & P38 are the only albums with new pics though..  except for nudi-zilla on the main page.. That was THE most massive nudibranch I've ever seen! It was also at a 'secret' reef, so I guess the extensive nudi population there is due to the area being non-publicized.. Awesome place~ it makes Marineland look barren of nudis in comparison!

~M

On a recent dive at a site I often visit, I decided to explore an area that I had never looked at before. In fact, it was an area I doubt any diver has really looked at because it just does not look diveable.

As I approached my intended exploration site, I noticed a green abalone. Although most abalone were decimated decades ago by the one-two punch of sport and commercial harvesting, and a disease known as withering syndrome, it is not unusual for me to see 1-3 abalone at this site if I look hard enough.

I continued into the area and discovered a 5-6' long crevice with 7 abalone in it. Now THAT was a find. Abalone are broadcast spawners that need to be no more than 18" apart for successful reproduction. I continued on and counted 28 green abalone before I stopped counting! This is the largest cluster I've seen in about 25 years. I'm estimating there were at least 100 abalone in this one small area.

I reported the find to the California Dept. of Fish & Game. Hopefully this refugium will provide a breeding cluster to help restock abalone populations over the next few decades.

I also saw additional abs at the other two sites we dove today. One adult looked like the flat abalone. One of the young ones also looked different... possibly a baby pink or even a white.

Also filmed my second and third brachiopods. They were on the bottom at about 175 ft. Cool.

Healthy kelp is beginning to return at some of the sites on the windward side of the island and the West End. Great to see real kelp "forests" reappearing after the summer's blast furnace.

After a week out of the water, I went down to Scuba Luv this morning expecting a simple two-tank dive since there were only five divers on board besides myself. However, not long after I entered the door, I discovered this would be a special dive day.

After transitioning from Hi-8 to digital-8 to mini-DV, I'm now looking at one more step "up..." to HDV! Astoundingly I discovered from my contacts at Light & Motion that the video housing I've used for all three prior formats will also house the new Sony HC-3 HD camcorder. Now that's what I call a GREAT product... no dedicated housings for me!

Now to acquire my new Sony HC-3, I'm offering (for a limited time) ALL SIX of my educational underwater DVD's for $100 US plus $10 shipping (Priority Mail in the US only) and California state sales tax  ($8.75) if sent within the state. That's a $45 savings off the normal retail price.

For further details, see the following web page on my site:

http://www.starthrower.org/products/dvd/DVD_special.htm

As for time,. I haven't had much lately so my blogs are few and far between... still diving "too" frequently, editing the footage, and creating new episodes for my cable TV show to have much time to blog. That bwill change as "winter" (in SoCal?) approaches.

Had an interesting day yesterday. It was a three tank dive on my fave, Scuba Luv's King Neptune. I've been doing a lot of deep (> 130 ft) diving to film the critters there in anticipation of a new episode of my TV show on "Deep" Ecology.

First two dives were to 180 feet for a total dive time each of 50 min. I issentially follow a transect line straight down from the anchor line to max depth, move about 15 ft up current (to get out of the resuspended silt cloud) and swim an up transect to the shallows.

Both dives were uneventful with no problems. Plenty to film given my limited bottom times (I only stay below 100 ft for 10-15 min), and quite different life at the two dive sites.

I planned to only go to 140 ft on my third dive and as I approached that max depth, I looked up to see a torpedo (Pacific electric) ray about 7 ft above me! I started filming it and it stayed with me for quite a long time. I kept an eye on my deco obligation as I filmed and as I neared 30 min, I started heading back to the shallows making several deep stops along the way.

I've gotten pretty good at judging my air consumption and managing my gas (straight air). I figured I would complete the full 31 min deco obligation using my primary tank. I always keep the pony mounted, but have never had to use it for deco.

I completed the obligatory deco as my SPG hit 600 psi. I practiced gas management for years when I was doing non-deco dives so I'd be ready for these type dives. Since I'd been on two very deep dives, I decided to do an extra 10 min of deco using my pony which gave me a good safety margin (all other obligatory deco stops were similar over-extended for safety).

The take home message? The years I spent practicing gas management during my non-deco dives really has paid off now that I do frequent deco dives. I used to set goals for my diving... for example, one dive to 100 ft for 45 min and a second one with the "same" profile from the second half of my HP120 tank. I'd have to adjust my depths through the two dives to make sure I had enough gas to complete my goal and surface with ~500 psi. It has given me a good knowledge base on my air consumption rates at different depths... pretty handy skill now!

On 14 Sept 06  Sean B. and I tossed our dive gear and drysuits into his boat and headed out to sea.... destination: the P38  (http://www.cawreckdivers.org/Wrecks/P38.htm ). The coordinates of this wreck, which crashed in 1943, are pretty elusive but we got em

We made it to the wreck in good time and made sure to anchor slightly away from the dive site so as not to damage anything.. After gearing up and heaving the steel 108's (with my 19 cuft pony bottle and his 30 cu ft pony respectively) onto out backs, we splashed into the ocean... unsure of what was below us.. Before moving the boat away from the site, we had dropped a weighted line attached to a float so we'd know where to descend... We gave each other the "ok, lets go" sign and started down the line together, with Sean beneath me.. Vis was nice on the way down, but I wasn't expecting it to be the 40ft that it was at the bottom!  We both saw the silhouette of the plane long before we hit the bottom~ we had descended & landed 10 ft from the P38's wing- perfect! I was worried about getting narced since the P38 is a little deeper than my usual dives (134fsw) so I asked Sean to keep a close eye on me, but by the time I hit the bottom I was off and swimming, camera in hand and no obvious narcosis  :-D    The plane is remarkably intact for sitting on the bottom of the ocean since 1943...  It is in several pieces, all of which are clearly identifiable... The gun still has the ammo cases (still with ammo in them) laying beneath it! There were fish everywhere, and a wolf eel ! I've only seen one other wolf eel in all of my dives, so I was pretty excited !!  Sean and I managed to stick to our dive plan, even though neither of us wanted to end that dive... so we begrudgingly looked at our computers, then each other, then gave the thumbs up when it was time...  Nice easy ascent since we both had quite a bit of air left..  so we did our .. um... extended safety stop.... and then finally headed to the surface, with a total dive time of 41 min. I don't think I've ever been that amazed on any other dive I've done before..  It went perfectly..   :o)     But we didn't stop there... we moved over to the outskirts of La Jolla Cove for a 2nd (and much shallower) dive..  I'd given up on ever seeing these "giant sea bass" that everyone had been talking about, so this was just a sightseeing dive since Sean had never dived in the cove area... Well.. halfway into the dive, I looked up...and saw 2 large figures in the kelp~ my sea bass !!!!!!  Yay!!!  I was able to snap several pics before they moved away... but within seconds after the 2 swam off, I saw about 10- 12 hanging out in a nearly cluster of kelp..  More pics  :-)

So all in all, that day could not have been any better... Excellent conditions all around, seeing the P38 & the giant bass, good dive buddy, and a warm sunny day...

Pics below:

I mentioned that I've been doing a lot of deep diving on air lately. I want to again emphasize that I do NOT recommend this to anyone else. It is not a decision I can make for anyone but me.

With that said, it has been interesting to watch the changes at these depths over the last few weeks. Our summer surface temperatures were incredibly warm this year, especially in late July and early August. Surface temps of 79 F were recorded on several days. However temps at the depths I was diving were as low as 50 F (even colder than they were during the winter).

In the past few weeks surface temps have dropped back to the low 70's. However temps at depth have risen significantly. At one site temps at 160 ft were 50-53 degrees 2-3 weeks ago. Last weekend it was a balmy 63 F!

Unfortunately this has affected the critters that I descend to film. Many of the species appear to have gone deeper in search of colder water... apparently to depths where I won't follow. Since they are not there, my profiles at these sites will return to normal rec diving limits. My only interest in the deep diving is to film the critters that are there.

Have a group of divers from another board in today thru Sunday, so it is time to get wet (or at least prepare the gear).

( don't you love those random 7am pictures that someone snaps of you when you're sitting on a cooler getting your gear set up? heh)

Finally! Something to blog about   It's been a while since my last entry, but I can't really say that anything exciting has been going on. Did some boat diving as a DM (heh, and I had to work my tail off too)~ went to "Checkout Pt", somewhere out in Pt Loma... and it was an awesome dive site. Unfortunately for about 13 of the 18 people on board the boat, the trip wasn't so pleasant... they were puking their guts out from the rough seas..  Oh, as for me~ well, I felt great!  I looooove the Scop. patch :-)   Seasickness is a thing of the past, so I'm looking forward to lots more boat diving...

Anyways, been diving quite a bit thes days... the shores, the cove, even Lake Mead (84F temps, even at depth-- woohoooo!!).  But again, it's time for some boat dives...  ;-)

Got a pink set of UK lights thanks to my dive shop, lol...  yes, pink. C4, sl4, and the size below sl4, which I can't remember offhand...   Gee.. gotta love a dive shop who finds and orders pink gear for you..  *grin*

As for my "boys" that are back~~  the fried egg jellies are finally back in town ! I've been waiting ALL summer for these guys to get here~  I love watching them... We must've seen at least 50 of them today at the shores... I'm assuming they're juveniles because they seem smaller than last year.... (but that's just a guess). Anyway, I'm still having some camera issues even though I got a strobe..  Just can't figure out how to get the green out of pics when I'm underwater...  Grrrrrr.....      The pic that I posted was PS'd, but by getting the green out, I also lost a lot of background color..  (ok and it's not the most focused, but it's the first one I was playing with on PS). Shoot, I'll get it right one of these days

What a summer... and it ain't over yet! I've been doing so much diving, video editing and creation of my products that I haven't had much time to blog. Then my old log-on wouldn't work, but fortunately Gabriel fixed that so I'm back on MDL, although I won't be blogging as frequently as before until the dive boat settles back to 2-3 trips a week.

Diving 4-6 times a week, then editing the footage acquired and creating new episodes of my cable TV show has certainly kept me out of "trouble" this summer. I've added some new dimensions to my diving as well.

First, we all know that there are two types of divers: those who pee in their wetsuits, and those who lie about it. Well, now there is a third type: me! I just completed my 61st consecutive dive without peeing. In the last 86 dives I've only pee'd once. These are world class records for me.

Second, I've continued a practice I began about a year ago... deep diving on air (the gas the Creator gave us and the only one I trust.. until I learn tri-mix). I regularly dive in the 160-180 ft range with my deepest dive being to 200 ft (my absolute basement depth on air). NOTE: I DO NOT ADVOCATE THIS OR RECOMMEND IT TO ANYONE ELSE. The only reason I've been doing it is to film the often unique creatures one sees at such depths in our waters. I now know why there are so few nudies in Catalina waters... they are mostly below recreational depths.

I continue to dive off the King Neptune as often as they go out. My last dive in our great dive park was in early June when a lovely mermaid came out to visit... and finally dive as my buddy!

I have also decided to finally upgrade to an HD camcorder. I discovered that my housing (which has accomodated Sony Hi-8, digital-8 and now mini-DV camcorders) can be used to house the Sony HC-3! No need for a new housing.

To achieve this purchase, I am now offering a special sale of all six (6) of my current DVD's for $100 plus $10 shipping and California state sales tax (8.75%) if applicable. That's a savings of $45 on the package. Check out the following web page for more information: Dr. Bill's DVD Special.

manatees like warm water.  that's why, in winter, they will leave the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic and go into the balmy waters of spring-fed lakes and rivers in Florida, where water temperatures hover around 70 degrees all winter.

well... a manatee has been spotted swimming in the Hudson River (yes, that Hudson River, as in, off Manhattan).

said a long-time resident:  "I'm 70 years old, and I've been on the river my entire life.  I've seen dolphins and everything else, but never a manatee."

See Full Story.

 so what does this mean?  without a doubt, a manatee would not be that far north if the water wasn't hot enough to keep it comfortable.

 this is further proof, if any was needed, that ocean temperatures are much higher than usual.  recently, it was confirmed that the water temperatures in the Caribbean were reaching their normal highs two months ahead of schedule, meaning the temperature would continue to climb unabbated for weeks to come.