12/3/2009 - Sandy Dunkin'

Merry and I made another venture out in the sand at Marineland this afternoon. We've had luck the last couple of dives out there finding unusual critters and today was no exception. The first half of the dive was pretty boring. Sand anemones, seapens, sea atars and not much else.

Windmill worms were everywhere, some with an interesting clear appendage, or maybe it was another worm.

While checking out clumps of broken kelp I found my first Acanthodoris brunnea. Better than that, I found my first two!


We had two schools of smelt surround us while we checked out a Mantis shrimp. He didn't seem interested in coming out of his den so we headed back toward the beach. We soon came across a Pacific electric ray buried in the sand. He didn't seem to mind us, but we didn't get close enough to disturd his hiding place.

We exited exactly at a minus tide, which makes it much easier to walk out, as we were standing in mud rather than the usual hill of rocks in the surf zone. Visibility wasn't bad for low tide at twelve feet, with 59F water.