I tried going out to Strongtide Island today (Dec. 4, 2009), but when I took my boat out into Baynes Channel, there were steep 3-6' breaking waves. I won't go into the details (I found that Zodiacs still float when they're completely full of water), but I wont be buying the weather forecasters any Christmas presents this year. I made it back to Cattle Point and settled for a shore dive. The Ten Mile Point area was too rough to easily get in the water so I drove back along the coastline to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, which was still nice and calm. Enterprise Channel is always colourful so I stopped here for my dive. Visibility around the outer edge of the bay was less than 6' because of a huge cloud of shrimp. It seemed to go on forever and I didn't think I'd be able to find the sewer pipe reef. In places, I couldn't even see the sandy bottom right below me even though I could reach down and feel it with my hand. Suddenly I was out of the swarm and right in front of the reef of boulders. Visibility was still only 10-15', but that was good enough to see the crowds of rockfish and colourful invertebrates coating the rocks. The current was also unexpectedly strong so I didn't go more than half-way out along the reef.
rockfish
copper rockfish
rockfish, etc
copper rockfish
black rockfish
black rockfish
copper rockfish and plumose anemone
copper rockfish
top of reef
black rockfish
top of reef
black rockfish at top of reef
copper rockfish and yellow sponge
rockfish
kelp greenling and rockfish
kelp greenling
rockfish at top of reef
pile of boulders on top of reef
copper rockfish at base of reef
copper rockfish and kelp greenling
copper rockfish
kelp greenling with octopus in background
When I took this picture of a kelp greenling, I didn't notice the octopus in the background:
Here's a cropped close-up of the octopus:
copper rockfish
black rockfish
black and yellowtail rockfish
kelp greenling and dead kelp on sand
copper rockfish and crabs hiding under boulder
copper rockfish
sea lemon nudibranch
hooded nudibranchs on kelp
hooded nudibranchs on kelp
hooded nudibranchs on kelp
hooded nudibranchs on kelp
sunflower star in bay
sunflower star in bay