This was the last dive we did (Sept. 22, 2024) on a weekend of diving on the Sun Fun dive boat. It's a small rocky mound in Hardy Bay. This particular reef is a Rockfish Conservation Area (probably the smallest one there is), so killing the fish is illegal. The reason dive boats come here is the abundance of rockfish and lingcod. The boat captain dropped a shotline for divers to follow down instead of anchoring, which would be more damaging. We descended to a rocky bottom full of large boulders. The top of the reef was 35' deep and my maximum depth on the sand next to the reef was 80'. The rocks themselves were pretty bare compared to the more famous Browning Pass dives. There were a few fish-eating and white-spotted rose anemones and lots of zoanthids. The rock surfaces seemed to be mostly covered with little white barnacles. The invertebrates aren't the attraction here anyway. As soon as we reached the reef I could see the swarms of rockfish and probably dozens of lingcod. The rockfish were mostly black, copper, China and quillback, but I also saw a couple of tiger rockfish. The lingcod were starting the mating season. The males were doing their "shimmying" dance to try and attract the larger females. Visibility was around 50' and there were lots of pale chunks of plankton in the water, including some long strings that almost looked like fishing line (actually, maybe it was old fishing line).
This place lived up to its reputation as a fishy dive. To be honest though, If I'm going to brave the logistical, time and financial effort of diving up in the Port Hardy area, I want to be blown away by the overload of colour in the Browning Pass area. This reef is also pretty small so it's easy to see it all during an hour long dive. If I was up here again and had the choice, I'd pass on diving here again.
