Who Dares Swims - 30/10/2105

"Who dares wins" is the motto of the SAS, perhaps the most famous British Special Forces unit. However, there is a another less well known unit called the Special Boat Services. I say all this because myself and Canada Dry, my guest buddy for the evening, watched as what I assume was the SBS performed some landing manoeuvres on the shore. Realising there were divers they beat a hasty retreat. The A-Frames is, after all, sovereign SCUBA territory.

Canada Dry, visiting from Canada, had bravely hired a drysuit and an unfamiliar weight system to join me for the evening, while Jester was coming later for a second dive. Before we went in I mentioned to Canada Dry that I was impressed by his bravery taking on so many awkward factors for a first dive in Scotland.

We headed down to the Frames enjoying the display of peacock worms, scorpionfish and scallops. However, as we returned to the surface it became clear that Canada Dry was having buoyancy issues caused the unfamiliar drysuit. I held him down long enough to complete most of a safety stop before he let go (his fancy mask having given the signal it was safe to do so).

We got back safely but the experience was enough to convince Canada Dry not to go back in. After that I was equally impressed by his lack of machismo, a factor that when left unchecked puts divers in situations that they really don't want to be in.

Jester had joined us for the second dive. So we buddied up and went back in. The second dive proved even more fruitful with a beautiful little nudibranch and some nice anemones. His ability to spot nudis is actually quite impressive.

The drive back saw us chat about diving misadventures and experiences - one of the cool things about meeting new diving chums.

Bloody Henry

Scorpionfish

Anemone

Nudibranch

Pipefish

Pipefish

The Long Way Round - 25/10/2015

With my ear still ringing from Thursday night's dive, Jester and I decided on a wee dip in Loch Fyne. We opted for the over dived St Catherines 2 due to the shelter the trees would provide from the rain (this was ultimately moot as the rain eased up).

It was to be a challenging dive as I was without any dive lights which really limited depth and photographic opportunities. However, our bimble was to ultimately last 71 minutes - my longest dive of the year.

Our pre dive chat had been about the absence of nudibranchs in the water of late. A trend which seemed like it was continuing until the eagle-eyed Jester caught sight of one just a few millimetres in length. It's pictured below. Photographed using super macro and even then it's still to small to focus on.

Also making a rare appearance of late were a cushion star and the delicate macropodia rostrata.

The water was definitely starting to chill for the winter. 9c, brr.

Eubranchus Farrani

Cushion Star

Cushion Star

Macropodia Rostrata

The Drysuit Cometh - 22/10/2015

Having ordered a new O'Three drysuit Saturday it had arrived by Thursday enabling a trip with the Zookeeper out to Loch Long and the A-Frames. The Aquatron school was out teaching the PADI Night Speciality (probably the most fun PADI Speciality if you are choosing to go down the PADI route).  

The nature of the night speciality training meant that with the minimum of alteration to our dive plan we could entirely avoid the training area. We did, admirably.  Circling round the far side of the big frame we encountered some nice feather stars and a couple of what I think are horseman anemones, I'm not really an expert.

From there it was down deeper and round for some feeding of Colin The-Conger. I'm not saying disaster struck, but from this point the dive was a bit downhill. Having forgotten to fully charge my Mares Eos10r I had a bit of a blackout. Switching torches meant that I spent the rest of the dive using an old torch with the same number of lumens as a roasted parsnip. I wasn't concerned. 

As I was leading us back, the Zookeeper offered me her primary, but it really wasn't worth it. I reckon I could get back to safety with no light at that sight. A challenge which I might attempt at some point.

During the safety stop I showed the Zookeeper some of my photos. They were pretty poor. In fact, some might say rotten. Anyway, that was enough to have us chuckling as we surfaced. Much to the bemusement of the Aquatron crew who wondered if we'd be eating the magic anenomes  around the site. Good times. Oh, and the drysuit? Very nice, very nice.

Horseman Anemone

Horseman Anemone

Feather star

Red Gurnard

Colin

The End of an Era? - 14/10/2015

The Zookeeper and I had decided to dive the wall at the Council Yard, Loch Fyne. We kitted up enjoying the excellent conditions and headed in.

The dive was going well, if a little light on life. Visibility was good. We were enjoying ourselves. Then towards the end of the dive my exhaust valve on my drysuit stopped exhausting. Worse was to come when I finally got to the shore and I discovered the cuff on my drysuit had also ripped. A bad day for my drysuit. 

My Northern Diver Divemaster drysuit cost me about £400 4 years ago and I've done over 200 dives in it. That's £2 a dive. A fair return. I've wanted something different for a while, but this was the excuse I needed.

We headed back to Aquatron, the local dive shop, and I tried on an O'Three  Ri 2-100 it didn't fit so I've ordered in a larger size. We'll see how that goes. Fingers crossed.

Face sucker

Urchin

Cuttlefish Boulevard of Broken Dreams - 08/10/2015

Tonight's post work adventure with the Zookeeper was a trip to Seal Reef, St Catherines. Upon arrival we met some of the guys from Clydebank Sub Aqua Club, they provided a nice backdrop for the dive. One of whom was leaving his newborn of a couple of days and wife in preference for an evening with a slightly motley crew of divers.

We went in and headed down. We were immediately joined by loads of small shrimp that fluttered around our torches like moths. As we made our way along to the reef it became clear that tonight was going to be mostly about Cuttlefish. I reached six before I stopped counting how many I'd seen.

Onto the reef we found two scorpion fish. Both of whom seemed delighted to be eating a torch-fuelled shrimp smorgasbord. We came up from the dive, glad theat we'd been of service to the scorpionfish.

At the surface the milky way was out and the water was filled with bioluminescence.

Testing Stuff - 11/10/2015

With a new Oceanic computer of late I was keen to test the performance of it compared to my other computer. Part of this was take it relatively deep to see how the no deco times compared with my backup. Diving with Jester, we chose St Catherines and headed to the bottom of the reef.

As we went down I kept an eye on both computers. It became clear there was a considerable difference in the conserative behaviour of one versus the other. However, it took me to a lesser dived part of the reef where we found :

• Purple sunstar
• Common sunstar
• Celtic feather star
• Firework anemone 

Really quite spectacular.

We ate some falafel and waited for the sun to go down, for a second dive at night. To be honest aside from a few Pollock and a large lobster we never saw the best of the night life.

Still it was good learning experience.

Purple/Northern Sunstar

Sunstar

Firework Anemone

Langoustine

Bloody Henry

Lobster

Scorpion fish

To the Bottom of the Reef - 04/10/2015

When Jester and I decided to go for a splash in Loch Long we decided to go to Twin Piers. I'd not dived it in a few months, but it's a site I quite like. In addition, I'm aware the visibility can be poor. After week of almost no rain, it was always going to be decent and I reckon 4-5m was as good as it was going to get. So we decided to go to the bottom of the sloping reef to see just how far it goes.

I was afflicted by the same camera problems that I experienced on my last dive and also a leaking drysuit. So at best it was frustrating.

We went in rounded the piers, down by the remains of the old truck, deeper by the remains of the barge and onto the reef at around 20m. We continued down by the cable and bottomed out at about 25m From there it was just silty seabed. 

I've probably been here before, but never during the day so it was pleasant to be able to turn off the torch and swim briefly in the sunlit gloom.

In amongst all the usual life we saw:

• a few conger eels
• a few plaice
• loads of dragonets

50 minutes of nice diving! Well played Jester, well played!

Below are some of the dudes we met on the journey.

Firework Anemone

Bloody Henry!

The 1st of Octopus - 01/10/2015

September ended with glorious weather, blood moons and lunar eclipses. October began no less spectacularly, from a scuba perspective. The Zookeeper and I headed to La Ruelle de Conger for a cheeky night dive. The skies were clear and the autumnal air was crisp. Ideal for diving in my opinion.

I was test driving my new Oceanic OCI in Scottish water for the first time and also a new Mares Eos 12RZ torch.

As we stood at the waters' edge looking out onto the moonlit darkness buddy checking, the Zookeeper asked the universe for a gift. Quite specifically, an octopus just hanging about in the open. We've seen one before here, twice, but its pretty uncommon and even more so to see them out in the open. However, one can ask!

We headed down, the Zookeeper didn't have her camera and I'd poorly fitted my Sealife  into the case so only three buttons were working. It wasn't going to be a photographic masterclass.

As we hit the reef at around 20m we spotted some of the usual life, dragonettes, the ubiquitous congers. Then as we swam over some rocks the Zookeepers torch went mental. I looked up and saw it. There, bold as brass, was a curled octopus sitting on top of a rock just chilling in the autumnal darkness,

As I mentioned previously my camera wasn't fully functioning. The problems I had were:

1. I couldn't switch off the flash
2. I couldn't change the focus settings
3. I could only switch from basic photography to video.

With this in mind I switched to video mode and began filming our little pal.

After the encounter we Hi-5'd before bobbing back slowly to the surface. We surfaced to discover the Milky Way glowing in the night sky and extraordinarily dense bioluminescence. We played in it for a few moments before declaring it the dive of the year thus far.

As for the kit, it all worked admirably. I love the variable beam of the Mares torch.