Bookshelf: The Devil’s Teeth

The Devil’s Teeth – Susan Casey

Devil's Teeth
Devil's Teeth

It’s rare for me to take as complete and instant a dislike to the author of a book as I did in this case (Elizabeth Gilbert of Eat, Pray, Love fame is the only other example I can summon to mind). Susan Casey is a magazine journalist who counts employment at O Magazine among her career highlights – but this isn’t the reason I took a dislike to her… Keep reading.

I suppose I am looking for a book about sharks that doesn’t exist. Briefly, here and there, this was that book. Casey describes the Farallon Islands, remote and hostile rocky outcrops some 50 kilometres from San Fransisco. Like our Seal Island in False Bay, the Farallones are home to many marine mammals and a large number of great white sharks (some of epic proportions).

Casey describes the birth of her obsession with the islands (she watched a TV show) and the sharks that call them home, as well as their history as a source of seabird eggs (they are an important nesting site). She recounts various visits she took to the islands, culminating in a long stay in 2003.

Casey’s ruminations about how dirty her hair was, what she packed for the trip to the islands, how clueless she is about boats, and how obsessed she – personally – is with white sharks are uninteresting, but her descriptions of the sharks themselves, the research being conducted with them, and the individuals – incredible to a man – conducting that research, are at times rewarding. A keen objectifier of men (like Elizabeth Gilbert, actually), Casey spends a lot of time describing the rugged good looks and well-defined musculature of the various researchers and scientists she encounters – really classy, and respectful of them as scientists and individuals rather than as eye candy. HA! I did wonder more than once if a continuation of this line of thought could explain how she managed to secure a stay on the islands despite them being officially closed to visitors…

Fascinating nuggets are, however, gleaned here and there. The predations at the Farallones generally do not involve the breaching we see at Seal Island, perhaps because the sluggish elephant seals living there do not require the same degree of exertion as frisky Cape fur seal pups do. The attacks mostly take place at high tide. The observations of Ron Elliott, a commercial diver who harvested sea urchins at the islands (the only one who dared) are fascinating – he’d see sharks on almost every dive he did, and hid from them under the rocks where necessary. Upon climing into the water, he’d duck straight under his little boat so as to avoid presenting an interesting silhouette from below.

On two occasions orcas killed a white shark at the island (in one case by holding the shark upside down until it drowned); after both predations, the other great whites vanished – just disappeared en masse. This is intriguing. Many marine mammals pass by – the islands are a popular whale watching location and up to 60 blue whales have been sighted at once. One of the researchers even became the first (and I think only) person to observe humpback whales copulating there. Apparently it takes two… Plus an assistant!

Something else I discovered here that I didn’t know is that the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, one of the foremost aquaria in the world, has had great white sharks on exhibit on several separate occasions, starting in 2004. They don’t keep the sharks indefinitely – they grow fast – but they’ve managed to keep five sharks mostly happy and healthy, before realeasing them (tagged) back into the wild. The reasons for release varied from increased size, increased aggression, to refusal to feed.

Ultimately, this book is an account of a tragedy caused by its author, who seems unaware of the extent of the damage she wrought, and hence unrepentant. She forced herself – there’s no other word – into a delicate web comprising the predators, prey, and the scientists who observed their interactions, and then tore down part of the web by her very presence. Because of her stay on the islands, Peter Pyle, the researcher in charge of the Shark Project on the Farralones, lost his job. Thanking him profusely in the acknowledgements doesn’t really cut it, especially after quoting Pyle elsewhere in her book as saying that he loved the Farallones, and being on the islands, “more than life.”

Aside from shutting down an entire shark research project singlehandedly and causing a ten year veteran of the project to lose his job, Casey also misplaces a borrowed sailboat and breaks the law repeatedly and with gusto. If I’d made such an utter fool of myself, I wouldn’t have written a book about it, but she glosses over her responsibility so thoroughly that I suppose some readers may fail to ascribe to her the blame she deserves.

Buy the book here if you’re South African, otherwise here. Actually, don’t buy it – this woman doesn’t deserve any support at all.

Dive sites: Castor Rock

Pyjama catshark over the reef
Pyjama catshark over the reef

Tony had three students who needed to finish their course, so we took them to Castor Rock. This is a large granite reef, a short distance from Long Beach in Simon’s Town where we were fetched by the boat. It’s just on the other side of the spectacular Roman Rock lighthouse.

Rocky crevices at Castor Rock
Rocky crevices at Castor Rock

Like Partridge Point, the Castor Rock area is a large maze of scattered boulders and pinnacles. Different marine life can be seen depending on the depth. This makes for an interesting dive from start to finish, because you can do your safety stop next to a shallow portion of the reef.

Sea cucumbers, urchins, anemones, sea squirts and feather stars
Sea cucumbers, urchins, anemones, sea squirts and feather stars

There are the usual sea cucumbers, urchins, feather stars and sea stars, but this site seems to be a particular haven for handsome striped pyjama sharks and catsharks. We saw six or eight pyjama sharks, some sleeping in crevices and others swimming around. A night light sea jelly greeted us as we started the dive, and bright orange sea fans are abundant.

Silvertip nudibranch
Silvertip nudibranch

The place is also nudibranch paradise – I found silvertip nudibranchs the size of hotdogs, and there were also gas flame nudibranchs in abundance.

Silvertip and gas flame nudibranchs at Castor Rock
Silvertip and gas flame nudibranchs at Castor Rock

The visibility was good, but the water in False Bay is still very green. We’re looking forward to winter diving!

Dean and Marinus at Castor Rock
Dean and Marinus at Castor Rock

Dive date: 2 April 2011

Air temperature: 24 degrees

Water temperature: 14 degrees

Maximum depth: 21.1 metres

Visibility: 10 metres

Dive duration: 30 minutes

Profusion of life at Castor Rock
Profusion of life at Castor Rock

Newsletter: Summer’s last fling

Hi divers

Recent Dives

As part of the Deep Specialty course currently on the go, we visited the SAS Fleur on Saturday morning. The Fleur lies in 42 metres of water (on the sand), and is quite far out in the middle of False Bay. Her sister ship, the SAS Somerset, is that curved grey navy vessel parked behind the Two Oceans Aquarium at the Waterfront. The Fleur is a spectacular wreck and we were fortunate to have perfect conditions both above and below the surface, with calm seas and 10-12 metres of visibility on the wreck (though it was dark).

Some photos taken on the SAS Fleur in False Bay, in 35-40 metres of water:

Overgrown wreckage of the Fleur
Overgrown wreckage of the Fleur
Sea urchin and sea cucumber on the Fleur
Sea urchin and sea cucumber on the Fleur
Rusted deck plates on the Fleur
Rusted deck plates on the Fleur

On Saturday afternoon we took a group of Open Water students on the boat to Castor Rock to finish their course. Castor Rock is a rocky reef system behind Roman Rock lighthouse, which stands near the entrance to Simon’s Town harbour. It was a short boat ride from Long Beach but very scenic.

Marinus and Dean showing off their perfect buoyancy
Marinus and Dean showing off their perfect buoyancy
Reef life at Castor Rock
Reef life at Castor Rock
Robyn (with a flooded mask!)
Robyn (with a flooded mask!)

On Sunday we visited the sevengill cowsharks at Shark Alley near Pyramid Rock. This is a physically demanding dive to do as a shore entry, involving a steep climb up and down the side of the shore and a tricky entry over the rocks. The rewards, however, are great. Even though the visibility was only about three metres, we had a super dive and were visited by lots of sharks. It was sad to see that several of the sharks have been injured by boat propellers and fishing hooks.

Sevengill cowshark emerging from the kelp
Sevengill cowshark emerging from the kelp
Cowshark passing overhead
Cowshark passing overhead
Sevengill cowshark with divers in the background
Sevengill cowshark with divers in the background

Weekend plans

The southeaster will continue to howl for one more day this week. Friday and Saturday should be less windy and we will dive at Long Beach both days doing Rescue and Divemaster training. We will be continuing the Deep Specialty course with a dive from Hout Bay on Sunday morning. Sunday late morning and afternoon will be spent in the pool, doing a Refresher and some Open Water students’ confined water skills.

There is a chance we could do a dive to the Aster, a wreck in Hout Bay Sunday afternoon, if there are enough people. Text me if you want in. It’s for Advanced divers, or you could do it as a deep Adventure dive, because it lies at about 28 metres with an average depth of over 20 metres.

Sodwana is getting close. For those coming along the water is warm, 26 degrees today, sunny and 28 degrees on the beach… For those not coming along the water is warm, 26 degrees today, sunny and 28 degrees on the beach… Hehehe!

Courses

There is a group of Open Water students starting on Monday whom I hope to finish diving during the course of next week.

I am also going to run an Advanced course special starting in the next week or two. It will consist of four boat dives and a shore dive and will focus on the skills and knowledge required to enjoy Cape diving and many of the wrecks we have here. We will focus on deep diving safety and this opens up a whole lot of dive sites in Cape Town. Mail me for more info.

Miscellaneous

Please remember your MPA permits. If you’re coming to Sodwana you will most certainly have yours checked, so make sure it’s in date. Also they’re required for all the diving we do in Cape Town, so please make sure you bring yours with you whenever we dive.

Just a reminder, if you don’t want to be on the mailing list please let me know. Also, feel free to forward this to any of your friends who might be interested in diving with us.

Regards

Tony Lindeque
076 817 1099
www.learntodivetoday.co.za
www.learntodivetoday.co.za/blog

Diving is addictive!

Dive sites: SAS Fleur

SAS Somerset (on the right) at anchor in the V&A Waterfront
SAS Somerset (on the right) at anchor in the V&A Waterfront

The current Deep Specialty we are running took us to visit the wreck of the SAS Fleur last weekend. She lies in 42 metres of water in the middle of False Bay. It was a 25 minute boat ride from our Long Beach pickup on a flat calm sea.

The bow of the SAS Somerset (the Fleur's sister ship)
The bow of the SAS Somerset (the Fleur's sister ship)

This is the sister ship to the SAS Somerset moored behind the Two Oceans Aquarium and the rounded form is clearly visible along the length of the hull. The Fleur was sunk by naval gunfire near Simon’s Town on 8 October 1965.

Descending into the darkness
Descending into the darkness

We descended on the shot line and slowed at 20 metres. We were already able to see the whole wreck below us – the conditions were exceptional but it was quite dark. We stopped briefly at 25 metres to ensure everyone was in good shape without any nitrogen narcosis, dropped a little lower to 30 metres and checked again. A final check took place at 35 metres on the deck of the wreck.

The superstructure of the ship seen from above
The superstructure of the ship seen from above

The ship is rusted extensively and most if not all the decking and side plates are rusted through, giving you an extremely clear view of everything inside the shell. We found several sleeping pyjama sharks and a catshark inside one of the hatches on the deck of the ship.

Bollard on deck
Bollard on deck

The visibilty was a good 10 to 12 metres on the wreck with a water temperature of 14 degrees. There was a strong current running parallel to the orientation of the ship on the sand. Large schools of fish hung over the wreck, facing into the current.

Mussels, urchins and strawberry anemones
Mussels, urchins and strawberry anemones

The wreck is heavily encrusted with mussels, each of which is in turn encrusted with strawberry sea anemones in beautiful shades of pink. There are many urchins, and also some large tube worms, which really give the feel of being in deep water!

Tube worm
Tube worm

We returned to the line and started a slow ascent with a stop at 20 metres, 10 metres and finally a 5 metre stop. We deployed SMBs as we started our series of safety stops, because given the exposed nature of the site and the possiblity of seeing sharks on the way up, it was very important for Grant to know exactly where to expect our heads to break the surface.

Rusted decking
Rusted decking

Cecil, Clare and I were using 15 litre Nitrox 30% cylinders, and ascended with plenty of air to spare. We were entertained by seals at our safety stops, and a large group of them frolicked near the dive boat as we waited to climb in after the dive. The dive site is quite close to Seal Island, but happy and comfortable seals indicated that we didn’t need to worry about sharks that day.

Cecil in the dark
Cecil in the dark

This is a spectacular dive, and we were very fortunate to do it in perfect conditions.

Dive date: 2 April 2011

Air temperature: 23 degrees

Water temperature: 12 degrees

Maximum depth: 36.4 metres

Visibility: 12 metres

Dive duration: 29 minutes

Scaly dogwhelks on the wreck
Scaly dogwhelks on the wreck

Sea life: Kelp

Ten metre tall kelp plants at Shark Alley near Pyramid Rock
Ten metre tall kelp plants at Shark Alley near Pyramid Rock

The South African west coast is characterised by the tall, beautiful brownish green sea plants called kelp. These plants thrive in cold (below 20 degrees celcius), nutrient-rich, highly aerated water, and the strong wave action of the Atlantic is thus a feature of their ideal habitat.

Sea bamboo at Long Beach
Sea bamboo at Long Beach

Much of the water at the Two Oceans Aquarium is filtered through the kelp forest exhibit before being transferred to other tanks in the facility. The kelp plants do a remarkable job of cleaning the water of ammonia and other waste products. The fact that there is a kelp forest exhibit in the TOA is remarkable – it’s a non-trivial undertaking to grow live kelp plants successfully in a confined environment. Read more about it here.

Lush kelp in the Atlantic
Lush kelp in the Atlantic

Three main species of kelp dominate the South African coast: sea bamboo (which is what we see mostly in Cape Town), split-fan kelp, and bladder kelp. Kelp plants are made up of a holdfast (which looks like a tangle of roots, but actually just clings to the rocks), a long stipe or stalk reaching upwards towards the surface, and the fronds, leaves or (most accurately) blades, which absorb nutrients from the water.

Sevengill cowshark disappears into the kelp at Shark Alley
Sevengill cowshark disappears into the kelp at Shark Alley

Kelp plants like rocky surfaces to anchor onto, so the dive sites that feature kelp forests are often rocky reefs and outcrops such as Fisherman’s Beach, Shark Alley, and most of the Atlantic sites. Sandy bottoms are no good for kelp – nothing to grip onto – which is why there’s not much of it at Long Beach.

Kelp growing at Long Beach
Kelp growing at Long Beach

At low tide you can often see the tips of the kelp stems sticking just out of the water. There are small air-filled floatation devices called pneumatocysts attached to each kelp plant, which keeps the blades close to the surface of the water where they can take advantage of the sunlight. Some species (like sea bamboo, which is in most of the photos I have here) have a single large pneumatocyst at the end of each stipe, and others have one at the base of each blade.

Kelp at Long Beach
Kelp at Long Beach

Kelp forests provide a habitat for countless creatures, from the fish that shelter among their blades, to the kelp limpets that are specially shaped to fit snugly against the kelp stipes, to the crabs that love to hide in the waving forests. Abalone feed on kelp, and sea urchins use drifting pieces of kelp blades as hats to shelter from the sun.

Kelp limpet at Fisherman's Beach
Kelp limpet at Fisherman's Beach

During our training at the Two Oceans Aquarium, we dissected a kelp holdfast, and the number of creatures that live in that tightly-packed root system is astonishing. We found tiny brittle stars, kelp crabs the size of your fingernail, hundreds of worms, isopods, mussels, and tiny limpets. There’s a whole ecosystem that subsists entirely within the holdfast.

Cape rock crab in the kelp at Long Beach
Cape rock crab in the kelp at Long Beach

There are also many creatures that call the higher-up portions of kelp plants their homes. Cape rock crabs often shelter in the fronds, and orange-clubbed nudibranchs feed on the bryzoans (moss animals) that form pretty lacy patterns on the kelp leaves.

Orange clubbed nudibranch feeding on bryzoans
Orange clubbed nudibranch feeding on bryzoans

Top shells (there are a couple of varieties) live and feed on the kelp fronds. They’re really hard to photograph (and they’re SO pretty) because the movement of the kelp in the water confuses my camera (and the photographer).

Tony shows me a top shell
Tony shows me a top shell

The kelp stipes themselves are a habitat for other creatures. Coraline algae encrusts them, and tiny barnacles, hydroids and sea plants form beautiful, detailed colonies that reward close examination.

Coraline algae on kelp stems at Fisherman's Beach
Coraline algae on kelp stems at Fisherman's Beach

These photos were taken at Fisherman’s Beach, which boasts particularly gorgeous kelp stems. Inside broken stipes, we’ve found isopods, sea lice and other creatures that shelter inside the hollow tubes.

The Silver Fox diving behind an encrusted kelp stem at Fisherman's Beach
The Silver Fox diving behind an encrusted kelp stem at Fisherman's Beach

Diving in a kelp forest for the first time can be scary – I was terrified I’d get wrapped in the kelp and be stuck there forever. In fact, if you move slowly, it’s very easy, and it’s REALLY hard to get anything wrapped around you to the extent that your movement is hindered. Kelp blades are smooth and just stroke over you gently. There’s no sinister thrashing or wrapping like a giant squid grasping you in its tentacles. Kelp is your friend!

In surgy conditions, kelp is useful to hang onto (this may not be good advice). The holdfasts attach to the rock unbelievably firmly, in order to withstand the buffeting that the kelp gets from the waves, so the stems can generally support 65 kilograms of diver as well!

I demonstrate how useful kelp is in surgy conditions, at A Frame
I demonstrate how useful kelp is in surgy conditions, at A Frame

Kelp is hugely useful to humans – it’s used in the production of plant fertilisers (mmm – breathe in the smell!). Alginate, a substance derived from kelp, is used to thicken custard, toothpaste, salad dressings, mayonnaise, ice cream and jelly. Kelp grows incredibly fast, so it’s an ideal crop. Sometimes you can see strips carved out of the kelp forests between Kommetjie and Misty Cliffs – that’s where one of the kelp product manufacturers has been harvesting. They move down the coast taking a strip at a time, and by the time they get back to the beginning the forest has recovered.

Kelp at Long Beach
Kelp at Long Beach

Sea life: Brittle stars

Serpent skinned brittle star at Long Beach
Serpent skinned brittle star at Long Beach

Brittle stars are echinoderms, which makes them relatives of starfish, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, feather stars and basket stars. I was never particularly enamoured of them until I started seeing striped brittle stars on some of the deeper dive sites (more on that later).

Serpent skinned brittlestars at Sunny Cove
Serpent skinned brittlestars at Sunny Cove

Brittle stars are mainly found in deep water, but in Cape Town we do find serpent-skinned brittle stars in the shallows (well, at over eight metres’ depth, usually), often clustered in large groups.

A brittle star curling his toes up (Tony was swimming over him)
A brittle star curling his toes up (Tony was swimming over him)

All of a brittle star’s organs are located in its central disc. They have five legs, much like whips, and are extremely agile and quite fast movers. Unlike starfish, which use tube feet for moving around, brittle stars acutally use their arms, moving each one independently.

You can see in the picture below (out of focus because he was moving so fast!) how dexterous the brittle star is at turning himself right-side up. He’s balancing on three or four of his legs as he gives himself a powerful flip.

The underside of a brittle star
The underside of a brittle star

Their mouth (same opening also serves as an anus) is located on the underside of the central disc, like starfish. They have five toothy jaw plates inside their mouths. They are scavengers, but will also eat small worms or crustaceans. In the deep ocean, they capture nutritious snacks in the form of passing organisms from the prevailing currents.

Some species (including those found in the Cape) actually give birth to live young – they brood their larvae in sacks called bursae, located between their arms.

Brittle stars on a coraline algae-covered rock on the Cape Matapan
Brittle stars on a coraline algae-covered rock on the Cape Matapan

Striped brittle stars are mainly found in deeper water, and we saw a lot of them at Partridge Point and on the SS Cape Matapan. They are extremely well camouflaged against the sand, should they choose to lie on it!

Brittle stars at Partridge Point
Brittle stars at Partridge Point

Like starfish, brittle stars can also grow missing limbs back, unless they lose all their limbs at once. Here’s one at Long Beach, with his growing leg tucked in coyly.

Brittle star growing a leg back
Brittle star growing a leg back

Dive sites: North Paw (Northern Pinnacle)

Tony has dived North Paw before (while I sat, sick with jealousy, in front of an Excel spreadsheet at work). This time I went with him and some students, and we were to explore an unmapped pinnacle to the north of the site, which seems to be quite extensive. It rises to within 10-12 metres of the surface, and doesn’t actually have a name yet…

Tony and Cecil on the surface
Tony and Cecil on the surface

Grant’s best suggestion (which some on the boat were keen to override) is “Bokkie’s Rump” – the idea being that the lion (Lion’s head) has its two paws (North Lion’s Paw and South Lion’s Paw) resting on a little springbok that he’s caught. The bokkie’s rump (ahem) sticks out beyond the northern paw.

DC relaxing with North Paw rocks in the background and Grant's boat approaching
DC relaxing with North Paw rocks in the background and Grant's boat approaching

Grant put the shot on top of the pinnacle, which according to Peter Southwood, is about 8 by 10 metres. We descended next to it – a lovely sheer wall – down to the sand at about 20 metres. There are rock lobsters galore, and rich invertebrate life.

Rock lobsters at North Paw
Rock lobsters at North Paw

Georgina pointed out a large cuttlefish, well camouflaged on the reef. When he moved, he changed colour to match his new background. Tony also found four tiny cuttlefish – fingernail-sized – lined up as if for a race. When he turned to call me with the camera, they scattered, invisibly, on the sand.

Cuttlefish at North Paw
Cuttlefish at North Paw
Same cuttlefish, different colour
Same cuttlefish, different colour

I found a few different nudibranchs – black, gas flame and crowned – and Tony also found one for me, much to his delight. He claims to have been having a “nudibranch drought” lately!

Gas flame nudibranch under some coral
Gas flame nudibranch under some coral
Black nudibranch at North Paw
Black nudibranch at North Paw

The site is rocky with lots of crevices for rock lobster to hide in. We saw some large ones, but, Gerard assured me, no HUGE ones. He should know! We were highly amused to see one big guy eating a sea jelly – the ocean floor was littered with a few dead (or incapacitated) ones, and apparently rock lobsters enjoy that kind of treat. I also saw a large rock lobster carefully carrying a cluster of mussels!

Hungry rock lobster eating a night light sea jelly
Hungry rock lobster eating a night light sea jelly

At the safety stop I saw no fewer than four different kinds of sea jelly – the largest being a night light sea jelly that was almost as long as Tony, with a huge purple bell. He obligingly swam behind it to give some perspective to the photo but I carried on photographing the jelly as it swam off into the distance.

Night light sea jelly
Night light sea jelly

Gerard had gotten low on air earlier, and returned to the boat… While he was waiting for a pick-up, something bumped his leg hard, and he was convinced it was a shark. Instead, it was one of the friendly seals that had visited us during our dive. His comments on the subject are unprintable – suffice it to say he got a bit of a fright!

Brittle stars on a sponge
Brittle stars on a sponge

When the rest of us surfaced we got to chill for a while, looking at the magnificent scenery, because we’d come quite far from the original pinnacle. We had drifted with the current, roughly towards the Atlantic seaboard. It must be – as I announced when the boat arrived – the most beautiful place in the world to surface. The diving’s pretty good too!

Anemone at North Paw
Anemone at North Paw

Dive date: 20 February 2011

Air temperature: 27 degrees

Water temperature: 8 degrees

Maximum depth: 23.6 metres

Visibility: 10 metres

Dive duration: 36 minutes

Rocks and sand at North Paw
Rocks and sand at North Paw

Sea life: Rock lobster

Many of Tony’s students come to him with extensive skin diving experience. Living in Cape Town, it’s almost obligatory to enjoy at least one lobster braai during the season (and often many more). Sometimes the veteran lobster-divers struggle at first with breathing through a regulator – their instinct while under water is to hold their breath (it’s illegal to take lobster when you’re on scuba). But their comfort in the water (and being used to the cold) stands them in good stead, once Tony’s tapped them on the regulator a few times to remind them to inhale!

Lobster on a wreck at Long Beach
Lobster on a wreck at Long Beach

We see West Coast rock lobster (not crayfish – those are freshwater creatures) in both False Bay and on the Atlantic side. They are gregarious, and can often be found sheltering in cracks and under overhangs, in quite large groups.

West coast rock lobster on the BOS 400 wreck
West coast rock lobster on the BOS 400 wreck

It’s a pleasure to do a deep wreck dive such as on the Maori and on the BOS 400, and see hordes of good-sized rock lobster teeming all over the wreck. Some of the shallower sites are definitely over-fished, and we only see really big specimens when we dive beyond the range of your average skin diving lobster hunter. On Gerard’s first deep wreck dive in Smitswinkel Bay, we hadn’t been on the wreck for three minutes when I turned around to see him excitedly waving a MASSIVE lobster at me, the biggest either of us had ever seen. Some finger waggling and head shaking convinced him to replace Mr Lobster in his home, but I think Gerard was heartbroken.

Small rock lobster at Long Beach
Small rock lobster at Long Beach

Rock lobster are almost impossible to farm. At the Two Oceans Aquarium on our crash course in marine biology we learned that there are 13 larval stages, during which time the creature drifts hundreds of kilometres offshore through a huge variety of water conditions that it would be impossible to replicate in a mariculture setting. The larval phases can last up to two years. Lobsters grow very, very slowly and can live to the age of 50. There’s some nice detail on the Two Oceans Aquarium website.

Rock lobsters on the Maori
Rock lobsters on the Maori

They eat crabs, abalone, starfish, snails and sea urchins – this latter fact makes them quite important in the ecosystem as a whole. I’ve mentioned before that juvenile abalone shelter among sea urchins. If there are too many lobsters, they eat too many urchins (and too many abalone) and this leads to a decline in the population of abalone. It’s a fine balance.

Rock lobster at Long Beach
Rock lobster at Long Beach

Lobsters are incredibly sensitive to the level of oxygen in the water, which sometimes leads to what look like mass walkouts onto the beach when there’s a red tide or similar event leading to (near-)anoxic conditions on our coastline. What actually happens is that they move away from the de-oxygenated water where the red tide has died, and get stranded on the beach by a retreating tide. Once when Tony was landing a dive boat at Miller’s Point, he was waiting for a chance to use the slipway next to a fishing boat that was packed to the gills with lobster. The captain said they’d found a spot where thousands of lobster were strolling together in orderly formation across the ocean floor, and he’d just scooped them up. (He would not share where this magical location was, but the lobster were probably moving to more highly oxygenated waters.) Having substantially exceeded his quota, the fisherman was somewhat twitchy about being pulled over by the authorities!

Rock lobster on the move on the Maori
Rock lobster on the move on the Maori

Poaching of rock lobster is a big problem in South Africa. They’re a very valuable commodity – you just need to go and have a seafood platter at a Camps Bay restaurant to see what damage it can do to your wallet – and easily accessible to anyone who can hold their breath and is prepared to do a bit of rock scrambling. The government Department of Environmental Affairs tries to manage stocks by implementing a closed season, catch and size limits.

  • Currently, you may only take lobster that measure greater than 8 centimetres from the front of their head to the end of their carapace (NOT to the tip of their tails, as I used to think – fortunately I’m not a lobster fisherman!);
  • You must have a MPA permit to take lobster (same form at the post office as the scuba diving one);
  • The season runs from November to April (the dates vary by year);
  • You may only take lobster during the day – between sunrise and sunset;
  • You’re not allowed to sell them;
  • You are not allowed to take females in berry (with eggs), or lobsters with soft shells that have just moulted;
  • There are also regulations about the number of rock lobster you may transport at once, or have in your possession.

If you’re in doubt as to the utility of this array of regulations, check out the graph in the middle of this page on the Department of Environmental Affairs website. Depressing.

Dive sites: Partridge Point

The first boat dive I ever did, and my first dive after my Open Water course, was to Partridge Point, where we cruised around Seal Rock and enjoyed the antics of the local inhabitants. It was on that dive that I met Fritz (“Borrels”) and Justin the Silver Fox, who was Divemastering. Here’s a picture Fritz took of me that time, with a chubby seal above my head. Look ma, no gloves! And did I mention how irritating snorkels can be?

My fifth dive, at Seal Rock near Partridge Point
My fifth dive, at Seal Rock near Partridge Point

I’ve dived the site twice since, the most recent time being on 6 February. We’ve had a couple of months of totally awful visibility in False Bay, but a little bit of north westerly wind and some big swells cleaned out the bay in record time and we were able to have a beautiful weekend’s diving. This time, when Tony told Cecil we’d be going to Partridge Point and that we’d probably see seals, Cecil said matter of factly, “Sharks eat seals.” Fortunately the great whites prefer to hang about near Seal Island in the middle of False Bay!

Profusion of life at Partridge Point
Profusion of life at Partridge Point

The Partridge Point reef system is extensive, and new areas are constantly being mapped. The most recent addition to the site (it was always there, but has only recently been discovered!) is Peter’s Pinnacles, named after Peter Southwood of wikitravel fame.

Sand strip at Partridge Point
Sand strip at Partridge Point

Grant dropped us on a pinnacle that rises to within 12 metres of the surface, and we descended on the shot line. The site is made up of an extensive scattering of granite boulders and rocky outcrops, separated with sandy strips that look very much like staircases or runways. Dropping down close to the sand at one point to photograph a four-legged starfish, I was delighted to discover that the area I was hovering above was covered with tiny striped brittle stars.

Stripy brittle stars on the sand at Partridge Point
Stripy brittle stars on the sand at Partridge Point

The site is incredibly diverse and teeming with brilliantly coloured life, including large numbers of sea cucumbers (surprise!) and sea urchins. Giant gorgonian sea fans inhabited by sponge crabs (resembling nothing so much as coconut-dipped vetkoek) wave gently in the surge, in orange, red and every shade in between.

Sponge crab on a gorgonian sea fan
Sponge crab on a gorgonian sea fan
Sponge crab seen from underneath
Sponge crab seen from underneath

And it is nudibranch paradise. I took a personal census of every single nudibranch on the part of the site we traversed – mainly gas flames and black nudibranchs – and felt it my duty to photograph every single specimen. I never, ever get tired of these creatures. They are so extravagantly beautiful!

Gas flame nudibranch at Partridge Point
Gas flame nudibranch at Partridge Point
Black nudibranch at Partridge Point
Black nudibranch at Partridge Point

There are also sea anemones in bright, bright red and orange, gregarious white ones with curly tentacles, and elegant feather stars in abundance.

Elegant feather stars
Elegant feather stars

We saw a number of very frisky dark and puffadder shysharks, zipping around with a sense of purpose we never see in their relatives at Long Beach. We usually see them on the sand at Long Beach, and I was surprised, seeing one lying on a rock, at how well camouflaged he was.

Seal at Partridge Point
Seal at Partridge Point

We weren’t particulary close to Seal Rock, but we were visited by three or four friendly seals who probably heard us from a mile away and came to investigate. They swam around us, checked us out thoroughly – I must say looking a seal in the eye at 20 metres as he circles me like a puppy is enough to put me in a good mood for a week – and returned once or twice for a further look. They are so graceful in the water, and have such large, soulful eyes and cute little ears sticking out at 90 degrees from their heads, that I just want to cuddle them. But I’ve seen their teeth, and know that this is a bad idea!

Top of a pinnacle at Partridge Point
Top of a pinnacle at Partridge Point

Towards the top of some of the pinnacles is the red bait zone, with sea squirts of prodigious size surrounded by feeding hottentot. While we were doing our slow ascent we looked up into the sunlit, shallow water above the rock closest to us, to see a cloud of fish swimming slowly around the top of the pinnacle.

Dive date: 6 February 2011

Air temperature: 26 degrees

Water temperature: 8 degrees

Maximum depth: 21.9 metres

Visibility: 10 metres

Dive duration: 38 minutes

The Partridge Point site is inside the Castle Rocks restricted zone in the Table Mountain National Park Marine Protected Area (MPA), and for many years no fishing has been allowed there. I like to think that the sheer profusion of life we observed is a result of this – MPAs can work, if they’re administered properly and the permit money we pay as scuba divers is put to good use enforcing conservation policies, instead of buying BMWs for government stooges.

Dive on the MV Romelia (2010.12.19)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-XWVdUaD8I&w=540]

We dived on the Romelia late last year, in very surgy conditions. It wasn’t ideal for videography – you can see the movement of the water, and also that there was a large amount of plankton and also many juvenile fish or larvae from other creatures in the water. Some of the red seaweed looks like it’s blowing in a strong wind!

The wreck is very broken up and covered with urchins and the most enormous and colourful sea anemones.  There are lots of boulders with narrow gaps between, fun to swim through. A couple of sea jellies pass by and once we ascended into the red bait zone you can see some curious hottentots passing by. There’s also a very large, four-legged sea star that caught my attention.

Look out for Clare and Cecil in the water, and Grant (in a bright orange jacket), Mauro (in the sunhat), Richard (in his rash vest, looking a bit like Jacques Cousteau) and Belinda (in the background) on the boat once we surface, right on the buoy line.