Dive #5 — New Territory
Jan 5th 2019
Today I dived with Kim on a completely new location for both of us — Repa Bay, which is around the corner to the right and out of sight from the eastern end of Palm Beach.
I was astonished by the many quick changes in seascape there were over the short distance out — shallow, sandy, sun-dappled bottom in Palm Beach, giving way to muddy bottom a little further out, then luscious kelp forest out around the headland between Palm Beach and Repa Bay, then a huge area of kina barren in the making, then more kelp, then more kina barren in the making… much more kina barren!
It was sad to see so much devastation so close to such obviously healthy and thriving kelp… but I suppose the silver lining is that there will be no trouble finding a site for the project out here. And if we can prove the concept in this area it might lead to a more widespread protection project there — as there is still plenty of kelp to protect, and lots of half-dead kelp that if we are lucky we could help regenerate… who knows? Plenty to talk to Tim about from today.
No photos or video today, as the GoPro I bought didn’t come with an SD card, so it doesn’t work yet… I’ll be sorting that out ‘any time now’.
