Dive Number: 233 23/12/11 11.29, Blairgowrie Pier

Wind: ???

Tide: ???

Conditions: ???

Visibilty: ??

Water Temp: 19.2c

Bottom Time: 151minutes

Max Depth: 6.4m

Air usage: 170bar/2500psi

SAC: ???? litres/min

Details: Took the boat over to blair with Chris and Kerry in search for the ellusive Tassled Angler. FAIL. Lots of nudis and other goodies around though.

Camera Details: Canon 60mm , SS200 Strobe

Photos:

Dive Number: 125 08/01/11 16.24  Blairgowrie Pier, Mornington Peninsula.

Wind:   15knot  SE’s.

Tide: 1hrs after 1.33 high tide at the heads.

Conditions:    Weather had swung aorund to the south, which suited heaidng over to the bay side of the peninsula. However a bit of a storm was brewing. A bit of side current that i’ve come to expect at Blair and vis was ok..nothing special.

Visibilty: 8m

Water Temp: 20c

Bottom Time: 134 minutes

Max Depth: 6.3m

Air usage: 200bar/3000psi

SAC: ???? litres/min

Details:      I was hoping blairgowrie would be crawling with nudi’s but i was a bit dissappointed. I saw a fair few species, but nothing special apart from a fairly generic orange slug, that i’m not sure if i’ve seen before or not. Lots of vercos, tambja sp’s, mating hedgpethis and flabellinas. Also a nicely positioned seahorse that didn’t fit into my macro lens.  A ring-backed pipehorse with a strange red sack near its mouth, pygmy squid, a blue-ringed octopus and the occassional stinkfish.  

Camera Details: Canon  100mm , dual SS200 strobes

Dive Report:

Dive Number: 95 24/10/2010 14.52 Blairgowrie Pier

Wind: 10knot South-easterlies.

Tide:   1.5hrs after 1.31 high tide at the Heads

Conditions:  Perfect weather with light easterlies meaning the west side of the peninsula were sheltered.  The current was pretty good in the first 20minutes, but became unbearable towards the end of the dive.

Visibilty: 6m

Water Temp: 15c

Bottom Time: 100 minutes

Max Depth: 3.6m

Air usage: 140bar/2000psi

SAC: ???? litres/min

Details:  Blairgowrie was the obvious choice for the second dive of the day. Nudi numbers where building up last time i was there, so i thought a dedicated macro/nudi dive was on the cards. I’d never tried macro with twin strobe on nudi’s, so it was going to be a learning experience.

Camera Details: Canon 100mm , dual SS200 strobes

Dive Report:

Dive Number: 87 01/10/2010 11.47 Rye Pier

Wind: ???

Tide:   1hr after 0.60 low tide at the heads

Conditions:  Nice day but a bit of current moving under the pier.

Bottom Type:  Sand bottom

Visibilty: 5-6m

Water Temp: 12c

Bottom Time: 125 minutes

Max Depth: 6.2m

Air usage: 200bar/2700psi

SAC: ???? litres/min

Details:  I stayed overnight at Sorrento and planned on diving a couple of sites around the mornington peninsula, but i ended up only getting one dive in at Blairgowrie. Tassled Anglefish were on the hitlist, but i only got onto one individual. Lots of Flabellina nudi’s around and a couple of others species too.

Camera Details: Sigma 17-70mm , single SS200 strobe.

Dive Report:

Dive Number: 70 25/07/2010 15.30 Blairgowrie Pier

Wind: 10knot SE.

Tide: 1.25hr before 0.91 low tide at the Heads

Conditions: Topside weather was near perfect for diving, light winds and not a cloud in the sky. BOM predicted westerlies, but it seemed like it swung around to SE’s which suits Blairgowrie down to a tea.

Bottom Type: Sand base with pier pylons and steel wall.

Visibilty: 6-7m

Water Temp: 12c

Bottom Time: 99 minutes

Max Depth: 6.2m

Air usage: 190bar/2750psi

SAC: ???? litres/min

Details: On a near perfect day i headed over on the Ferry to meet James Peake (JimSwims) for a dive at Blairgowrie to hopefully find some of the mythical Tassled Anglerfish. We met up with Lincoln(Link) as well and headed out to the end of the pier to start our dive. There was some serious pressure put on us by a 5 year old girl, who would not leave with her parents until she saw us get in the water. I obliged, only to hear the dreaded buzz of my leak detector on entry. After heading back to the car to clear out the water, swapping lens and swapping ports, we were on our way again. Once in the water for the second time, there were critters everywhere, and i soon realised i hadn’t put my lens on Autofocus… god damn it! it was just one of those days…great dive though and we saw plenty of “Tangler”, i even managed to get some shots that approximate being in focus.

Camera Details: Tokina 10-17mm , single SS200 strobe

Dive Report: After abandoning my sigma 17-70lens due to the leak, i went for the fisheye, and mixed with having no autofocus, i couldn’t get any shots of all the cool macro subjects we saw..ring-backed pipefish, pygmy squid, blue-ringed and pale octopus, nudi’s, scorpionfish and lots of others. My focus was fixed, so it was just shoot, alter my distance and hope…i didn’t nail the focus of any shots, so most of these are horribley oversharpened…so excuse the noise! A noisey tassled angler shot is better than no tangler shot!

OK..lets play spot the anglerfish (Tip: its towards the middle…look for the pink lips, and dont be distracted by the seastar!)

Find it? Here’s a shot in a less cryptic pose:

Here’s a different one (we saw..um..7 all up i think)..nestled in some sponge:

I got a bit to close at one stage, and it took off further up the pylon.

A silohette shot:

Jim goes in for a closer look (er..pose):

There were other critters around to photograph..like this mosiac leatherjacket:

And a bit of Spider crab action Jim couldn’t get enough of:

But then back to the Tassled Anglers.

Jim finds a Blue-ringed Occy on the wall to photograph:

Dive Number: 54 27/06/2010 16.48 Blairgowrie Pier

Wind: 15 knot Westerlies

Tide: 4 hours after 1.40 high tide at the heads

Conditions: Dull and overcast., approaching dusk.

Bottom Type: Pier Pylonsand wall over sand.

Visibilty: 4m

Water Temp: 12c

Bottom Time: 32 minutes

Max Depth: 4.0m

Air usage: 70bar/1000psi

SAC: ???? litres/min

Details: Last ferry back across to queenscliffe was at six, which with early winter sunsets, meant i could almost do a night dive at Blairgowrie..but i’d had to be quick. It turned out that it was really just a dusk dive, and i didn’t see any interesting night critters that blairgowries famous for.

Camera Details: Canon 17-40mm , single SS200 strobe

Dive Report: I didn’t see much..a few crabs, a sea cucumber and admired the growth on the walls. Here’s a few pics.

Dive Number: 43 23/05/2010 14.21 Blairgowrie Pier

Wind: 5 knot SE’s

Tide: 2.5hrs after 0.57 low tide at the Heads

Conditions: The day was getting colder with a bit of cloud build up, but still a nice day. Conditions were a touch choppy but not too bad. I noted that i did too dives on the Bellarine peninsula yesterday, both were 14C at 12pm and 2pm in 7m and 3m. Today, on the Mornington Peninsula, i did two dives at 12pm and 2pm in 4m and 6m and they were both 15C. Looks like the Mornington Peninsula waters is a touch warmer!

Bottom Type: Sand bottom with pier pylons and a metal break wall covered in sponge.

Water Temp: 15c

Bottom Time: 71 minutes

Max Depth: 6.1m

Air usage: 100bar/1400psi

SAC: 12.7 litres/min

Details: I’d finished my dive at Flinders Pier and Blairgowrie was on the way home. ; ) Catching the ferry back to Queenscliffe was on the cards, coz there was no way i was driving all the way back through Melbourne to Geelong. The dive produced a massive ray that was eyeballing me. Of course..this was a macro dive, so no pics. I was pretty dissappointed not to find more nudi’s but i saw a few, so it kept me happy enough. Luckily i’d brought a spare strobe battery since my other battery died during my flinders dive.

Camera Details: Canon 17-40mm , single SS200 strobe.

Dive Report: Blairgowrie has a big reputation for critters, but i really didn’t set my expectations high for seeing the likes of a Tassled Angler. I put my eyes in the nudi world, and hoped to find a few new species. It started off well with Doriopsilla carneola appearing straight off the bat.

This small little marine plant had a nice structure too it.

I came across some type of goby. I initially thought it had a bit of luecism to it (lacking skin pigmentation) since it had a whitish back that didn’t look right, but maybe its just a different species that i’m not use to.

There’s some really nice ascidians at Blairgowrie with some interesting textures.

Here’s another species of ascidian:

A young globefish wondered what i was doing and did a swim by…slightly inqusitive.

I continued out to the end of the pier and came across two Chromodoris tinctoria, which i’d seen before, but only at Blairgowrie. Obviously a fairly common species here.

Right out the back of the pier, it drops off into about 6m of water. In an old tractor tyre were a pair of fish using it as a home. I’m not sure what these ara, maybe juvenile rosy wrasse???

I headed back towards shore but it looked like i’d only notch up 2 nudi species…a bit dissappointing. I spotted this tiny little decorator crab…always hard to distinguish these guys from weed in photos.

This small Pygmy Leatherjacket was just whistling away, minding its own business.

While i took photos of him.

A wry smile from a wrasse as i left Blairgowrie and headed to Sorrento to catch the Ferry home.