Jak Crow
Contributor
Did a 3 day liveaboard this weekend, expecting better results than my last visit in Feb, but with the exception of maybe 2 sites out of the entire weekend, every spot was decimated by urchins. Some of the sites reminded me of the scenes of dead tropical corals reefs, nothing but bare rock and urchins. No variety of invertebrates, barely a sun star to be found, few crustaceans, and few anemones, the expected carpets of strawberry anemones ended up being anemic clumps here and there, with no other species larger than my hand. The boat captain seemed more interested in accommodating the spear fishers, so kept us on the north side of Santa Cruz the entire weekend, taking us to one barren after another, and there was no way he didnt know the condition of these spots. While there have been a few bright spots, so far going to the Channel Islands has been a bust and not very enticing for more trips without assurances that these crap dive sites will be avoided in the future.