Lemon Sharks

[HalcyonDaze]

Just to check in, how are the non-baited dive charters doing with the lemons, and what sites are they being found at? Curious to know if the Lemon Drop is "the" site for them or whether they're cropping up elsewhere off northern Palm Beach County.

 

[mscott556]

Looks like SL8R found some lemons the other day but I don't know where. Someone posted the vid to FB.

 

[HalcyonDaze]

Looks like Narcosis has been finding them at Governor's Riverwalk as well. I'd really be interested to know how many we have out there now, how distributed the aggregation is, and how closely the sharks are adhering to particular sites.

Did a little reading at work; lemons have a two-year breeding cycle - gestation takes a year and then the females need another year to get ready for mating again. Last year I saw a lot of what looked like pregnant females; be interesting to see if there are any this year that have pups onboard.

 

[MrChen]

Here's from Sl8r on Jan 19th, his first Lemon shark dive of the year. It was crazy fun. I would say 80+ sharks on one dive. I counted 62 on my video and I couldn't even record them all. Every time I wasn't recording a shark, someone was tapping my shoulder to point out how close they were, which got a little annoying at times. There were just so many... Enjoy!

[video=youtube;DTAGUzF4LnA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTAGUzF4LnA&list=UUfOp-jFb0p7lyYk7hwCajRg[/video]

---------- Post added January 24th, 2015 at 08:33 PM ----------

BTW: He's doing $55 Friday Lemon shark dives for a few months. Jupiter, FL Scuba Diving Charter

---------- Post added January 24th, 2015 at 08:39 PM ----------

Also, we only saw sharks on the first half the dive, we were moving north trying to find lobster and the sharks thinned out.

 

[HalcyonDaze]

80+ individuals, or 80+ sightings that could have been the same group? Difficult to tell. Couldn't see if any of them were the same sharks the Emerald and Miss Jackie have been playing with; if I had seen Righty (has something jammed through the right side of his abdomen with an eyebolt on the end of it) or Snooty (her upper jaw is locked down and out) those would have been giveaways. One lemon towards the end had a big freaking hook jammed in the right side of its mouth, haven't seen that one before.

Still, loved the counter and the sound effects. Sums up very nicely why Jupiter diving rocks.

 

[DKL]

Love diving Jupiter myself. I can't figure why they call them Lemon Sharks....every time I try to get close enough to get a lick and see if they really taste like lemon they swim away.

 

[HalcyonDaze]

Love diving Jupiter myself. I can't figure why they call them Lemon Sharks....every time I try to get close enough to get a lick and see if they really taste like lemon they swim away.

Got to take it slow - they don't just let any bubbling beach ape give them a wet kiss :kiss2:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VoB5ibrprM

 

[MrChen]

80+ individuals, or 80+ sightings that could have been the same group? Difficult to tell. Couldn't see if any of them were the same sharks the Emerald and Miss Jackie have been playing with; if I had seen Righty (has something jammed through the right side of his abdomen with an eyebolt on the end of it) or Snooty (her upper jaw is locked down and out) those would have been giveaways. One lemon towards the end had a big freaking hook jammed in the right side of its mouth, haven't seen that one before.

Still, loved the counter and the sound effects. Sums up very nicely why Jupiter diving rocks.

We did not remain where we dropped and kept a constant north heading, yet the rest of the boat remained at the drop site because that's where the highest concentration of sharks were. We swam north hoping for lobster and kept running into sharks and finally into turtles. Is it possible a few were double counted? Sure and most likely at the beginning of the dive as we were being constantly circled... But there were definitely a lot of unique sharks, more than I've ever encountered on a dive. In all honesty, the video doesn't give it justice for how many sharks there were on the dive. At times I could be video recording 3 sharks in front of me and missing the 4 behind me.

It was an epic dive. As we were coming back in, Randy's boat was behind us.

 

[HalcyonDaze]

We did not remain where we dropped and kept a constant north heading, yet the rest of the boat remained at the drop site because that's where the highest concentration of sharks were. We swam north hoping for lobster and kept running into sharks and finally into turtles. Is it possible a few were double counted? Sure and most likely at the beginning of the dive as we were being constantly circled... But there were definitely a lot of unique sharks, more than I've ever encountered on a dive. In all honesty, the video doesn't give it justice for how many sharks there were on the dive. At times I could be video recording 3 sharks in front of me and missing the 4 behind me.

It was an epic dive. As we were coming back in, Randy's boat was behind us.

It is hard to tell given that they tend to pass in and out of visual range; the last time I did a non-baited drift dive with the lemons at Lemon Drop I had three apparently turn up out of nowhere and buzz me unawares while I was taking shots of a nurse shark under a ledge.

Generally the estimate we get on the Emerald dives is somewhere around 10-15 individual lemons. It's definitely not the sum total, as for instance when I went on New Year's Day Righty was there but Snooty was absent. I'd hope there are many more out there; when the aggregation first hit the news about a decade ago I was seeing reports of 80+ on one dive.

 

[Johnoly]

....every time I try to get close enough to get a lick and see if they really taste like lemon they swim away.

OK I smiled at your comment and enjoyed it.
But actually, Sharks urinate thru their skin. True fact.
Hope you keep diving Jupiter, it's a great place to see every type of big animal underwater!!