Dive Report - 4/12/09 Panama City Beach

Got up at the ungodly hour of 4:45am this morning in order to meet up with XRay in Navarre. We consolidated our gear, and headed out to PCB Jetties to beat the high tide.

It was a beautiful day. The kiddie pool was stained with tannin, but the seaward side of the jetty was nice and green. We met some other divers in the parking lot, but they opted against diving. Something about red flags and terrible viz. XRay and I thought this was a good sign, so we kitted up as quickly as we could, and splashed in.

Temp was 66F, and once we got past the jetty, the water cleared significantly. Viz topped out at about 25, but was variable depending on one's position relative to the rubble piles. We saw the usual denizens plus very, very large sheepies and queen angles. When I say large, think large red-snapper size :shocked2: I also spotted a hogfish, which I've yet to see until today. I was able to snap one crappy photo before he turned tail, and headed South.

Our second dive was much like our first except we encountered the tide change, which resulted in significantly darker, dirtier, and redder water. The water was so red, I considered the possibility of a boating accident topside (think blood). In reality, it was just the fresh tannin-stained water moving into our area. We also encountered a 15 foot thermocline that offered us a nice blurry ending to our underwater explorations for the day.

Debriefing was at McGuires in Destin where we both inhaled our food, and reviewed the day. Despite what we expected to be bad conditions, the dives of the day turned out to be pretty damn good.

Thanks for the report, I saw my first hog at St. Andrews jetties as well.

Thanks for the report and the 66 degree temps. I especially enjoyed the hermits. I have a true feeling that hermits and blennies were put on Earth for the sole purpose of making us smile. I like to smile.

I saw my best hog on a plate in Playa del Carmen - sauted in butter.

Thanks again for braving the elements and telling us how it was.

That's by far my favorite beach dive! I love that picture 7th down.

Excellent report and pics. I am ready to get back in there myself. Its a great dive.

Nice report. Id expect a lot of tannic water with all the flooding.

I had a great time diving with Alex! We both enjoy photography so much that it just opens the dive debrief into a whole new realm. Great shots Alex! I'll add that we hadn't been in the parking lot but 10 minutes when I realized that I'd left my dive falg at home. So Alex headed off to the little store on the boardwalk to buy another one...What a guy! The ironic thing is that not 5 minutes into our dive I found one in about 25 feet of water all rolled up, now it didn't have a float or anything but it was so ironic that we both found ourselves laughing histarically underwater. As Alex said we kind of bounced around the boulders and enjoyed relatively good visability for the entire first dive which on both we went to the right toward the gulf and deeper water thinking we might have better viz in deeper water, but I think honestly the water was a bit clearer in 25 feet than down at 65 feet but the deeper water was holding a lot of snapper and some giant sheepshead, some of the biggest I've ever seen. I'm talking scary big. And they love to swim up to you and show that backwoods Country smile (No dental plan is an understatement). Another highlight of the dive was catching a real nice grouper you can see below.... Actually what happened is I saw this beautiful grouper and took a photo the one you see below, but after the flash went off he started thrashing aout wildly...Odd behavior I thought but he didn't leave...Let me try that again I thought.....Same thing! It was n=then that I noticed the mono filamentgoing around the rocks holding him fimly to the rock. Now he had swallowed the hook, but I was able to free him with just minor handling and away he swaw....... Underwater catch and release.... Nice! Here are some pics!





So I yells.... Hey buddy which way to the beach?

Here's a video of some sheepies:

That was a nice grouper you caught!

I think Scamp(grouper) and Hogfish adolenscents hang out at the jetties, there are always small ones around the rocks there.