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Does anyone know why the visibility completely deteriorated over the weekend in Laguna Beach? I'm curious because Thursday night we were at 15-20 feet and then come Saturday it was 4-8 feet viz + washing machine surge. Sounds like Sunday was horrible viz wise too. Could it be the surge causing the viz to be so low?
Does anyone know why the visibility completely deteriorated over the weekend in Laguna Beach? I'm curious because Thursday night we were at 15-20 feet and then come Saturday it was 4-8 feet viz + washing machine surge. Sounds like Sunday was horrible viz wise too. Could it be the surge causing the viz to be so low?
A strong surge will cause sand and particles to be churned up, especially in sandy areas. Also, a spotty red tide has been coming in and out the last couple weeks, it could be that too.
Hi there,
I was at Channel islands this Saturday the 14th and dove Santa Cruz and Anacapa islands with a local diver(who's diving these islands since early 50s) and we had very limited viz(5-10) on the top 20-30 feet of water but cleared to 40+ from there to 70 feet of water but made it much darker than usual down there due to the plankton coverage above....also it's funny when ascend to safety stop at 20 feet, it's almost like entering a cloud and sitting in it. According to him it was totaly the beginning of the plankton bloom season and he said it will be like this or even worst until mid-July or August. I am not sure if local beach viz is related to that but I was looking forward to some local dives...bummer if that's how the conditions are going to be until August.
I wonder if another factor was the fact that I saw a couple of them cement rivers flowing today. Pretty surprising. Maybe they're releasing some water from upstream.
Also, we were down at Laguna (Crescent) yesterday, and I was surprised at how large some of the sets were (4-5 ft.). Very surgy, lots of foam in the water. There was definitely a lot of sand being sucked out, too.
Not unusual for plankton blooms this time of year due to increasing daylength. I noticed that bottom temperatures were colder and there was even a noticeable thermocline on Catalina... indication of possible upwelling and input of nutrients usually contained in colder water.
Let's hope we're not in for a season of plankton soup like two summers ago! If so, when's the next plane to the tropics?
Amen to that Doc!!! Every dive was a night dive two summers ago. You could get below the swirling orange/brown soup but the sunlight sure couldn't.
I am keeping my fingers and toes crossed but with all the rain washing tons of nutrients into the ocean for most of the first half of the year, chances are good for a return of the gloom.
Here on Catalina we had a winter of unusual blooms due to the alternating periods of rain (enriching nearshore nutrients) and warm sunshine (providing the energy to "fuel" the bloom. Fortunately with our steeper dropoffs than the mainland, the nutrient load may have dropped down below the photic zone here. However during the annual Avalon Harbor Cleanup it was obvious that there was plenty of silt on the bottom!
Lexy check out the swell model. You can see the next few days will have larger waves which will most definitely drive down the vis. I remember a few days back looking at the swell model and Laguna was flat... That was probably your nice vis.. Check it out now:
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