DivemasterDennis-

If you have ever been to a zoo, you have seen one or more signs conspicuously displayed that say "DON'T FEED THE ANIMALS." Interestingly enough, I have never seen a sign like that under the sea. To some people that means it's just fine to feed the animals- a fishball to attract sharks, green peas to draw out a moray eel, or chopping open an urchin to feed the Garibaldi's in the kelp forest off southern California. I have seen all of these, and disapprove of each of them. I have also seen the ...

"How close should your stay to your dive buddy?" This question has been raised and discussed regularly here on scuba board for years. Lately it has been coming up quite often. Responses have been quit varied, and some have been a little disturbing. In my observation, some divers think being in the same ocean with their buddy is all that is required. The simple truth is that you should stay close to your buddy throughout a dive. But how close is close? First of all, that depends on conditions. ...

Most of us have been on a group dive trip. Sometimes our groups are made up of friends, and sometimes we make new friends on those trips. Traveling in a group can be great fun, but it can also be just the opposite. I have been on some great group trips, but there have been some that weren't so great. As Debbie and I are working on the sequel to The Scuba Snobs Guide to Diving Etiquette, we have been thinking about and writing about group travel. I want to share some of those thoughts with my ...

Reading a new thread on the DAN diver tag system raised an interesting discussion at my local shop about things a diver can do to minimize (or better still, eliminate) the chances of being left behind by a charter dive boat. This does not happen very often, but one time is too many! The charter company can implement proper plans, of course, like the DAN tag, a roll call before and after every dive, and the like, but there are some things every diver can do to minimize the chance that they will ...

There is a really good thread concerning a navigation question in the Basic Scuba Discussion Forum started November 21, 2011. There are a lot of good tips in that thread, and to go with them,I share with them my own navigation tips for recreational divers. Navigation is second only to buoyancy control on my list of important skills to master in order to be a competent diver. (there are of course more skills on the list) I enjoy working with advanced open water students and navigation specialty ...