Whale shark at Catalina!

[MaxBottomtime]

Rare whale shark sighting documented near Catalina - Pete Thomas Outdoors

 

[merxlin]

Manta rays, Whale sharks, Hammerheads....who needs to travel to tropical locations.

 

[blinkswiler]

Is this for real?????

 

[Lopez116]

And sea turtles in San Diego

 

[Kevrumbo]

On Liveaboard, M/V Peace Diveboat out of Ventura for back-to-back charters, to San Miguel 19-20Sept and San Clemente 21-23Sept: I'm expecting to see Whale Sharks, schooling Hammerheads, Manta Rays, Bluefin & Albacore Tuna, Sea Turtles, Trigger Fish etc --and all the weird & wonderful warm water pelagics that can possibly come up this way in a rare strong El Nino Southern Oscillation Cycle. . . :cool2:

 

[diver 85]

Cat 4s & 5s next???

 

[drbill]

Is this for real?????

Although I didn't see it myself, I've talked to two people who said they did so yes.

We have historic photos that show manta rays and other unusual fish caught in our waters. This year is an exceptionally warm one due to the potential El Nino and the storm surge from several hurricanes off Mexico. Surface temperatures have been as high as 77-78 and I had 73 F as a minimum temperature at 120 fsw off Ship Rock last week. Problem is that when these tropical and subtropical critters show up, the giant kelp forests are often very much depleted by warm water/low nutrients (and this year by storm surge as well).

---------- Post added September 17th, 2014 at 07:48 AM ----------

On Liveaboard, M/V Peace Diveboat out of Ventura for back-to-back charters, to San Miguel 19-20Sept and San Clemente 21-23Sept: I'm expecting to see Whale Sharks, schooling Hammerheads, Manta Rays, Bluefin & Albacore Tuna, Sea Turtles, Trigger Fish etc --and all the weird & wonderful warm water pelagics that can possibly come up this way in a rare strong El Nino Southern Oscillation Cycle. . . :cool2:

Love the Peace boat but doubt whether you'll see many of these off cold San Miguel. San Clemente is a good possibility though.

 

[Lopez116]

Why is the water so warm at Catalina, yet 66 here in Laguna? I don't understand how the water temps can vary so dramatically in SoCal over very short distances. Can someone explain?

 

[drbill]

On the protected leeward side of Catalina, especially the region from Long Point to the East End, there is not a lot of vertical water movement so surface waters warm up. On the exposed mainland coast there is a lot more vertical mixing and deeper, colder water more frequently enters the shallows is my guess. Of course the south swell can affect this, but it can also bring up warm southern water

 

[HalcyonDaze]

On the protected leeward side of Catalina, especially the region from Long Point to the East End, there is not a lot of vertical water movement so surface waters warm up. On the exposed mainland coast there is a lot more vertical mixing and deeper, colder water more frequently enters the shallows is my guess. Of course the south swell can affect this, but it can also bring up warm southern water

Yup. My first year in SoCal was in an ENSO year (2006). Early in the fall I was talking to a friend working with CIMI at Toyon Bay and she said the water temps were up to 74. My first collection trip out around Palos Verde and the LB breakwater I decided that, if the water temp was up in the 70s, I was going to leave my comfy 7-mil at home and bring my thinning Florida-issue 3-mil and a 5-mil vest and hood. Well, we get out on the Cal State Long Beach boat and the surface temp is reading 62 or so. I wasn't on the collection dive, but when we got to the second site I decided to suit up and go for a snorkel.

After about five minutes of curses flying out of my snorkel and certain portions of my anatomy vainly trying to retreat to the top of my head, I was okay - numb, but not in agony. After that the 3-mil stayed in storage.