Scuba Diving Gold

Archive for the ‘Sea Life’ Category

 

As a Scuba Diver I love to see even the smallest underwater creatures and although Nudibranchs, Hermit Crabs and Starfish are fun to discover there is nothing quite like the thrill of seeing a Shark gliding by – silent, powerful and majestic.

I also like seafood and my motto is ‘if you cannot hunt & gather it yourself then don’t eat it’. When I catch and kill a fish and I will do it quickly, painlessly and respectfully for the critter that is about to be my dinner. This is a long way from what the fishing industry is doing on in our oceans all around the world.

Shark meat has little value commercially however shark fins are another story – highly valuable as the signature ingredient in Sharks Fin Soup. Apparently the sharks fins don’t add much to the flavour of the soup but they do add to the prestige of any occasion since, other than restaurants, it is usually served at banquets and weddings. How many of those who eat sharks fin soup would go and get their own fins?

The harvesting of the fins, known as shark finning, is reportedly quite barbaric with the fins being cut from the often live shark and the bodies thrown back into the sea. The shark dies by slow suffocation (since it now cannot swim normally and sharks need constant movement of water over their gills to breathe) or by being eaten.

This is an atrocity for all the sharks left to die and it may lead to a problems with our oceans ecosystems if sharks are hunted to extinction. Sharks being the top of the food chain therefore moderate the numbers of species below them and ensure the health of the underwater gene pool.

Some shark specialists estimate that anywhere between 38-100 million sharks are killed for their fins annually, others report 10-100 million. Even if we take the lower estimates this is a LOT of sharks every year especially as they only reproduce in small litters and the pups are slow to grow.

Today I joined the Facebook group ‘The Global Shark Initiative’ and put my name against the practise of shark finning. The group will let me know about bills, initiatives and petitions. They also have contact details and set letters so that with a few clicks I can cut, paste and send out to governments worldwide adding my voice to do some good for the sharks.

What are you going to do?

 

 

Bobtail Octopus

This is a great photo of a Bobtail Octopus taken by Mark Thorpe in Indonesia and kindly sent in.  These are amazing little sea critters with incredible iridescent colourings. I’m not sure if these are the same as the Hawaiian Bobtail which apparently establishes a symbiotic relationship with a luminescent bacteria by collecting the bacteria when young and using them to form part of a light-producing organ! Either way - it is another wonderful sea creature – Thanks for the photo.

What kind of fish is that? Colorful fish you may see on your next dive. Learn tips for tiger grouper identification in this free scuba diving video of Caribbean fish from a staff member of the New …

This is a short clip of a Russian scuba-diving cat.

I spotted this jellyfish on descent down the bouy line to the wreck of the F69 Frigate  in Wellington, New Zealand.  

It was about 14″ (36cm) round and looked like a flower from the top then as the rest came into view it looked like a piece of offal. 

It had become its own reef system with young fish living around it.

Can anyone help identify it?

What kind of fish is that? Learn tips for French angelfish identification in this free scuba diving video of Caribbean fish from a staff member of the New England aquarium.

Expert: Don Stark
Conta…

http://www.ScubaDiverGirls.com The girls fun dive and come across a bunch of Giant Sea Bass! Margo and Stephanie have fun hanging out with them for awhile and Stephanie even gets to pet one! You wi…

• Clear blue water
• Warm water averaging 28 degrees centigrade
• Pristine Coral Reef formations
• Established Diving Centers and Scuba Equipment Shops

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The most popular tourist areas for scuba diving in Thailand are Pattaya, Phuket and Koh Samui. These resorts offer great fun and excitement for beginners and certified divers. Whether it’s vibrant fish life, colourful corals or sunken ship wrecks, the camera won’t stop clicking while you’re scuba diving in Thailand. I’ve captured pictures of Seahorses and giant Gorgonian Sea Fans in Phuket, Black tip reef Sharks in Koh Samui, and World War 11 ship wrecks in Pattaya.

Todays modern camera equipment has changed the way that scuba divers ’shoot’ fish underwater. The traditional film camera is still used by many diving professionals, but digital underwater cameras have made underwater photography both accessible and affordable to the majority of scuba divers. Learning to Scuba Dive is not difficult for most people who are comfortable in the water, but snapping great photos under water takes novices some time to learn. One of the most important attributes is good buoyancy control. Apart from all the obvious advantages that neutral, relaxed buoyancy has for scuba diving, if you’re trying to compose that image of the tiny yellow blob, commonly known as a Frogfish, being able to hover almost motionless just centimetres away from your subject is what sets you apart from the norm. Also, as recreational scuba divers descend, water absorbs colour. Starting with Red, Orange and then Yellow, and as you dive deeper, you’ll lose Green and Blue. Strobe lights help to restore some of the colour that’s lost, which is how the professionals obtain fantastic vibrant colours from their images.

I fully appreciate that not every diver has a passion for taking pictures of the new world that they’ve discovered. Many divers are more fascinated by ship wrecks, perhaps diving deep or making dives using nitrox (an increased amount of oxygen) but most of my scuba buddies have admitted that they are very keen to share the wonders on the underwater world by shooting pictures of fish and other marine life. With modern technology as a friend, it’s now possible to store and share underwater images with your family, friends and even the general public via social sites and the internet. The dive may have been the most amazing experience that you’ve had, but it’s so much more powerful to share the adventures with those for whom it may not be possibly to try scuba diving. PADI scuba courses teach student divers how to capture and share underwater photographs, and the Digital Underwater Photography course is now available to all scuba divers from the age of ten.

Private scuba lessons are becoming more popular now, especially in Thailand. Taking a dive course with you own private scuba instructor offers exclusivity, the personal touch, and usually more flexibility. So to enrol in the shooting fish course, otherwise known as the PADI DUP (digital underwater photography) course, you do need to be a certified diver of at least ten years old. But be prepared for some underwater fun that diving in Pattaya has to offer. The coral reefs are shallower here than other dive sites in Thailand, and the other advantage is that scuba diving in Pattaya is available year round because the Gulf of Thailand tends to be sheltered from the southwest monsoons that arrive in Phuket from June until October. Pattaya is not a famous diving destination, but beginners and experienced divers will be rewarded with some of the best wreck diving in Thailand. So, clean up the lens, replace the batteries and make sure that you have a watertight seal, because when you dive in Pattaya the camera never lies. You really can see Turtles, Seahorses and Sharks, and the wreck dives will leave you breathless (pardon the pun) as you drift along US Landing Crafts from the Second World War that were intentionally sunk by the Thai Navy for the local Thai divers and tourists on a scuba diving holiday in Pattaya.

Learn how to Shoot Fish in Thailand the passive and harmless way with a private scuba photography course from a Master Instructor at www.private-scuba.com