Teri's 1999 New Year's Eve Dive

Sharon Ringsven’s comment on Facebook reminded me about diving on New Year’s Eve. Ten years ago (ten!?!) two dive buddies, Philip and Christa, dove with me at Ulua. We went in about 11:45PM with an unopened bottle of champagne. I was afraid we were either going to break the bottle getting in or out, or that we would drown trying to drink while underwater! The smartest one of the bunch, my future husband Jim, remained safely on the beach.


Anyway, we went to 15' deep (to make it an official training dive!) where we knelt in the sand. I counted down the last five seconds of 1999 on my watch. Philip popped the cork out of the champagne bottle. What a great sound it made! Now it was time to try to take a drink. Philip had done some research and was told that if we forced air into the bottle that the champagne would be pushed out. So I removed my reg and blew into the bottle while Philip held it over my mouth. I let liquid into my mouth but it was all saltwater! Yuck!!!

Then Philip had a great idea. He put his thumb over the bottle opening and shook it up. This time the champagne flooded my mouth. It tasted so good, and later he said that my head was surrounded by a million bubbles! We each took a good drink and toasted the year 2000. What a great memory! Thanks for reminding me Sharon

Jim Asks, Are We Taking it for Granted?

This is really more a question for all you local divers...

I can still remember the moment I realized that not everybody sees the ocean the same way.

I was diving Makena Landing…this was about 5 years ago, and I think I’d been certified for about 6 months. My dive buddy and I were just coming up to one of the caves when a big, beautiful Green sea turtle came swimming right past me. I quickly turned to signal to my dive buddy, got his attention and happily pointed out our new friend. His reaction?

(shrug)

I didn’t get it.  Here’s this amazing, huge marine reptile, and my dive buddy didn’t seem to care. He just went back to looking around for interesting shells. Meanwhile, I kept watching the turtle. Noticing how with the tiniest of motions this Chelonia mydas could completely change orientations in the water (sea turtles are very maneuverable), how it had a tiny claw on the front of each flipper, and how the back flippers and tail folded together for streamlining when not needed. What an incredible animal!

Later on over a post-dive breakfast, I asked my buddy about this.  “So, you didn’t think the turtle was cool?” I said. He just shrugged again. “It’s only a turtle," he said. “We see them all the time.”

Hmmm. Well, that’s true I suppose—we do see a lot of turtles in our waters…but let me ask you local divers out there: how many other places in the world do you think that’s true? Chelonia m. isn’t even really “common” here—the population was last listed as “threatened”, and in some parts of the world they are considered “critically endangered”. There are millions and millions of people who will never see a sea turtle, not once in their lives. And consider this: if someday (and hopefully, this day will never come) the Green sea turtle becomes extinct, no one will ever see one again.

Ever.

(a side note: we have another turtle species out here, the Hawksbill turtle, that is sadly a lot further down the road to extinction. It can happen, all too easily. More about Hawksbills in a future posting.)

Have I made you consider looking a little more closely next time a turtle joins you on a dive?

One of the advantages of being a dive instructor is that I get to see the reef through “new eyes” every day. I’m always diving with people who are diving the reef for the first time, and the wonder and amazement they get from seeing turtles and other marine life (marine life that we are lucky enough to see as part of our daily lives) keeps me from forgetting just how special scuba diving in Hawaii really is.

And it’s not just about turtles. Hawaii is one of the most isolated land masses in the world…and because of this, many of the “common” species we see every day are not found anywhere else. Nowhere. Those black-and-white Domino damselfish that we see over coral heads all the time? The scientific name is Dascyllus albisella and you won’t find them anywhere but here. How about those “mini-puffers”, (Canthigaster jactator) the Hawaiian spotted tobys? Only in our waters. Those red urchins with the fat spines that are all over our reefs? Slate pencil urchins (Heterocentrotus mammillatus) are only common here, and everywhere else, they’re usually dark brown, instead of that incredible red color. Those are just a few examples: there are hundreds of others. The more I learn about marine life, the more I appreciate just how fortunate we are to live where we live and dive where we dive.

I want everyone we dive with to feel that fortunate, too.   Aloha, Jim

Turtle Stories

During the 10 years I've been teaching scuba, I have never EVER tired of seeing turtles. They are just amazing (who knew something shaped like a Volkswagen bug could be so streamlined and graceful?) and I've been lucky to witness countless interesting behaviors and turtle interactions.

I will never forget the time a turtle I called "Lefty" (no front right fin) zeroed in on me as I was kneeling in the sand. My students were wide-eyed as the turtle approached from behind (I had no idea what was going on) and came up and nudged and "purred" me! That's the best way to describe it. Lefty passed against and through my legs a couple of times and then settled down in the sand directly in front of me. I was intrigued, so I laid flat in the sand facing the turtle and waited to see what would happen next. Well, Lefty had some ideas. I saw him glance up once, twice, then he lifted his head and approached once again, clamping down on my bangs and the top of my mask. I was trying not to giggle too hard (didn't want the exhalations of bubbles to disturb him) as he seemed to process, "nope, guess that wasn't sea grass after all" and sat right back down. I wish I could find the photo someone took of this event!

If you've been in our shop, you've seen the photo of "Rascal the turtle" above our classroom door. Everyone comments that she seems to be smiling. Well, for several months during the winter in 2002, this turtle seemed to join us as an extra buddy during our dives at Ulua Beach. She would appear mid reef and would swim along very close to my face and just above my shoulder, usually a diver's blind spot. You can imagine that I was frequently surprised by her when I'd turn my head to check on divers and come face to face with "Rascal" instead!

For years I have enjoyed watching turtles use flag and mooring lines as scratching posts, rubbing their necks and fins against them to take care of that itch. I marveled at how they could do this and NEVER get tangled! Or so I thought. Just a few weeks ago, I noticed that my flag seemed to be bobbing in an unusual way and as I approached, I discovered that a turtle was hovering around it. Ah ha, I thought, I get to show my dive buddy this behavior! But as we got closer, it became obvious that the turtle was indeed tangled; she looked like someone had tried to gift wrap her and tie a bow. How on earth had she gotten THIS tangled up??? As a diver, turtle lover, naturalist, etc. seeing this type of situation really tears at your heart, and I hurried over to free her. The first thing she did was bolt and I followed her, towing the flag so that the turtle wouldn't inadvertently tighten the noose she'd fashioned. As I approached again, she seemed to sense my intentions and settled right in for the help being offered. She was untangled and freed in under a minute - whew!

Then there was the time we were doing surface skills during an Open Water class. One of the students pointed to something floating nearby and we swam over to investigate. Well, one turtle was on top of a larger turtle and they just floated together with the larger turtle struggling every few minutes to get her head to the surface for a breath. Yes, we got to see turtles "doing it"! Being the nosey buggahs we are, we tried to stay for the whole thing, but these turtles had staying power, and eventually we had to continue with our class...

Most recently, I had the extreme privilege of getting to watch the excavation of a hawksbill turtle nest right here in Kihei. Right around sunset, a small group gathered to watch the pros help the remaining hatchlings out of their nest. Mama turtles dig their nests about two feet deep - that's a lot of sand for these little critters to break through before journeying to the waterline! Some emerged and began to flop around immediately, and others still had to actually hatch from their eggs - it was so cool to see! Once all the baby honus were freed (over 60 of them that night), our group got to escort them to water and see them off on their first ocean journey!

If you want to see a hatchling video clip, you can check it out on our Maui Dreams Facebook page.

And P.S. I bet you already know this, but it is illegal to harass sea turtles. Please do not feed, chase, touch, or crowd them. Be respectful and observe sea turtles from a safe and reasonable distance.

Aloha, Rachel

New Reef at Keawakapu

Did you see the barge, tug, and support vessels in front of Keawakapu today? Well, one of those was the Maui Diamond II. Several days a week, I captain the Maui Diamond II on trips to Molokini Crater, but I have got to say it was exciting to get to participate in something new. Today, I brought the Maui Diamond to the site as a safety boat to make sure that no other vessels approached within 300 yards during the deployment.

This morning at 7:30, the barge arrived from Oahu with 1500 concrete fish habitats on board - 1400 "z modules" and 100 four by four square "tubes" to create a diverse new seascape. The workers on the barge deployed 10-12 modules a minute (and these things weigh over 2000 lbs each), creating huge splashes, some of which were heard by divers at Ulua who later told me that the sound was reminiscent of slapping whale tails. One of the interesting things (and one of the reasons it was important to keep vessels, divers, etc. away) was that some of the modules would break apart on impact, spraying chunks of concrete up to 100 feet away!

By about 12:15, the concrete "Z's" were all underwater, sitting on the bottom from 50-80 feet deep. By 12:45, I was among the first to get to dive this new reef. As you can see in the photo, an urchin had already climbed on to check out the new substrate!  -Don