Northwest Dive Club

Holmes Harbor, Freeland. I returned to dive it after almost one year hiatus, and reconfirmed my assessment of this once very interesting dive site. Once a year is enough. It lost most of its appeal with the disappearance of most of the marine life and kept its notoriously limited visibility. The very long swim to reach deeper water is not worth the effort, at least for me... Add to the disappointment a leaky drysuit.

Digging into 115 year old publication to get "dirt" on this feather worm. Few years ago, I collected Pyramidellid snails off them for a researcher. The snails seem to be able to eat blood or body fluids from a wide variety of hosts but prefer the feather dusters. ...

For this sea star, loosing four of five arms is not big deal. It grows four new ones ...
Isn't nature wonderful ?

Keystone Jetty colors to brighten windy and overcast day on Whidbey Island.
The Yellow and Red provided by tunicates and small fish

When the Bull kelp begins to turn into a tangled mess and Northern Kelp crabs take up residence on kelp stipe and blades, winter is not far away ...

From the Skyline Wall. Scaled crab with Crimson anemone.
Such handsome pair

OCTOber 8 - World Octopus Day !

Possession Point Fingers. Like Deception Pass on the northern end of Whidbey Island, the south end also requires a walk through the forest to access the dive site.

Few recent Keystone Jetty fish encounters. some common and some not so common...

Keystone Jetty. The underwater world of crab eats crab...

Love your Warbonnet pics Jan!

Thanks, Gdog.

Keystone Jetty. Until now, all my photos of Stearn's Ear Shell depicted it as a flat blob on top of its favorite tunicate, blending in perfectly. Finally I got few shots of what it looks like from different angles. No snail was hurt during the process.

Keystone's attempt to look tropical

Everybody who dives Keystone Jetty notices, that the place is overrun with Green sea urchins. However, finding a different urchin specie here is unusual. I wonder how it got there. The odd individual doesn't stay around for long neither...

With the onset of winter, you can expect some changes in Keystone kelp

Lovin your shots Jan, and the awesome education included. Keep em coming!

Blue skies just a memory? It rains and it rains. Throwback to a more cheerful day, Skyline on October 5th.

The good news from Keystone- I did not see any sea star wasting. And Hornmouth eats barnacles and crabs are decorating... Life is good

Facebook and internet in general. Yes, it does contain lots of divisive material, but here is an example what I enjoy about it. Couple months ago I came across a fish I had hard time to ID. It started discussion and more people chimed in, and then others found same fish on different dive and different dive site. No arguing or disparaging comments, just common desire to identify the critter. What started as Gunnel ended as Prickleback. Thank you all...

As the night descends on Langley Harbor, bigger fish eating smaller fish commences ...

A belated Happy Birthday youngster.
-Curt

Thank you Curt, just another day in the life of a senior citizen ...

Langley Harbor - Home of the one and only Two-Headed Giant Plumose Anemone !!!

What a beautiful Sunday weather. Made even better with friends at Keystone .

Few more from the Sunday dive at Keystone Jetty.