By Gregg Stanton and contributors

Back to Underwater Wakulla Archive

Click on the date of a column to jump directly to it.

January 7, 2016

Water.

Current thinking (one theory) has water arriving from extra terrestrial sources embedded in asteroids and comets called cosmic sponges, as ice.
Over the long life of our planet Earth, this water was released on impact or on entry into our atmosphere.
Once on Earth, water contributes to the hydraulic cycle, pulled by the heat of the sun, from larger concentrations, such as an ocean or lake, up into the atmosphere as vapor, forming clouds. These clouds move by the wind as they accumulate water.
Once full enough and under the right conditions, the vapor coalesces around dust and airborne microbes to fall as rain. Rain picks up carbon dioxide in the air resulting in a mild acid that contributes to the enrichment of the soil and erosion of limestone when it falls on land.
Since water is never destroyed, it recycles through virtually everything and everybody.
Life came from the Sea, the largest concentration of water on our planet.
As creatures moved (evolutionarily) on land, they took the ocean water with them. We humans are no different, made mostly of a salt water akin to the Sea.
To survive and prosper, we drink large quantities of water, often as a base to our many flavored drinks. This same water flows from the stomach, through our blood to wash our tissues, and with those accumulated waste product, filtered by our kidneys, and drained out to continue water’s journey.
Leach fields take our nutrient rich water to eager bacteria that feed and thus separate the waste in a never ending process of cleaning the water.
Gravity continues moving this water through soil strata until it reaches streams, then to rivers, locally often underground, then a return to the Sea.
How many times this same water passes through another animal is anyone’s guess. Even while in the ocean, our water recycles through sea creatures before being picked up again by the sun’s evaporative force to move aloft once more.
Water has been harnessed by humans to create electricity (hydroelectric), energy to move things (steam), and thermal stored energy (geothermal) just to name a few.
We swim in it, kayak over it, move large and small cargo over large distances through it, hide stuff in it (out of sight/out of mind) and of course scuba dive in it, enjoying the abundance of life found within.
Our planet Earth is truly a water planet, with 95 percent of its surface underwater.
I have lived underwater, in a habitat, for weeks on end. Such an experience was profound, living in a three-dimensional world, flying in an 800 times denser medium than our atmosphere. I studied animal in their natural habitat as a visitor, an ethno biological experience.
It is a humbling notion that the very same water I drink, shower under, get rained upon and spend large amounts of time swimming under, has traveled through galactic space to provide this basis for life as we know it.
Galactic matter flows through our veins! How cool is that?

Back to list of columns

January 14, 2016

Let there be light – underwater!

By Joerg Hess

Diving can be a stunning experience, visibility permitting. From beautiful reefs with colorful fish, to awe-inspiring formations and landscapes in caves, the impressions can be life-altering. The sun provided the light for early underwater explorers. It wasn’t too long ago, though, that the early pioneers found themselves for want of artificial light to venture onto night-time expeditions. Forced to become home-builders, they made due with adaptations from other areas to take “torches” under water. I remember the revolutionary design of combining a sealed-beam headlight bulb from a car in addition to a blocky lead-acid battery, also taken from the automotive sector, into a 10 pound package the size of a shoebox – amazing!. It provided a mind-blowing 200 lumen yellow light for about 60 minutes. Once depleted, the battery was recharged over night, ready for the next day. In order to reduce the weight and bulk carried in the diver’s hand, cave divers split the design into a “light head”, connected via electrical cable to the battery box carried on the waist belt.
Along came improvements in light bulbs and battery technology. Halogen light bulbs, and rechargeable Nickel-Cadmium batteries increased light output four-fold while still being contained in the similar size housing.
In the late nineties, it was once again the automotive sector that provided the next evolutionary jump. High-Intensity discharge (HID) lights had been successfully used in street lighting applications to provide lots of light with high electrical efficiency, and they had now been miniaturized for use as car lights. You may recall the almost blinding blue-white lights that expensive limousines started displaying, common today. Divers jumped on the occasion to achieve this near-sunlight performance under water. It provided yet whiter, brighter light, and longer duration. Combined with improved battery technology, Nickel-Metal-Hydride battery packs were smaller and lighter, resulting in 10W, 1500 lumen lights with a duration of four hours. Earlier lights appeared very weak and yellow in comparison.
I have had a 10W HID dive light for about ten years, and it had served me well. As of late, the bulb showed signs of aging. I dreaded the costly replacement, and looked for alternatives. In recent years, LED technology has made its debut on the lighting market. The last hurdle had been the integration of blue into the LED light, for a combined white appearance, impossible for the longest time. Increased output density as of a few years back made the LED superior to all other competitors. LEDs are cheap to produce, and of much improved durability compared to the fragile filament and arc light generators. These LED lights have been available on the diving market for a few years now. Instead of simply buying a new light, however, I took on the fun project of replacing the HID bulb with a newer LED bulb. Unfortunately, no direct replacement is available. The solution was to design a new light head to fit the LED. The result was a much smaller head! Combined with lithium battery technology, the upgrade from the HID solution with 1500 lumen, four hour duration now provides me with 2000 lumen for 8 hours!
I am certain that, in a few years, we will look back at this light just as we look back at the early dive lights today, and think how we could have possibly lived with that. Today, however, the light brought back a lot of joy into the dive.
Gregg wants me to make one for him too.

Back to list of columns

January 21, 2016

Artificial Reefs.

We can differentiate between a natural reef, which in our area is comprised of a lime rock outcrop protruding through a sand veneer, covered with soft and a few hard corals, bryozoans (often look like corals) grasses and algae, and visited by crabs, shrimp, fish, worms and the like, and a man made reef which after a short while has attracted, all the same stuff. Well placed and designed artificial reefs can perform better than natural reefs. A reef module floating in sand will not be buried by storm generated sand waves.
A reef provides shelter for many creatures, that in turn provide food for others. Passing currents create eddy currents where plankton concentrate. These are fed upon by small fish that may reside in the crevices. Larger fish, resident or non-resident passing by, pick off these smaller fish, along with crabs and shrimp. Pelagic fish prefer higher profiled structures to hide from the current. Grouper and others prefer the creviced deep pockets where at night they may rest out of sight. We can build species specific reefs.
Good management practices require artificial reefs be placed away from productive natural reefs. If you have been off shore, you know there is a vast sand prairie covering most of our off shore fishing grounds. GPS has permitted fishermen to locate elusive reefs in this vast area. Reef placement is not just based upon the location of natural reefs. Placement however, is critical so that the intended reef does not sink too deeply in the sand and out of sight. As I said earlier, reefs can be designed to float in deep sand. Selected materials may be unsuited for placement, such as cars that dissolve in a few years.
Traditionally, artificial reefs have been made of surplus concrete, or metal, usually donated rather than buried in land-fills. The construction of the shallow Rotary Reef that I coordinated in the mid 1980s was made of such materials. OAR has been very successful over the past 30 years placing similar reefs all along the Big Bend. We are now witnessing dedicated reefs to lost loved ones, and even a place to store the ashes in dedicated modules. With the acidification of the ocean waters, corals are dyeing throughout the world. In their place humans are culturing hardy corals in nurseries that are then transplanted on artificial modules and natural reefs to replace lost stocks.
Let’s take this one step further. A Fish Attracting Device (FAD) is normally thought of as a floating structure anchored to the sea floor. FADs usually attract pelagic fish, but develop their own biomass over time. Bob Ballard, taking advantage of enriched local waters, has deployed thousands of oyster FADS in Wakulla County bays, successfully culturing crops in areas where they would normally never be found. Other shellfish have been raised in similar nets on the west coast of the USA.
We have an invasive species called the Lion Fish. They are moving in and growing to very large commercial sizes in deeper waters. When they move on to a natural reef, they can kill it. But a new industry is developing around the Lion Fish, a fishery, selling for up to $5.00/pound (head and guts intact). We have been noticing Lion Fish will occupy anchor lines, feed in the water column, and may be attracted to FADS. Since FADS have been criticized because they attract fish for easier harvest, perhaps we should deploy FADS near natural reefs to attract this creature up to the FAD and make for easier harvest of Lion Fish by divers.
Anyway, we’re talking to reef construction people to see if this theory might work. Lion Fish taste good!

Back to list of columns

January 28, 2016

Minnesota diving.

By Travis Kersting

In June 2012, I ventured home to Minnesota for what is probably best described as a family reunion but it was based around my grandfather’s 90th birthday. In the years since then I have stayed in Florida with little interest to return to the cold white north. After his 93rd birthday, my grandfather’s second wife unexpectedly served him with divorce papers and his mood and health began to decline.
Against my better judgment I planned a short venture home again, for about 10 days, this month.
Minnesota has seen snow in every month besides July and August. Temperatures can regularly be 10, 20, and even 30 below zero without accounting for windchill (our coldest day was -40). For someone from a warm climate it can be a dreadful place just because of the cold temperatures.
Minnesota is very beautiful and it comes with many other amazing features. The industry is huge compared to North Florida, mining and steel production are at the top of a very lucrative economy on the iron range (where I am from). Healthcare is also less expensive, which was one other reason I visited. My small home town, with a population similar to Crawfordville, hosts a plethora of businesses including an eight theater cinema, a Home Depot, three grocery stores, restaurants of all types, and my favorite hardware/feed store in the country, L&M Fleet Supply.
In Florida winters we see less diving than my home town probably sees. Divers who fill cylinders from compressors in their garage, because no support stores exist for about 100 miles or more, are eager to use chainsaws and other implements to cut holes in the frozen lakes and take a dip. Instead of taking a boat to the dive site they take snowmobiles and ATV machines towing sleds of equipment.
Because of adventurous fisherman and snowmobile owners getting a little antsy and heading out on the lakes early we always had a few things go through the ice that needed recovering too. Usually the ice needs to be at least 12 inches thick for a car to safely drive over it. Sometimes the ice isn’t very good quality or the lakes get too many vehicles in one place and things still fall through. Divers volunteer to aid in vehicle recovery.
Many of the great iron ore ships come into Duluth/Superior for maintenance in the winter. Divers are used to inspect and repair the ship’s bilge, propellers, and other components. It’s cold and miserable work but some divers can earn thousands of dollars a day for enduring the freezing water temperatures of 32-36 degrees.
The ships of the past litter the floor of Lake Superior and winter offers the best visibility to explore them. Some are a simple shore dive where divers use a turkey fry pot to heat water on the beach for warming up before and after the dive. Others can be reached by boat if the lake is still open (it was when I visited) and if the lake has frozen they take out across the ice. Warming houses, usually used for spearfishing or ice skating are used for dress-up/down on the coldest days so your bare skin isn’t exposed to the minus zero temps.
Strangely enough there is plenty of diving opportunity in Minnesota. Divers typically learn in a drysuit or buy expensive multi-layer wetsuits from day one, a departure from Florida divers for sure. I used electric heated suits, cobbled together from things not meant to be underwater, to help buy a few extra minutes of relative warmth.
Rebreathers actually became popular up there because the warm moist air being rebreathed was more pleasant than the cold dry air of a scuba tank.
On this trip home I didn’t do any diving, thankfully. I wanted to show my girlfriend some places I used to spend time, have some blood tests done, eat some foods I missed, visit with family, and catch up with my grandfather.
My grandfather seemed much healthier than my family led me to believe, and I don’t see him going anywhere soon.
One vacation every three years may be too frequent for me.

Back to list of columns

February 04, 2016

Oxygen is Required!

To survive, we must breathe a blend that includes oxygen. It does not matter if we are above or below water. Air is a blend of gases that includes 21 percent oxygen. We can breathe up to 100 percent oxygen (supplied from a cylinder) above water, even for hours, with little deleterious effects. After a dive, breathing 100 percent oxygen can even be quite beneficial. The toxic effect of high concentrations of oxygen underwater (and only underwater) is a topic of great concern to divers, open and closed circuit alike. But drop your oxygen concentration below 10 percent on land, even for a short time, can cause death.
The common open circuit scuba diver must calculate the Nitrox mixture and the intended depth of the dive to assess the threat of Oxygen Toxicity for a given dive. We know our Oxygen clocks are based upon our partial pressure of oxygen exposure not exceeding a value of 1.6, or 1.6 times the oxygen content of pure oxygen at the surface for a limited time as provided by the NOAA Oxygen Exposure Tables. Fortunately, most Nitrox divers that breathe a conservative blend of 32 percent (typical for our area), find their oxygen exposure is far from toxic levels when diving shallower than 100 feet.
The Closed Circuit Rebreather scuba diver faces a very different challenge. The quality of the breathing gas comes from a bag worn on the chest or back. Many ingredients contribute to the content of that bag, including moisture, heat, oxygen, gastric gases, chemicals used to remove CO2, and diluting gases, such as nitrogen, argon and possibly helium. The diver must monitor these elements to insure a breathable loop. Some are stored in a cylinder attached to the rig, others are packed before the dive and added to the rig internally.
We consume all of these elements during the dive. The scrubber removes the CO2 and sponges or traps remove excess water, throughout the dive. Once we leave the bottom and head back to the surface, we reverse the consumption of many of these elements and begin a process called decompression. This means the nitrogen, argon, helium and gastric gases, must be vented out of the loop or it dilutes the much needed oxygen from your breathing loop. The CO2 scrubber and oxygen delivery mechanisms must continue as before, through decompression. Ascent lowers the concentration of oxygen while expanding the volume in the breathing bag (physics again). This physics problem results in your consuming an additional third to a half of the oxygen you carry with you on the dive, depending on the time it takes to get back to the surface in order to maintain a healthy decompression schedule.
Visualize nitrogen, helium, gastric gases, coming out of your body and occupying space in your breathing bag while the oxygen concentration is diminishing due to a reduction in depth while the pressure around you is reducing causing the volume of the bag to increase exponentially. That’s a mouthful!
Venting the bag is a practiced skill to maintain a safe return to the surface.
If an open circuit diver leaves their cylinder closed, there is nothing to breathe! They know it immediately.
If a closed circuit rebreather diver leaves their oxygen cylinder closed at the beginning of their dive, unless they closely monitor their oxygen content in their breathing bag, the oxygen will slowly be consumed and they will ultimately perish without much symptomatic warning. The oxygen concentration in the breathing bag on decent, increases with increased depth (physics) and is then consumed by the diver over time, until (s)he becomes euphoric and passes away. Failure to open their oxygen cylinder and monitor the oxygen content in the breathing bag (due to a distraction) kills more closed circuit divers than any other mistake they could make.
We mourn an experienced student of ours, (trained over a decade ago) who may have made such a costly mistake. Our prayers are with his family.

Back to list of columns

February 11, 2016

Proposed spearfishing ban using scuba in Southeast Florida.

Our Florida Reefs is a Florida community planning process designed to bring the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, South Florida Water Management District, scientists and marine-related professionals together on a plan to save our Florida reefs. This process, which currently has a focus on the four counties of Martin, Palm Beach, Broward and Dade, has been working on preserving Florida reefs since mid 2013. The final proposed document will soon be provided to the FWC for consideration.
A proposed Recommended Management Action (RMA) N-59 to ban (make spearfishing illegal by scuba divers) along the southeast Atlantic coast of Florida from Martin County southward, is open for public comment until Feb. 16.
Our Florida Reefs has prepared 68 recommendations, some reasonable, and some not, in an effort to protect Florida’s reefs. RMA -S97 proposes to reduce the Lobster mini season daily personal catch from 12 to 6. RMA S-87 makes collection of Parrot and Surgeon fish illegal.
RMA N-146 could establish no-take, and no-anchor zones along the east coast of Florida. RMA S-54 proposes Florida apply to UNESCO for the entire Florida reef track be designated a World Heritage Site. If granted, it is suggested Florida (and the U.S.) would be relieved of some of its sovereignty.
Treasure hunting and marine archaeology would come to a halt, and be managed by an international community.
I suggest there is, in this process, a bias, creating a scapegoat of our scuba spearfishermen and women, who select target species and limit their catch according to current management regulations.
Left out of this debate, are the vast majority of fishing people who catch anything that bites a hook and usually kill their catch on it’s rapid way to the surface (decompression), or after release by predation. Chase away the scuba spear fishing public and there will be no one left to help moderate the Lion Fish. I suspect frustrated east coast scuba spear fishermen will put even more pressure on the Gulf of Mexico. If there is a problem with overfishing the reef, then why not apply restrictions to all fishing, recreational and commercial, hook and line and spearfishing, breath-hold and scuba diving.
All South Florida residents and those who visit their beaches and enjoy ocean-related activities should visit OurFloridaReefs.org/rmacomment and submit your comments and recommendations to any or all of their RMAs.
The only recommendations however, that will actually reach the work groups are those submitted in writing. For Fishing, Diving, Boating & Other Uses/Restoration review please visit:
http://ourfloridareefs.org/fishing-diving-other-uses-restoration.
Once completed, the working groups of the Our Florida Reefs will submit their recommendation to the FWC, which will then decide whether or not to take on the action and work through their process, which could eventually become an amendment to the Marine Life Rules and be published as new fishing regulations.
I recommend anyone who dives or visits this coastline (and there are many of you who annually make the trek during the summer), review these recommendations, seek the blogs on line and express your concerns in writing to the Our Florida Reefs working group soon.

Back to list of columns

February 18, 2016

Scallops.

There are few more remarkably family friendly ocean activities than scalloping in North Florida.
All that is required is a good mask, fins and snorkel, collecting bag, dive flag and marine fishing license to enjoy this type of sport during our nice warm summer.
The water temperature is above 80 degrees, the sun is hot and may require a T-shirt, and abundant local knowledge is available to find productive sea grass beds.
Your efforts will result in a great harvest of these tasty creatures.
While many grass beds can be accessed from shore, the majority require a small boat.
In the shallow waters of North Florida, we have an abundance of grass beds. I love the extensive St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge beds beginning at the St. Marks Lighthouse out to five feet deep (up to several miles off the shore line) and running east around the Big Bend down to Stienhatchee.
There is/was a line of stakes marking the outer limits of the Refuge that I use as a reference. I like to anchor my boat in four feet of water and swim towards shore or find my way closer to protruding rock islands to anchor and swim about them.
Weather permitting, the water is calmer in the morning and I think best for scalloping on the high tide.
My family made a game of the sport. Breath hold diving is fun, teaching everyone buoyancy control, fin kicking and snorkel skills, and good lung ventilation.
We kept count of the number of scallops a person could find using one breath.
Depending on water visibility, search techniques varied. Some swam on the surface until a scallop was spotted, and then retrieved. You might find one or two on a single breath using this technique.
Others swim down and run their hands through the grass, disturbing the residents, making scallops swim, and thus made more obvious. In this way, I would collect around 10 on a single breath.
This year’s bag limits of 2 gallons of shells per person and no more than 10 gallons per boat, does restrict your catch, but conservation means more people can enjoy the activity.
This year’s season will begin a few days earlier on June 28 and run through Sept. 25.
Remember, scallops generally will be bigger as the summer progresses.
Cleaning scallops is fast and easy. Most people eat just the abductor muscle throwing the guts and shell away.
I pry the bivalve open with a dull kitchen knife, detach the muscle off one side (of one shell) and discard the shell. I then take my fingernail and sweep around the attached muscle on the remaining shell and pull the guts off that shell.
What is left is the muscle, which can be easily separated from the remaining shell. The raw scallop muscle tastes sweet but most prefer to cook them in butter or mix them with pasta and sauces.
Remember to take plenty of drinking water, sun tan lotion, a hat and a bucket to measure your catch. Be sure to stay within the safety limits of your dive flag.
A boat dive flag is 24 inches long while the floating flag you drag with you can be smaller.
And watch out for divers and their flags as you maneuver your boat around the sea grass beds.
Even though it’s cold out now, summer is just around the corner, and the scallops will be waiting.

Back to list of columns

February 25, 2016

Spearfishing in Florida

Rachel Schweers

By Rachel Schweers

Summer in Wakulla brings out the fishermen and women. Fishing in general is almost always good no matter how you capture the critters. The advantage of hook and line fishing is you seldom get wet and you seldom know what you catch until you bring it to the surface.
Spearfishing is a popular coastal passtime throughout North Florida. Either by holding ones breath or with the use of scuba equipment, divers hunt fish using specialized spearguns. The advantage with spearing the fish is you select the size and species you want. But you get wet and sometimes cold.
You can use a simple shaft, with a point and barb at one end, and some way to thust it.
Pole spears have a bungy cord that, when released, propel the pole at your target.
More sophisticated spearguns have a metal or wood body upon which a thin spear is laid and locked at one end, with bungy rubber tied to a metal wish bone, wire or strong line.
Once cocked, the shaft is sent at the target by pulling a pistol gripped trigger. And if you are really tech-y, your shaft can be propelled by a pneumatic (air) charge instead of a rubber band.
Spearfishing tournaments add the extra level of competition to the activity.
Either by weight of the fish they spear or by number of fish, participants strive to have the best collection of speared fish by the end of the competition day.
There are a great number of spearfishing tournaments put on every year in Florida, from the Alabama coast to the Keys, spanning the entire summer.
If a person is willing to travel, starting in May, a dedicated spearfisherman can participate in a new tournament almost every weekend until September.
Tournaments vary from the Destin Lionfish Derby where participants only hunt lionfish to the St. Pete Open with categories including grouper, snapper, and amberjack.
Prizes for these competitions vary from bragging rights, to cash prizes, to spearfishing equipment, to four-wheelers depending on the popularity of the tournament.
Raffles often accompany these spearfishing competitions. Depending on the tournament, tickets vary in price from $1-$10 for smaller prizes all the way to $100 a ticket for prizes as big as boats or live-aboard diving vacations.
There are also hook-and-line tournaments in North Florida. The Panacea Rock The Dock is one such tournament with five categories like kingfish and redfish. Just like spearfishing tournaments, hook-and-line fishing competitions often include high value prizes and raffles.
Here in Crawfordville, the third annual Wakulla Diving Center Spearfishing Challenge is being held on May 21.
Seven fishing categories are being offered including a lionfish category, grouper category, and a pelagic category.
A raffle will be accompanying this tournament with prizes worth over $1000.

Back to list of columns

March 03, 2016

Dyneema.

By Travis Kersting

In the winter of 2010 I worked at a manufacturing facility. We made cutting boards from a product called Rochlite, a material made of laminated recycled paper and phenolic resins, as well as high end plastic outdoor furniture.
The massive CNC (computer numeric controlled) router machines had a table holding 5×12-foot sheets of the materials that were cut using carbide tooling at up to 300 inches per minute and 20,000RPM.
If you were a nerd for manufacturing it was a beautiful thing to watch. If you didn’t know what was going on it would be terrifying due to flying debris and thousands of pounds of mass moving at crushing speeds.
To protect our hands from cuts from the razor-sharp carbide tooling, broken pieces of material, and while operating finishing tools we wore gloves. The gloves looked similar to the vinyl or rubber coated versions used in common gardening but at 10-20 times the price.
We would wear out a pair a week instead of destroying a pair of cotton gloves in every shift.
These specialty gloves were woven from a fiber material called Dyneema, a product trademarked as the world strongest fiber.
For years after I used them in tree trimming, fish filleting, and other activities where you need hand protection and dexterity.
In 2014, Spearfishing Specialties Company released a glove specifically for spearfishing. It was the same glove I was already using but with their logo printed on the back.
Other companies followed suit with identical products within three months.
Little more than variation in color is all that separates them.
Materials like Kevlar, though popular, do not lend themselves as well to making gloves but I regularly have people asking for Kevlar when shopping for hand protection.
I have a fair bit of experience working with Kevlar, carbon fiber, fiberglass, and other woven materials; Dyneema is in a class all of its own. The dexterity and comfort is unparalleled.
Dyneema isn’t just protecting divers from cuts or abrasions.
It’s also woven into lines used to attach the spear shaft to the speargun. It has an amazing tensile strength and cut resistance.
This makes for an ideal material when fishing around wreckage instead of using the monofiliment lines of the past.
The wishbone section of some speargun bands are also made from Dyneema especially on guns used in freediving.
In climbing and tree trimming Dyneema has revolutionized how workers complete their jobs. Rope Products like Amateel and Tenex are many times stronger than steel cable plus dynamic enough to handle the impact forces in Arboculture.
These ropes were originally designed for tree care but are now being adopted by boats of all sizes because of their strength to weight ratio, ease of splicing, and feel in the hand.
Even if you can’t tie knots, I can teach you to do a locking brummel splice on these Dyneema lines in about two minutes.
It may look like a regular pair garden gloves and just some funny colored rope but it’s a modern material with unexplored potential. How can you use Dyneema to make your job safer and more productive or your hobby more fun?

Back to list of columns

March 10, 2016

The Obsolete.

Back in my day – the 1960s – I could purchase a diving regulator and expect it would still get support decades later.
In 2000 I still dove with the regulator I purchased in 1970, with parts and service readily available to this day.
But much of this is rapidly fading. Perhaps equipment is not built to last as companies succeed based upon how many units are sold, not how many are serviced. I’m sure there are exceptions.
The warranty on my new well pump is a year. It replaces a pump I bought more than 30 years ago, that cost a fraction of today’s cost (fair enough), and I did some maintenance along the way.
Increasingly, I welcome students into training who have purchased their diving equipment on the used market. The internet has opened up a huge opportunity for people to purchase obsolete technology, often beyond its useful life, get it rebuilt, and squeak out a few more dives before it becomes a liability rather than an asset.
Companies, such as Daccor, which made an awesome regulator, have been out of business for decades. After-market rebuild parts from China are getting hard to find. After trying to keep up, we have had to reject these regulators for repair as the cost of customized parts becomes too expensive.
The first of the recent generation of rebreathers came on the scene in 1997, almost two decades ago. In that time, thousands have been made. Estimates show that as many as 80 percent are located in closets or garage storerooms.
The rebreather market now has hundreds of obsolete rebreathers available from divers who have either quit diving or moved on to better systems. Several companies have gone under, stopped providing parts and upgrades, resulting in their value plummeting.
What once sold as a $10,000 rebreather can now be had for just over $1,000. After-market retrofit companies are rising up to accommodate the vacuum created. Other companies have just refused to service their older models, forcing their customers to buy into upgrades, stop diving or shift to other companies.
Access to cheap, used rebreathers has meant folks who could not afford to dive with a rebreather, now can. Since there is no filter to insure divers get training, many become self trained.
With the incentive of a profit from selling a new rebreather, many instructors will not or cannot afford to provide training on these archaic rebreathers.
This situation provides the opportunity for increased injuries, which is not good for anyone. I do teach with these rigs, but I am retired and teach for other reasons than profit. Thus I see many more of these obsolete rigs.
More and more students come to us for training with required minimum credentials but not backed up with experience in technical experience.
I find my classes are taking longer to teach, and requiring a greater ramp up what with technical challenges facing a less experienced student.
Some quickly become bewildered.
Soon enough, I have another star struck young student at my door, dragging the same unit with the same problems we saw six months ago.

Back to list of columns

March 17, 2016

Change.

By Travis Kersting

Our season lasts six months. Scuba diving is mostly a warm water sport, but for us, something must change. Change is an interesting subject. It can be welcomed yet hard to digest at the same time.
We have known our dive shop needed a change for a while now as revenue drops to near nothing during the winter months. For example, each summer we get 25-30 requests to teach a basic scuba class, but we almost never connect to teach one. We teach rebreather and cave classes year-round that is the backbone of our current training. In the end of February, Gregg, Rachel, and myself traveled to North Carolina for a training session that may bring change to our business.
The training took place at Gypsy Dive Center, a Scuba Schools International (SSI) training facility. They also had a large onsite pool, offer swimming lessons to the public, have a regulator service department with six employees doing just servicing nationally. The building was purposefully built for aquatics for just over $1 million and they moved in a week before the Sept. 11 attacks in New York. In today’s money the same facility would be $3 million or more.
Their facility has between 400 and 750 swimming students a month throughout the year. They come from schools and individually. Each swimming lesson is 30 minutes a week and the students have an additional 30 minutes to play in the pool after class. In addition to the children learning to swim we saw several groups of people doing water aerobics and physical therapy. Because the pool is such a central part of the business it is visible from the store, halls, and classrooms. What a luxury it would be to have such a facility in Wakulla County.
Part of the training we took was to improve sales, training and inventory management. And part was to network ideas with a dozen other stores. One of the things we liked was the idea of a store club where members got reduced prices on travel, cylinder rental, and free access to the pool. To date we have never booked a travel opportunity with customers, and while we don’t have a pool, perhaps we can work with a pool in south Tallahassee to make space available.
The model is to integrate multiple interconnecting revenue streams to encourage people to dive. It is not enough to just have inventory. After all, we know a store is all about service. Recreational dive students like warm water with pretty creatures, which is scarce here in Wakulla County. The speaker said to plan checkout dives in warm places (called travel). We have all been working on rearranging the store to give it a more open feeling and we are putting up mannequins to display equipment.
Perhaps the hardest change of all is something I never guessed would happen: During our training we learned about alternative home-based training with excellent quality online or digital educational options, call it an electronic book (a hard copy is also available). SSI’s media package allows the student to learn at home using any device they like and to spend four times as much time in the pool as with other online training packages recommended. Students still come to a dive center and discuss academic topics learned online.
All this change is hard to swallow. Certainly it will cost both time and money to implement, but hopefully we will apply these changes in a way to improve the diving experience for all.

Back to list of columns

March 24, 2016

Where did the porpoise come from?

Now that summer is nearly upon us, aquatic adventurers will again encounter our playful marine creatures and wonder where they came from.
They are intelligent, air-breathing mammals, with which we hold considerable empathy.
At one time they must have had land ancestors that moved back into the sea. J.G.M Thewissen et al, in 2009 shed light on this question in a paper called “From Land to Water: The Origins of Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises.”
The Cetaceans, as this group is called, originated around 50 million years ago, during the Eocene epoch.
The transition is documented through a series of intermediate fossils from India and Pakistan.
They report that Cetaceans are unrelated to sirenians (manatees and dugongs) which are more related to elephants and, the pinnepids (seals, sea lions and walruses) which are more closely related to dogs and bears.
I was so willing to believe porpoises were related to dogs! Bummer.
I argued that our empathy with porpoises was akin to similar social behaviors we share with our pet dogs.
The mystery was unveiled however, from Himalayan fossils discovered in 2007. Raoellidae is one of the families only known from fossil specimens.
These animals were the size of a cat, but with a long snout, a long tail and long slender limbs. These limbs had at their terminus four or five toes that ended in hooves.
Further similarity in early morphology (bones), lead scientists to later fossils (Ambullocetus) 41 million years ago that look more like the land based predecessor of the cetacean of today. These protocetds (early cetaceans) spread out over the world with a diverse fossil record in Asia, then Africa, Europe and North America gaining worldwide distribution by the middle of the Eocene.
Early protocetids most likely spent time in and out of the water, much like seals do today.
By the period of 34 millions year ago, the first representatives of the modern whales, and odontocytes (toothed cetaceans) immerged. They had developed echo-locating capability by this time.
This distinguishing feature, emitting noises that are recovered after reflecting off objects, persists today.
Body form continued to streamline as the various groups became dedicated to a strictly marine form, resulting in the creatures that fascinate us today. Much of these revelations in science have happened in just the past two decades.
Further research is needed to find out why these creatures moved from lush land environments into the ocean.
Were they forced into the ocean due to overwhelming competition, or predation or drawn to a better food sources. Once in the ocean however, they proliferated worldwide quickly.
Figure 27 of Thewissen’s paper did give me some delight as the proto cetacean Ambullocetus sure looks like a dog to me!

Back to list of columns

March 31, 2016

Dry, Underwater.

While our bodies are made up of water, mostly, we require air to breathe. To consume the oxygen out of air, the surfaces of our lungs, bronchial passages and nasal area must remain moist, all in an effort to moisturize the dry air.
To transfer these gases into our liquid body, we require moisture. Dry air is an oxymoron; opposites better defining a process.
I heard this again today as I worked with a drysuit class during checkout dives.
The objective for using a drysuit is to stay dryer and warm underwater.
As you know, the more popular and less costly wetsuit permits water to circulate between a neoprene layer and your skin.
After the shock of the entry, where cold water cools your skin down, your body warms the water and since the warm water is now contained, the wetsuit slows down the heat loss for the rest of the dive.
A drysuit skips the part where cold water hits your skin. Seals on your wrists and neck keep the water out. Thermal clothing that resembles a bed roll, more efficiently help keeps the body heat in (like a jacket).
But, unlike the wetsuit, in an air environment, the body sweats water into the dry suit. Your skin cannot sweat when in contact with water.
By definition, a functional drysuit is not dry. New award-winning technology relocates the sweated water away from your skin by wicking it towards the outer layers near the suit skin.
After an hour dive in my “dry suit,” I look like my suit has sprung a leak when I peel out.
There are many ways for water to penetrate the suit, from external to internal sources. The drysuit becomes no better than a wetsuit when flooded, perhaps worse.
A functional drysuit is also a source of buoyancy. When flooded, it becomes very heavy and can be dangerous.
Air we breathe underwater is made dryer than atmospheric air to minimize corrosion in our diving cylinders. We dehydrate the body by trying to make the compressed air more breathable on open circuit (bubbling diver).
Have you heard of cotton mouth? When you finish a dive on open circuit, you need to drink lots of water to make up for what you lost when trying to moisturize the compressed dry air.
But when using a closed circuit rebreather (no bubbles diver) it’s just the opposite. A dry rebreather is nonfunctional. We again need the moisture to active the removal of carbon dioxide from our exhaled breath.
The chemicals we use to remove carbon dioxide create heat (some say better than a wetsuit) and more water. Coupled with the water we exhale from the body, this moisture condenses on the interior of the rebreather and must be captured (not unlike the drysuit).
I generate up to a cup of water every hour! I prefer the rebreathers that capture this water in sponges and the counter lungs. Counter lungs are bags we breathe into and out of during the dive.
Many in diving search for the dry micro environments but in reality what we mean is to say we search for the warm microenvironments. Partially flooded dry suits and rebreathers may function just fine as long as you remain warm.
There is, after all, only a relatively dryer space underwater.
Be warm, (not dry) underwater.

Back to list of columns

April 07, 2016

Spot, Our Magic Dragon.

By Rachel Schweers

We are happy to welcome our newest aquarium friend, Spot the ocellated moray eel, locally sometimes called a honeycomb eel, or black edged eel (Gymnothorax saxicola).
Ocellated Morays are mostly brown with golden spots over their whole body. The underside of oscillated moray eels are mostly light gold. Their tail is trimmed with black, giving them their common name.
This species of eel is native to the northern portions of the Gulf of Mexico and are most concentrated on the coasts of Florida. This small species of eel only grows to 20-35 cm long and are docile aquarium residents.
In the wild, these animals hunt in shallow sea grass beds but prefer to hide under rocks and in crevices for most of the day.
Individuals tend to establish a “home base” where they spend most of the day peering out of their rocky hiding place with their mouths wide open as a way of tasting and smelling the water for food.
Like most moray eels, occellated moray eels have poor eyesight but a keen sense of smell, which they use to hunt small fish, crustaceans octopi and squid.
Unlike most other eels, ocellated morays tend to hunt during daylight hours.
This species is popular for aquariums because they remain small even as adults and make entertaining tank residents as they are aggressive and tend to try to eat anything that will fit in their mouths.
So much so that it is advised to only keep these animals in environments with fish much larger than the eels so they do not attempt to eat them.
Spot has a habit of eating so many bait fish on feeding days that he ends up stuffed and can barely move.
Spot will even pull food from the claws and mouths of his fellow aquarium predators. While ocellated morays are not venomous, their mouths are full of bacteria that easily infect any bite that they may inflict on people. Such bites almost exclusively happen as a result of self-defense. These eels tend to try to avoid people.
Our Spot is a deviation from the norm in this respect. He (she?) is very willing to interact with people who come by our aquarium, often found swimming and dancing as people direct him with their finger on the tank glass.
We hope to have Spot as our liaison to the underwater world for a long time to come.
Spot shares our aquarium with two Lion Fish and a swimming crab. We are not sure if Spot is female or male, but s/he has no fear of any other resident.
Visitors, especially young ones, gravitate to our aquarium and ask lots of questions.
As marine biologists, we love to talk about the wonderful underwater world.

Back to list of columns

April 14, 2016

Water Quality.

As a visually oriented creature, the quality of our water is critical. Most will agree since we drink the stuff. But as a diver, we immerse ourselves with full body contact in the water we dive.
Talk to the fishermen on the Panama City Jetty, as we did last week, and they will tell you they caught very little from the tea-colored water. That’s because fish often need good visibility to see the bait. But to our divers on their first ocean dives, the same conditions were stressful! Near the surface we could see 5 feet away because of the limited penetration of light. But the deeper we went, the less light could penetrate, and the less could be seen.
Recent heavy rain brought about flooding conditions on land. Swamps overloaded into underground conduits as the water table rose. These caves delivered high tannin and sediment (land run off) levels to the bays and ocean, where all rain eventually reaches.
In our case, St Andrews Bay, swollen by this land discharge, overwhelmed the tides and pumped seaward past our divers at the jetties. So much for tide charts to predict the best dive conditions. Local divers have reported similar conditions offshore.
Water loves to stratify (remain separate), based upon its contents. Rain is freshwater, with a weight of 62.4 pounds per cubic feet. The salt in ocean water means it is heavier, at 64 pounds per square foot. At sea, freshwater will float on salt water until mixed by waves. We saw this phenomena at the Jetties, with a mixing zone between the layers. The upper 25 feet of fresh water was headed out to sea while the remainder of the water below 30 feet was slowly headed into the bay. The foot between the two water masses created an optical illusion of wavering images. A denser and darker layer hugged the inlet floor, heavy with sediment. Each body of water had a different temperature. Our students had a chance to witness a thermocline (sudden change in depth related temperature), halocline (sudden change in depth related salinity) and picnocline (sudden change in depth related density).
What are the consequences of a low visibility dive? A flashlight will provide very little help, but we did use them. Divers like to land on the sea floor, which on the jetties, means landing on sea urchins and their spines. Fish tend to bump into you before dashing away, which means fishing hooks are not too far away. As long as you don’t let your imagination run away with you, the fish that bump into you are probably more frightened than you are. And we always carry a line cutting knife. Most people see little reason to dive under these conditions, yet the jetties were diver popular last weekend.
Water borne chemicals are of concern to divers. We are pleased to know our water seldom carries toxic concentrations here in the North Florida. Our skin will absorb chemicals in the water when we dive. A few sinkholes in South Florida carry dissolved hydrogen sulfide, a close relative to hydrogen cyanide. Diving near sewer outfalls is never a good idea as pathogens hazardous to humans abound. There was/is concern that oil dispersal agents left over from the Gulf oil spill are affecting marine life. More on that topic later.
As we submerge ourselves in our aquatic environment, we need to be more aware of the consequences of our surrounding water quality. And for the mean time, we seek a better water quality for checkout dives.

Back to list of columns

April 21, 2016

BCDs.

By Aaron Weese

You’ve been diving for a while and either own a buoyancy control device (BCD) or have exhausted all of your possible rental options and are ready for a new rig.
Where do you start?
Of course as you begin your search for the perfect BCD for you, confusion quickly mounts.
With the many options of BCDs on the market, they can be simplified into three main categories with each possessing their own attributes.
So, with that in mind let’s talk about the three main categories and attributes of each.
First, let’s discuss the most widely seen BCD out there – the jacket style.
There’s a reason you see these type of BCDs in rental fleets at just about any dive operation out there, and that reason is simplicity. Simple in the sense that you can strap on a single tank, hook up the inflator, tug on a few adjustment straps and dive!
Jacket BCDs can be inexpensive, although some models can be higher end. So with that in mind, they are often the logical choice for the new diver.
The weaknesses of jacket style BCDs lies in the fact that they cannot grow with your diving as they are only designed to accept a single tank and usually don’t possess any modular characteristics. If you’re looking for a solution that can be adjusted as your diving grows, read on.
The BCD that many divers see as a good “middle ground” is the back inflate BCD.
While many are simple like a jacket style BCD with a bladder that inflates behind you, many are modular and can be adjusted and altered to grow with your diving.
Some of these consist of units manufactured by Dive Rite and Hollis. These units feature the ability to change bladders to adjust lift for larger and multiple cylinder use, as well as bolt on accessories like butt plates to add the ability to carry accessories needed for technical and specialty diving.
While back inflate BCDs can be a great option, there are some who are looking for these features in a more streamlined package.
The final option we will discuss is the Back Plate and Wing BCD, or BP/W for short.
These units were once thought to be only for the hardcore diver but many are finding them to be excellent options for the novice diver as well, mainly for their simplicity and infinite adjustment and modular characteristics. Like many back inflate BCDs the BP/W can be adjusted for type and complexity of diving but accomplishes it in a simpler and more minimalistic fashion.
The BP/W begins with a hard back plate, simple 2-inch webbing harness and an air cell and can be altered in a number of ways to adjust to your diving style.
So there you have it, if you simply place BCDs into these three main categories and determine your needs,  your search will be a little less daunting.
Spend some time at your local dive center to try the three options and discuss the topic further. Think twice and purchase once!

Reprinted by permission of author.

Back to list of columns

April 28, 2016

Cylinders.

By Travis Kersting

If you are not a diver, you may have little appreciation of what a scuba cylinder is used for, but there is a good chance you encounter cylinders containing compressed gases in other parts of your life.
The cola machine at every restaurant is charged by carbon dioxide stored inside a cylinder much like those used by divers. Nitrogen – now being put into many tires on the road – is first stored in a cylinder.
A cylinder is a container with a valve for carrying hazardous materials. Hazardous materials, in our case, is any pressurized gases over 40 psi (this number recently changed to 2 bar or about 30 psi in some definitions). The air around you is at 15 psi is then pressurized to about 3000 psi/200bar when it is put into a scuba cylinder.
Because we put so much pressure into these cylinders it is important they be properly designed, tested, and inspected to ensure safety of anyone that could end up in contact with it.
Most scuba divers are well aware of these tests and inspections. A hydrostatic requalification is done every five years for most types of cylinders in scuba and elsewhere. This test is required by law. Cylinders are then visually inspected, at least annually, to standards set forth by the Compressed Gas Association (CGA) and the manufactures of the cylinders.
Over almost three decades an inspection system was established, revised and is now consistently used, an 18 step protocol, which is recognized by government entities, courts, scuba training agencies, and the manufactures themselves.
Gregg Stanton has been teaching PSI inspection since almost the beginning and I took over in 2012. We teach a few people every year for our own internal use and for the last few years I’ve taught at least one military or government group per year.
Typically there is little need for a diver to be certified to do their own inspections because it simply isn’t cost effective for them. The training runs about $300, must be updated every three years, and the tools can cost hundreds of dollars.
Still, most inspections are highly subjective. An individual must determine how much rust is too much or if a thread is damaged beyond a particular threshold. We have CGA and manufacturers reference charts for comparison, but some things are more difficult to quantify than others. For this we have the luxury that most individuals don’t have, access to several other well trained inspectors with hundreds or thousands of inspections under their belts.
Very few cylinders fail inspections and fewer fail hydrostatic requalification but whenever there is anything questionable it becomes a community event here and as many people take part as possible.
You can tell our diving community take cylinder safety very seriously and inspect each and every cylinder as part of a multi-step process, which incorporates the basic 18 step process from PSI. Regardless if you have a cylinder of CO2 for a home brewing system, a scuba cylinder, or an oxygen cylinder from a cutting torch it must go through the same thorough inspection.
If you ever have questions related to cylinders please don’t hesitate to contact us, we’ll advise you for free and help any way that we can.

Back to list of columns

May 05, 2016

Talking Underwater.

If we could breathe water, we could not talk as we know it. Marine creatures do communicate through audio means. Whales transmit and receive very low frequency sounds across vast oceans. Porpoise emit high frequency noises that allow them acoustical sight (bouncing signals that penetrate the skin of their prey to reflect detail even in poor visibility). And reef fish emit sounds that when received by others across the reef, enable a degree of socializing that only recently has been appreciated by diving scientists.
Our sound generating vocal cords require a particular density of gas to produce the base tones we then modify in our mouth. Underwater, as depth increases, the density of the gas increases. Sounds generated with higher density gas are distorted. We must slow down the speech to be better understood. Add narcosis, the consequence of Nitrogen under elevated pressure, renders people to giggling fools when tested in a hyperbaric chamber. But the sobering effect of cold water means folks don’t realize they are impaired at depths beyond 130 feet. We add helium to reduce the density of the gas, making the breathing medium easier to breath and diluting the nitrogen.
Most scuba divers know they can’t talk through their regulator. The loud exhaled bubbles interfere with the transmission and reception. And the regulator in your mouth restricts the articulation of words. Many take to diving because they don’t want to talk anyway.
Back in the 1970s, I found a gadget with a handle, a rubber opening that enclosed my mouth and a rubber diaphragm on the other end. I could fill the unit with air and broadcast words in the direction of my partner underwater and if (s)he held their breath, might be able to understand me. This expanded into using a glove or plastic bag. It was a cool toy. Later, while attending the Scientist-In-The-Sea Program, I was introduced to serious (and expensive) electronic communication technology, both wireless and hard wired.
Gone was the mouthpiece, replaced by an oral nasal cup that improved articulation. We still needed to speak slowly. And reliability was reduced due to the nature of electronics underwater. We found the more we talked underwater the higher the CO2 built up in the mask or helmet. Definitely, communications became a series of short words from below the water. “Roger,” “Affirmative,” “Going up” – you get the message. But the benefit was we could reduce the requirement for a buddy. Our buddy was on the surface, capable of pulling us up if needed, and sending supplies down on a needs basis.
A recent project to clean out some intake boxes found me on the end of a short umbilical, my head in a helmet, working for four hours while sending tools up and down, buckets of sediment to the surface, and wrestling a jet water pump all in zero visibility. All the while, we had a dialogue with the surface that sped the job up nicely. I was talking underwater. I did need to curtail the chatter near the end as a CO2 headache set in, but safety and efficiency was the result of the ability to talk underwater.
The next generation of divers will be talking underwater. Rebreathers allow us to talk through vibrating hoses and a large mouthpiece with little distortion since we do not release noisy exhaust gasses. Again, witness a return to the future, talking into an air filled diaphragm.

Back to list of columns

May 12, 2016

The cost of underwater training.

By Travis Kersting

On Friday of this week I posted a question to Facebook: How much should scuba training cost?
In the 16 years since I was first certified to dive I said I would never teach scuba. The sport is fun, the people are often amazing, but there simply isn’t enough income in it to make a living. That may seem shocking when you see the price of scuba training at anywhere from $300 to $500 locally.
First let’s look at the expense for someone to become a scuba instructor. I’m going to ignore the expense of all the previous training and equipment that would have been required, but that amount can be tens of thousands of dollars. The instructor course materials from an internationally recognized training agency will usually be a few hundred dollars just by themselves. An instructor must attend a training seminar where they are evaluated and that course can be as much as $1,500 plus the travel expenses to get there. With simple rounding, our new instructor spends about $2,000-2,500 just to earn that title. On top of that they must buy liability insurance, costing upwards of $1,000 a year plus diving specific insurance from the Diver’s Alert Network which is another $200 or so. Let’s not forget the expense of membership fees to the training agency which are another $200-800 a year depending on the agency as many instructors choose to teach for more than one agency. At this point, just to teach basic scuba, they will have easily “invested” nearly four thousand dollars.
It doesn’t much matter where you teach. You’ll work for something between free (most commonly) and $200 per class (not per student). That can make paying off your investment almost impossible. But if the student is paying $400 and there are three other students in the course why does the instructor get paid so little? Well, your course requires a bunch of things that are very expensive. The instructor or dive store must provide you with books, learning materials, and eventually a certification card. Those items can cost $40 to over $100 depending on the agency. Because the store wants to sell equipment they require the instructor buy and teach in the equipment the store sells, further adding to the instructors “investment”.
An instructor friend told me they must teach over 100 students just to break even on their initial investment plus yearly insurance then teach an additional 100 a year to have an income they can live on. If you wanted to do a single tandem skydive it could cost $200-300 dollars. In scuba, we do promotional “try scuba” courses for free and some places charge up to $59. In flying you pay thousands of dollars to become a recreational pilot. In golf you may pay $250 for a 1 hour lesson from a highly rated instructor. These other professionals enjoy their sports and get paid a salary commensurate with their knowledge and experience. So why is scuba different?
I ask, how much should scuba training cost? If I was an instructor (I am not at this time) and if you were paying me to spend five days teaching your children to dive, adjusting their equipment, answering questions at 11 p.m. the night before a dive, and otherwise providing the best service I can, wouldn’t you think it’s fair for me to be compensated like any other professional? Just curious.

Back to list of columns

May 19, 2016

Scuba connections.

By Travis Kersting

I doubt it matters what age you are and you still probably had an elementary school teacher tell you that the USA would switch to the metric system.
For me it was probably 24 years ago and unless you are a scientist you probably still aren’t using it. The concept is simple, and there is a joke about how 1 joule of energy heats 1 cubic centimeter of water by 1 degree Celsius and that 1 cc weighs 1 gram so it makes conversions within the system very easy, contrary to the imperial system.
We divers wear a metal cylinder on our back, which caries compressed breathing gas. To make breathing this gas more easily at depth, we must attach a regulator which reduces the high pressure of the tank to that of the ambient water.
The weakest component of this life support technology is the connection between tank and air delivery system.
When I started diving in 2000-01 we had “yoke” or “A-clamp” 1st stage regulators to rent but even then my instructor knew about the European connection technology and said it would be what everyone on scuba uses in the future.
When scuba was a young device, the pressure was relatively low at 1800 to 2250 psi. Then came 3000 aluminum cylinders. Today we commonly find steel cylinders at 3500 psi.
What was designed to hold 1800 psi cannot withstand 3500 psi without breaking.
The DIN connection meant only the regulator needed an O-ring seal instead of each cylinder. The single seal was more securely captured to prevent an extrusion under higher pressure.
The connection could also handle higher pressures than yoke. In the USA, it is a violation to use yoke technology above 3500 psi.
An additional benefit of DIN is the lack of another knob to snag on things like underwater line. Perhaps the best benefit of all was that with the assistance of an adapter, this connection could be fitted to virtually any scuba valve in the world.
When I purchased my first regulator in 2004 I had to special order it with the European connector called “DIN” for Deutshe Industrie Norm along with a spin on connector to make it possible to use with yoke valves. The extra expense was considerable.
At the time when I ordered scuba cylinders they were only available with yoke valves so I had to special order DIN valves in addition. Because they were not common in the U.S. I had to pay about $100/valve (for each of my four cylinders) in addition to the $150 cylinders.
At least shipping was free back then.
Here we are between 12 and 16 years from when I first started using and buying scuba gear and still DIN isn’t totally recognized worldwide.
If you are traveling to Europe, Asia, up the east coast or west coast or even to my home state of Minnesota you will likely find DIN cylinders for rent. If you travel within the southeast U.S., Caribbean, Bahamas, or parts of Mexico you will still find the yoke connection to be prominent but that seems to be changing too.
When you consider your next regulator or cylinder/valve purchase, be sure to look at how they will be connected. Because, unlike America’s continued use of the Imperial measurement system, the metric system is the standard in the rest of the world, even with our community of divers.

Back to list of columns

May 26, 2016

A spearfishing contest.

By GS and TK

People who spear fish are likely to harvest deer, turkey, and other game animals during the winter.
They are a competitive and hearty group, many of which participate in tournaments throughout the state. Locally they surpassed all expectations this year by participating in at least two tournaments this May and bringing in record numbers of fish.
Lionfish Removal and Awareness Day (LRAD), an annual tournament in Pensacola with over 700 people attending on May 14-15, is dedicated to harvesting the invasive species currently devastating our North Gulf reefs. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation reported that LRAD resulted in harvesting over 8,000 Lionfish!
They also captured a new state size limit record for Lionfish of 445 millimeters or just over 17.5 inches.
Lionfish meals are now be available from local restaurants and raw fish from Whole Foods Markets. (see http://myfwc.com/news/news-releases/2016/may/18/lrad/ for more details).
Last week Wakulla Diving Center also agreed to serve as a depository of captured Lion Fish tails, in support of the FWC’s Lionfish Challenge, an incentive to exchange 100 Lionfish tails for a special permit to collect an extra Red Grouper or Cobia beyond bag limits.
The Panhandle Pilot Program will run from May 14 through May 20, 2017. Fill out the FWC Lionfish Challenge Check-In Form (available on the FWC website or at any Checkpoint location).
Not to be left out, Wakulla Diving Center hosted its 3rd annual Spearfishing Challenge on the 20th and 21st of this last week.
While the final Lionfish tally is not in, it is rumored to approach 300 or nearly 10 times the number harvested in 2015.
Of that almost 250 were harvested by only two divers. Preliminary data from FWC suggests these targeted harvests are having an impact on the destructive effects of this invasive species. Like the Pensacola Tournament, two days were dedicated to the event.
Bad weather on Friday prevented the majority of the 53 participants from going out. But they made up for it on Saturday. More than 150 people participated in the festivities consuming donated fresh fish during the weigh-in party that followed.
Though FWC has been promoting the harvesting of lionfish for several years, we are just now having divers report them regularly on virtually every local reef.
Even if only one or two are observed, it still means they are moving in.
Many report carpets of Lionfish across the ocean floor. Because of this there won’t be a decline in area tournaments or derbies to promote their capture.
We’ll hopefully be working with a local Eagle Scout to hold a lionfish derby in August and have already discussed plans for 2017’s events.
This won’t be the last we talk about lionfish.

Back to list of columns

June 02, 2016

George Fischer, 1937-2016.

Sunday we lost another pioneer in our quest to understand the underwater world. A resident of Tallahassee and a U.S. National Park Service (USNPS) archaeologist, George was well known as the father of underwater archaeology for the Park Service. Back in the late 1970s, perhaps earlier, I met George as one of the few on-campus resources at FSU working underwater. The USNPS had an office within the Anthropology Department where they sponsored graduate students with funds, and opportunity to study within National Parks and Monuments. The group was and is still called the Southeast Archaeology Center. We collaborated for 20 years.
I brought underwater life support and research technology. He brought research opportunity and students. Soon George provided guest speakers to my Applications of Diving to Research class. Our students began conducting pilot projects at coastal National Parks up and down the East Coast and across the Gulf of Mexico. My biology course drew criticism from my department because too many of the participating students were not biologists. In a sweeping move, Provost Turnbull provided each of three departments funding to support three classes: an advanced basic Introduction to Compressed gas, an Underwater Techniques within the Department of Anthropology, and the original Department of Biological Sciences Applications of Diving to Research Class.
Not long thereafter the basic class was moved to the Department of Oceanography and our holistic science diving opportunities took off. Anthropology soon elevated their class to a Field School status for 6 credits.
George was involved in every bit of my 20 years at the main campus of FSU, serving on our Dive Control Board, advising everyone on underwater research techniques and opportunities, and even assisted me in our earliest Underwater Crime Scene Investigation training with what is now called the FWC (then called the Marine Patrol). We agreed that our field of science, be it biology, criminology, anthropology, oceanography, chemistry, exercise physiology, whatever, would be blended in our courses, thus exposing our students to other ways of approaching underwater science. Our collaboration was so effective, the Anthropology Department launched a PhD program in Underwater Archaeology!
At my departure from the main campus in 2000, the Academic Diving Program had approximately 100 registered multidiscipline diving scientists, about a third from Anthropology, and George Fischer very much involved. I can go on about the 300-plus pilot projects George and I attended, many under his tutelage.
I would start out by saying “there we were on the deck of the RV Bellows in search of the Nuestra Senora del Rosario, with our students in small inflatable boats searching for telltale cannon, evidence of the shipwreck, when one team lead by Harold Moffitt (Geology Department) contacted me about a find. I realized what it was and called George over the radio that we had found a cannon nest. His reply was for radio silence as I had just announced to all the treasure salvagers listening in where to search after we left! Oops! George and I had an ongoing discussion about the non-renewable nature of his trade and the renewable nature of mine (biology).
To say that we have lost a loved one in George Fischer’s passing is an understatement. I am certain his many students now in leadership roles around the country, will band together to perpetuate his legacy.
What an adventure we had, George!

Back to list of columns

June 09, 2016

New recruits.

I often spend time working with young aspiring aquatic scientists (in training).
Two weeks ago the Texas A&M University at Galveston again brought their Scientific Diving class (24 strong this time) through North Florida for cavern training.
I participate, at the request of Dr. Tom Iliffe, their director, for an entire week of overhead training.
We begin in Morrison Springs north of Panama City, then Jackson Blue north of Marianna. Here we begin the land drills, eyes closed, feel the line drills so needed by people who collect data, not always in clear water.
We move on then to Peacock Springs north of Mayo and end at Ginnie, south of High Springs.
Here students practice navigation skills and lost line/lost diver drills. I hope I will see the day when I can proudly include Wakulla Springs in that exposure.
Without such exposures, the next generation of diving scientists will surely pass our county by.
Once done with me, Dr. Iliffe’s class moved over to Panama City where they were hosted by the Naval Lab as they expand into salt water exercises.
This summer, many will take another class offered in Mexico that studies the cenotes and marine life associated with coastal systems. Students spend two weeks studying marine and cave ecosystems, diving, and learning about local cultures, (speaking Spanish, eating authentic food, etc.).
The students use the underwater data collection techniques they learned in the diving program of the previous class to gather information about the environments in the Yucatan.
Several return to us to get further advanced training in cave, deep and rebreathers. One such person is Rachel Schweers, a Texas native who over the past four years since she attended Dr. Iliffe’s class, secured her Master’s Degree from the University of South Florida in Tampa.
During that time she also trained up to diving rebreathers in deep caves (requiring helium breathing mixtures) to gather her dissertation’s data.
I am pleased that for the past year she has also been working at our facility as an intern, securing her NAUI and IANTD Instructor certifications.
Before the end of the summer she will also become a rebreather instructor (if she passes the exams).
I see more and more of Dr. Iliffe’s students showing up in Florida and filling much needed underwater positions that once were filled by Florida Universities. My compliments to the vision now fulfilled in Texas that is helping Florida move forward again.
On Saturday I was invited to the YMCA in Bainbridge Georgia, to discuss opportunities in underwater science. I guess as we age, recruitment becomes an increasingly important job. Several young recruits were searching for opportunities to study Marine Science. I found them as interested in the opportunities in science as they were in the technology that will permit them to study at depth.
With few opportunities left in Florida, I had to encourage them to look towards Texas.
When and how can we go back to the future?

Back to list of columns

June 16, 2016

Scallops 2016.

Our much anticipated scallop season will begin on Saturday June 25, and run until Sept. 24.
Harvest is limited to state waters from the Pasco-Hernando countyline north and west to the west bank of Mexico Beach canal in Bay County. There is a catch limit this year of 2 gallons for intact scallops (with shell) per person and 10 gallons limit per boat or 1 pint scallop meat per person and 1/2 gallon meat per boat all per day.
The FWC survey of the red tide damage to scallops in 2015 in St Joe Bay MAY (not determined as of Monday) move the harvest location limit eastward to exclude Gulf County in 2016. Stay tuned to the FWC website for further development. Fortunately, the vast St. Marks grass beds rebounded last year from a disastrous 2014 harvest. We can only hope for a continued rebounding this year.
Our Bay Scallop (Argopectin irradians) can be plentiful due to our extensive shallow grass beds off the armpit of Florida. These creatures drop out of the water column (plankton) early in the year and attach to grass blades, then morph into the shell form, albeit very small, that we recognize as the Shell emblem (as at the gas station). Over the early and warm part of the summer, they feed on plankton and grow out into their adult size. There is no harvest size limitation, but expect to find larger creatures later in the summer. Several months ago, while we were cleaning out a water intake in Franklin County, we found scallops the side of a dime to a quarter.
With my newly acquired boat, you can be sure I will be out collecting these magnificent creatures. I prefer to harvest in depths between 3 and 6 feet of water, a bit less that the FWC recommends at 4 to 8 feet. While scuba is permitted, I prefer to use mask, snorkel and fins, testing how many scallops I can find on one breath. Years ago my best one breath catch was 15, but I doubt I can do that now. I run my hand through the grass blades to scare the scallops into flight, and then grab them in mid water. If they are too small, I release them to grow out a bit more. I have a 2 gallon limit after all. I carry a small mesh bag between my buddy and I, and always drag a floating dive flag. My boat also flies the 20×24 inch larger dive flag as required by the FWC.
I clean the scallop by inserting a small blade to cut the abductor muscle on shell which exposes the internals. I remove the “guts” by sweeping my thumb nail around the muscle still attached to the shell, grab the guts and pull. Some keep the guts to make a stew of the gonads and other parts. I like the muscle best. My kids used to keep the shells and make shell leis (from Hawaii) for our Fourth of July party. I also see these shells show up at restaurants as the shell for crab cake. They are beautiful shells.
Now there are more than 50 ways to cook scallops (listed on the internet!). Or eat them raw. The raw scallop meat is sweet and flavorful. OK, yes, I also like raw oysters. To each their own. At least try one just for me. My next favorite recipe is lightly fried in butter, with onions and parsley.
Everyone in the family can enjoy this activity, but shield against the relentless sun. Be sure your boat has a canopy, wear at least a T-shirt, better yet, a full body rash guard in the water and waterproof sun block and a hat while in the boat.
Go out early in the day so that you can beat the late afternoon showers. Be safe and enjoy one of North Florida’s great adventures!

Back to list of columns

June 23, 2016

Background behind Hola Hola.

As a Senior at The University of Hawaii back in the 60s, I took an Ehnobotany class from a German American names Beatrix Klaus. She taught us the medicinal value of plants around the world. Such studies continue today, but include many of the ocean invertebrates as well. Graduates of this class spread out across the Pacific in search of lost medical lore.
Each of us were required to write a paper on a plant describing its therapeutic value. As a fish biologist, my imagination drifted ocean-ward. I was delighted to read about the “lost” art of Hola Hola, or Vegetative Fish Poisoning.
Century old descriptions were available, including sites where the technique was performed by royalty near the City of Refuge on the Big Island (Hawaii). I had just spent a summer working as a National Park Ranger on this same island, becoming friends with local Hawaiians in the Kalapana District (under the active volcano). Off I went to the Big Island to conduct an ethonobiology survey.
There I met a Chinese Hawaiian family, who brought me a phonetically transcribed (in Hawaiian) and typed manuscript called Booke La’au, or Book of Medicine from their grandmother, a known witchdoctor. I brought it back to Dr. Krause to translate by a blind Hawaiian classmate.
Later, while I was splicing film, she was excitedly tellimng me she had found several passages related to the plant I sought used to treat cataracts. My good grade in this class was assured!
When the National Park established Volcanoes NP, they set forth plans to remove the ethnic Hawaiian population to the outskirts of the park. There I met one disgruntled and now blind man who was pleased to tell me about Tephorsia purpurea, a plant he very much wanted to help cure his cataracts. So he told me where to find the plants, behind his old homestead in the Park below the volcano.
The volcano erupted soon after, leaving me no choice but to make an 8 mile dash on foot across the Kalapana rocky coastline ahead of advancing lava. There at his abandoned village, we found Tephrosia right where he said they would be!
We transplanted as many as we could carry on our backs and fled in time to reach his house before his old village was buried in lava. We planted a few of the plants in his yard and watched him burn some leaves, passing the smoke over his eyes. But an idea was forming.
The remainder of our plants were replanted at the City of Refuge on the other side of the volcano. There, we were assisted by an elderly Hawaiian Park Ranger that mentioned that as a child he performed the Hola Hola and would be pleased to recreate the procedure. I jumped at the opportunity! I sought and secured funds to purchase 8mm color film, built an underwater camera, and assembled what we knew about Hola Hola, which wasn’t much.
Our Hawaiian Park Ranger friend brought his grandchild to serve in the capacity he once served under his grandfather, all in the dress of their day. And as we filmed, he taught his grandchild the Hola Hola. His performance doubled what information we had collected from the literature. The filming took one tidal cycle, and three months of splicing to create a 30 minute documentary film.
Next week Hola Hola.

Back to list of columns

June 30, 2016

Hola Hola, Part 2.

Vegetative Fish Poisoning was practiced throughout Polynesia at the time western civilization began exploring Pacific cultures. Rotinoids, found in a number of native plants, were often ground up and spread on shallow reefs or small lagoons, narcotizing or more often killing marine occupants.
No doubt, the practice of Hola Hola and perhaps even the plants needed, came with the original Polynesian explorers when they sought to occupy the Hawaiian Islands.
In Hawaii, this fishing technique was used to collect small fish that were used as condiments in a meal of Poi, meat and larger fish. The men of the village would fish off shore from canoes, leaving the fish poisoning to the elder supervising young children in coveted tide pools.
Once caught, these fish were tossed whole up on hot lava rocks to bake and dry out. They were appreciated as very tasty morsels to compliment a bland poi meal.
The Tephrosea plant looks like a weed, but was regarded as a medicinal plant by the Hawaiian Kahuna (doctors). It was grown in coastal villages and used to poison fish as well. A shore line tide pool would be selected and permission acquired from a ruler or King. There is such a pool today next to the City of Refuge, that was under royal control. The Tephrosea plant would be collected along with Pili grass and taken to the tide pool before the high tide.
Careful inspection revealed depressions in the eroded lava rock next to the tide pool where the Tephrosea plant would be crushed in water using round pounding rocks. The timing was important as the ingredients must be freshly crushed by the time the low tide arrived. Children would spend this time to collect rocks and line the seaward edge of the tide pool.
At the low tide, Pili grass would be used to soak up the opaque milky broth of crushed Tephrosea plants to transfer the poison into the tide pool, often pushing it up under the surrounding ledges. Almost immediately, fish would come out of crevices and dance across the pool surface toward the sea. Most would be stopped by the rock barricade, and fall back into the frenzy developing in the tide pool. Those that were captured by the children in mid air would be thrown up the beach onto hot lava. The elder would instruct which fish were preferred and which to throw back in the pond or over the barricade.
In just a few minutes the tide pool would become quiet, permitting elders and children the opportunity to calmly select what fish they wanted from a wide range of options. A small flounder here, a few damsel fish there, perhaps a small eel, the exercise would become an elder’s educational opportunity in fish identification for the children. Puffer fish and stone fish would be rejected as inedible. Each fish selected would be laid out on the rocks and baked until crisp.
As the new tide would begin flooding the tide pool, the day’s harvest would be wrapped in Tea leaves and taken back to the village. A flooded tide pool would then dilute the poison and wake up those fish not harvested.
The practice of Hola Hola using Tephrosea does not poison fish to death but rather temporarily narcotize them.
The elders would take this opportunity to teach conservation to their enthusiastic children.

Back to list of columns

July 07, 2016

Safety Underwater.

By Travis Kersting

Do you wear a helmet when riding your bicycle? How about a seatbelt when driving? I would hope the answer to both of those questions is “Yes”! But sometimes I still make fun of today’s society because we have an obsession with safety and safety features.
I’m not that old, but I feel like things were a lot different only a decade or two ago. How many of these extra safety features does the common person really need to invest in? How about for a sport like scuba where your life relies on the equipment you use and carry?
In the past, scuba training took longer, had more in-depth education, and required more skills. Early divers ventured into the depths and even into caves or wrecks without buoyancy compensation devices which are now considered “required life support equipment” and absolutely essential to a diver’s personal safety. Those early divers also had a single stage regulator with a single mouthpiece and nothing extra to donate to a distressed buddy yet now we see multi-stage regulators with three or more hoses and typically at least two mouthpieces even for simple shallow recreational dives. Now it would be unheard of for a diver to not have a pressure gauge attached to their system. More than likely he or she would have a computer to track time, depth, pressure, temperature, and decompression stress. Many regulator systems of the past lacked a provision for a pressure gauge. Computers back then didn’t exist for any industry, much less scuba.
So, is a buoyancy compensator with a redundant second stage regulator with computer necessary safety equipment for scuba diving? Most dive instructors would say yes. Equipment manufacturing has improved, producing more reliable diving technology, training standards have adjusted to on-line and less complicated procedures, and the expense of it all has also changed. Under the time stressed public, there simply isn’t enough time, these days, to teach a student to use a recycled bleach jug as a buoyancy device, buddy breathing from a single regulator, or track decompression stress using confusing square dive tables. We also don’t teach people to breathe directly from a cylinder valve anymore, as your dentist wouldn’t appreciate it if we did.
How about all these other gadgets and accessories sold to divers for their “safety”? Are they necessary, or is the local scuba store just trying to make an extra dollar off of you? I would say that depends greatly. Many live-aboard dive operators and day charters will not take a diver on board unless they have a few key items such as a whistle and a marker buoy (aka a safety sausage or SMB). A marker buoy will make a diver stand out when they dip into the trough of a wave and a whistle will help get a boat operator’s attention.
Sophisticated electronic equipment for divers to radio back to the boat from their surface position is available from Nautilus. This pocket friendly device is waterproof to 300ft and is now becoming standard on every diver on many charters. Because of the high purchase cost of these gadgets, commercial boats will often rent them out to divers for $10-15 a day. The device can call for assistance, radio the boat, and displays GPS data if you use it to tell folks searching for you at sea. This technology is probably not necessary for all divers. Could it save your life? Absolutely! If you are doing dive trips well off shore, with boat operators you are not familiar with, leaving a boat unattended (bad idea!), or hauling up too much fish to swim comfortably back to the boat, then the Nautilus lifeline could be money well spent.
Ultimately some of the items are worth owning and some are just a waste of money. It is up to each diver to decide what they need to make sure they come home to their family when something doesn’t go as planned.
If you don’t have anyone to come home to, call me or the staff at Wakulla Diving Center and let us know your plans.
Safety carries risks that require precautions.

Back to list of columns

July 14, 2016

Hygiene Underwater.

By Travis Kersting

Most of us shower every day and a few may even bathe more than once but that doesn’t make us “clean.”
Your body is covered in both good and bad microbes at any given point in time and that’s perfectly normal. The inside of your mouth is no different with 500+ different species of microbes thriving in there any point in time. These two facts alone are the premise for the scuba and snorkeling community changing, over a decade ago, away from renting what we call “personal equipment.”
Today, many of us wash our ears out with a solution of alcohol and vinegar that can be purchased at any pharmacy. Let’s face it: our waters are not as clean as they used to be. We need to expand on this topic to sanitizing our underwater garments and life support equipment for the same reason.
When I took my open water course, I rented my mask/fins/snorkel package and even my wetsuit. I was 14 at the time and hygiene wasn’t a concern. Now people are seldom interested in renting this equipment for fear of the germs from the last user. We still get an occasional request, which we don’t fulfill. Some scuba facilities even stopped renting regulators with mouthpieces and instead require the diver to buy or provide their own mouthpiece every time they rent. Although this can generate more waste, it does add an additional barrier between the current user and the previous one.
Wetsuits are perhaps the most common thing classified as personal that are still shared and rented. Let me just say there are two types of divers, those who pee in their wetsuit and those who lie about it. Urine, assuming the individual is healthy, is essentially sterile to the owner of the urine only. For that reason, and because of the added cost and labor associated with renting and cleaning wetsuits, we don’t offer them in our rental.
OK, so I hope I have not grossed you out. What can you do to keep your personal equipment clean? The most common treatment, soaking in fresh water, just isn’t enough to actually clean things much less remove the odors that can develop from the bacteria. Scuba stores have forever sold products designed to help clean wetsuits, the common one is “sink the stink” which has never worked for me and was always expensive. We carry Microban, a broad spectrum, that works but is also expensive compared to my favorite treatment…. Mouthwash. You have to use an alcohol based one not a peroxide based variety but an inexpensive over the counter mouthwash added to some warm soapy water in a rinse basin has worked for me for the last 10 years. Your wetsuit ends up with a minty smell, and eventually a “tainted” minty smell, and alcohol kills a fair selection of microbes with enough concentration and exposure time.
Another popular option, one that may stain certain products to look like mountain dew, is a product from the livestock community called “Vircon.” This powdered substance kills most any microbe and leaves a slight chemical scent that is almost reassuring that it works.
Much like Sterimine, used in the restaurant world, you mix the powder or tablet with water and toss everything in for about 30 minutes.
The moral of all of this is, do yourself a favor. Own your personal gear and sanitize it properly between uses.
If you are going to rent, have your own mouthpieces and zipties handy cause your regulator may not come with them. Also have a container of sanitizer so you can sanitize the rental equipment before you use it just in case the last person or dive store didn’t.
We are talking about your health and your wellbeing so be proactive and help everyone prevent the spread of microbial diving infections.

Back to list of columns

July 21, 2016

Complications of Excessive Heat Underwater.

People swimming underwater usually are concerned about becoming cold. Any water temperature below 86 degrees, or thereabouts, results in an increase in the body’s metabolic efforts to generate heat. Since body temperature is pulled into water 25 times faster than in air, most of our metabolic effort becomes dedicated to keeping our body warm. We shiver when the body can no longer passively stay warm, moving muscles to generate heat at the expense of the core temperature. But cross that temperature boundary of 86 degrees and complications happen.
The core temperature of our body is 98 degrees. Any movement or work will generate heat which must be removed or it builds up.
On land our body can function in warmer temperatures by a cooling process called sweating, where water is pumped out on to the skin and evaporated, thus cooling the skin through a liquid to vapor phase shift. This process works great in the southwest, where the air may be hot but it is also dry, a low humidity, facilitating evaporation. In the southeast however, where we live in Wakulla County, the humidity during the summer is high, rendering evaporation less effective. And to make things worse, underwater, sweating in a wet suit or direct contact to the water simply does not happen. Underwater we absorb heat 25 times as fast as in air.
As our summers get hotter, our ocean water is getting warmer. Our body becomes less effective at removing the heat generated by our work load. And our customary evaporation technique is unavailable. Breathing dry gas dehydrates us from within. Add to this that the salt in the ocean is leaching water across the skin and out of our body continuously while we are underwater. Fortunately we are less likely to pee since the vasoconstriction response to cold is less likely to happen in warm water. In any case, we become dehydrated over time. Between dives on the boat we are exposed to the hot summer sun depleting our hydration as well.
Heat exhaustion is the result of dehydration and working in hot, usually humid, conditions above or below the water. The toll is cumulative. Symptoms are fatigue, headache, confusion, dark urine, dizziness, nausea, diarrhea, pale skin, and excessive sweating (which is not apparent underwater). To avoid the problem, stay out of the heat! But active people usually seek adventure regardless of the threat. So the next best thing is have and drink plenty of liquids, not caffeine or alcohol, stay in cool places out of the sun, and minimize the work load. Heat Exhaustion can lead to Heat Stroke, when the body stops trying to stay cool, the skin is dry and sensitive tissues like the brain are being damaged. Young and old people are more susceptible to the heat so protect them even more.
As I approach the geriatric years, I find myself more susceptible to heat. Last week I was working underwater cleaning out a water intake box. I wore protective (and thick) garments that were very uncomfortable on the deck and to my surprise, worse underwater. A very limited amount of water on the boat complicated the project which left me exhausted a few hours later. I soon reached shore and sat under a shower hardly able to get up. Both hands and feet cramped badly. But I kept drinking lots of water and continued sweating.
Last weekend I was conducting checkout dives with a family and children. We had a great time, but dehydration was a constant threat out in the hot sun. Even miles offshore, I was surprised to see the surface temperature in spots hovering close to 90 degrees. Such temperatures sap your energy, overheating your engines as you swim back to the boat. One non-diving child exhibited heat related problems that brought us back ashore quickly.
Stay cool and drink plenty of water this summer.
Heat exhaustion is real above and below the water.

Back to list of columns

July 28, 2016

Weather underwater.

While I am no meteorologist, I do see and feel the effects of atmospheric weather underwater.
In fact, the checkout dives of the past two weeks have demonstrated surface temperatures soaring into the low 90s with 88 degree water temperatures deeper down.
Our last class did not want to get out of the very warm water on Sunday, when passing squalls (no lightning) chilled the beach ten degrees cooler. And we are still in midsummer.
How much warmer will our waters get?
When underwater, weather passing over “topside” is always a concern. Just to get out to the dive site has taken planning and close squall observations, especially those with imbedded lightning.
Fortunately we have apps that will document lightning strikes and their distance away from your location.
We know lightning strikes can occur within 5 miles from the squall, a safe distance is observed at 10 miles.
Closer strikes must get you to abort the dive. If already underwater, we should climb out of the water.
Lightning strikes on cave divers in the cave have resulted in injuries, but to date no recorded fatalities. We can witness underwater a darkening of the ambient light, an increase surge on the sea floor, and if close enough, the noise of a strike.
Years ago, off Key West, a squall overshadowed our sailboat while divers were deployed. They surfaced off the anchor line as a heavy rain arrived.
The surface support team lost sight of the returning divers, as did the divers of the boat. They had to raft up and drift until the storm passed.
No one was injured, even with striking lightning in the immediate area, but the experience was a topic for discussion for weeks to come.
How do you accommodate for the weather while diving?
It gets back to good surface support, good monitoring of the weather conditions and a shared awareness, above and below, to changes in conditions. Years ago we used an M-80 waterproof weighted firecracker to signal divers to get back to the boat ASAP!
These diver recall devises are no longer allowed. When sudden darkness happens, divers must get back to the anchor line and surface to see if an exit is in order. And don’t get in the water if foul weather threatens. Climbing out of the water as a storm hits the boat is challenging, what with the howling wind, agitated sea condition and down pouring rain. It is best to avoid such conditions.
Heavy rain brings muddy land runoff, which brings poor visibility. Heavy storms can reach down to the sea floor and stir up the sediments, again reducing visibility, the more so the shallower the dive site. Outgoing tides during storms will also carry this suspended material seaward to where you might be diving. And surface mixing that comes with squall driven waves will mix the water column and change thermoclines that otherwise may isolate water masses and preserve water quality below.
On the bright side, while our local squalls may bring as much as a 70 knot wind and an inch of rain, they seldom last more than an hour.
They leave behind a cool fresh air and a return to the previous conditions that would permit a return to diving.
Such was the case on Sunday, and a marvelous second dive. Safety through Education!

Back to list of columns

August 04, 2016

Back to School.

It is August again. Past projections will suggest revenue and the number of customers at our facility will be cut in half this month. While June was down 44 percent from last year’s June, April and May were better.
July was the same as a year ago, which points to the difficulty at projecting revenue in this business. Richard, at Coral Reef Scuba in Tallahassee, warned me years ago that, in August, parents rightly become focused on getting their children back in school, in Georgia sooner than here in Florida.
This condition is no different at dive facilities along the Gulf of Mexico.
Weekends are still popular beach days. So what’s left to dive for in our gulf?
Our popular scallop season runs through Sept. 24 this year which is an improvement over last year.
In state waters we have gained Gray Triggerfish (Aug. 1 )and Lobster (Aug. 6) this month.
We still have Gag Grouper in federal waters (9 miles out) until the end of the year.
FWC has closed Amberjack until further notice, though it was slated to open Aug. 1 as well.
We have improved scuba training this summer. We have offered more basic training this summer than in the entire time we have been open put together (since 2010).
We anticipate this month, creating a list of available affiliated instructors from which customers can choose to get training. I suspect weekend classes will become more popular with the children due to classes and homework. Keep sending in those summer vacation diving pictures!
The days will get shorter and the heat worse through this month and perhaps some of September.
September is the peak of hurricane season, but who knows with climate change this year.
This summer has had some ferocious afternoon squalls, but on the whole, good beach weather.
Reports of major reef damage in the Gulf of Mexico due to high water temperature (88 degrees in the Texas Flower Gardens) will only get worse. But no local adverse effect has been reported.
Travis just returned from a dive trip near the Florida Middle Grounds where he may have captured the largest Lionfish on record. We will know more tomorrow. He will also participate on a survey trip to the Texas Flower Gardens with several state & federal agencies at the end of this month. He will be gone for a week at the end of August.
Labor Day in September has been the last day of diving for many in our area.
It seems folks are packing up their boat and fishing gear in September and pulling out the bow and arrows, tree stands and dogs for the fall hunting season. Such is the pulse of our community.
I’m working to get my 26-foot Mako boat in the water, which did not make it this year, when the fuel tank ruptured last month. I’ve rejoined the Coast Guard Auxiliary (look to the column to my left), and will be training up with them. We’ve been hosting the Sea Tow Radio Check for years now, so I figure the winter training and fellowship will be a good substitution.
Travis is trying to pull together a group trip to Cozumel, Mexico for February (which we can now offer financing for). It won’t be for spearfishing but if you’ve never been drift diving on the reefs it is a luxury worth experiencing. It’s the perfect place to take your spouse as the all-inclusive resorts cater to both divers and non-divers alike.

Back to list of columns

August 11, 2016

Boats and diving.

Weather permitting, local boats will continue supporting diving for a few more months this year. I have owned power and sail boats since I was 16, so when a friend gave me a classic boat last year, I began dreaming again!
I had such high hopes of joining the local fleet with my recent acquisition of a 1984 26-foot Mako boat.
Mike’s Marine installed a nice 250 Yamaha in June after we discovered the old 235 hp engine had a blown cylinder.
But on its maiden run out of Panacea, I found I also had a bad fuel tank leak.
This old a boat requires the deck be cut out to replace the fuel tank. With crisis also comes opportunity!
But then I have had to step back into the shop many times recently to cover for our new instructor. My available time for such an ambitious boat project became limited.
The extra time required has led me to consider what it will take to turn this boat into a dive boat.
The old console is low in profile with no T-top.
So I seek a change in the control center since I am to rip the deck up anyway.
The fold out dive ladder in the back is the best I have ever seen. And the Bimini canvas is near new.
The rest of the deck is absent of features.
For example, I will want to store dive cylinders and rebreathers, probably along the gunwales.
I will need a cooler and a fish storage device, which could be built into the front deck, or a tied down stand alone set of coolers forward of the consul. The upgraded console may have them built in, with seat covers to sit on.
While visiting on the boats of others, I saw cylinder assembly prior to a dive leading to congestion.
With all this space forward of my console, I may build a shaded assembly module using Pelican coolers as benches straddling a rig-up rack in between and capable of supporting four divers.
Bean bags are also a great way to ride on the way to and from the dive site.
Rod & reel storage is often attached to the gunwales and consul T-top, which can also host the electronics box, radios, radar and a sun shower.
I have already ordered the vertical speargun rack from Spear Fishing Specialties to mount on the stern.
And yes, my family has already commented on the hole in the water where all this money will soon vanish into.
We shall see. I must first pull the deck and seek a replacement in Perry. While in Tampa, I will visit their boat junk yards seeking consuls and T-tops.
Diving and Boating are synergistic, one expanding on the thrill of the other.
And I have gone long enough without the boat.
Thank you to those who have taken us out on their boats in the meantime. I hope to reciprocate soon.

Back to list of columns

August 18, 2016

Lionfish slaying.

By Travis Kersting

People seldom change but we do change interests. For me moving to Florida was a stepping stone to cave diving in Mexico. I came here for caves but Wakulla County was probably a poor choice of residence as the caves here lack consistent conditions and many are not welcome to divers. In the past two summers more and more of my attention has been on the salty side of diving, something I hate even admitting.
When I started working at the dive shop the invasive lionfish wasn’t much of a local subject but I still pushed for stocking the specialty tools used to handle them. Most of those bits and pieces sat here for several years as the locals were not seeing lionfish off our shores. A lot has changed since the first sighting of a lionfish in 60 feet of water out of Panacea in 2012. This year the shallowest reported (to us) lionfish was in 27 feet of water out of St. Marks.
Grayson Shepard, a local fishing guide and avid lionfish slayer, was invited to our May 2015 spearfishing tournament to help show people how many of the little monsters are actually out there. He has since become a bit of a superstar in the Panhandle with his YouTube videos involving great white sharks, Goliath grouper, and the invasive lionfish.
Grayson was kind enough to take me out with him in the summer of 2015 and it sure was a miserable experience. Salty water, gear that needed rinsing, waves and current, sunburn, virtually everything us knuckle dragging cave divers hate. For some reason I went again, and again, and a total of five trips in 2015 specifically harvesting lionfish.
We used scooters, rebreathers, technical cave diving gear, and enough other random stuff to drive the captain batty and drive the boat’s fuel consumption way up. It was, and is, a learning process to see what the most efficient systems and techniques really are.
For this year’s Wakulla Diving Center Spearfishing Challenge I wanted to bring back a big one, just to help the store’s publicity, but I failed. The diving trip was to a lesser known wreck called the Zenia about 55 miles out of Apalachicola in 190 feet of water. We found some large lionfish but nothing to write home about. The video that came back was stunning though, thanks to professional videographer Heiko Kiera who accompanied me on the two hour boat ride to the site. You can view this short 4-minute clip by visiting YouTube and searching “Zenia Wreck vs Lionfish 01”
AnchorVia Grayson I have built a friendship with several local experts including Alex Fogg, a biologist with FWC, who studied lionfish for his degree. Alex helped me a few weeks ago when I brought in the new state record (Gulf) lionfish at 455mm or about 17-7/8-inches from the middle grounds. The three of us are heading off at the end of August to the Texas Flower gardens with NOAA to see what kind of devastation the lionfish are causing there. I have another project in the works after that too.
I still don’t dive much but when I do it’s for lionfish. Amazing how my interests have changed.

Back to list of columns

August 25, 2016

Boy Scouts Invade Lionfish Territory

With so much interest in the invasive Lionfish, it comes as no surprise that a local Eagle Scout applicant within the Boy Scouts of America has scheduled a Lionfish (only) Tournament on Sept. 24.
This month Travis Kersting brought back a new state (Gulf) record setting 17 7/8-inch Lionfish from deeper water off our coast. He is also traveling next week to the 125 mile offshore Texas Flower Gardens to survey for Lionfish populations for a week.
More and more of these invasive creatures are being harvested, often sold to restaurants and eagerly consumed as they taste as good as Hogfish.
FWC reports that the harvest pressure is reducing the number of Lionfish found on frequently visited sites. Multiple tournaments encourage harvesting on new sites thus reducing the overall Lionfish populations. With no permit or license required, no bag limits, season or size restrictions, spear fishing folks are increasingly harvesting Lionfish.
Even my older brother from Virginia is coming down for a visit to participate in a Lionfish harvest. Do we have a Tourist Development Opportunity here?
Part of Aidan’s effort to reach the rank of Eagle Scout is to initiate and complete a public service project to benefit our community.
For his project he is organizing a lionfish tournament on Sept. 23 and 24 in coordination with the FWC.
Lionfish are an invasive species that have no natural predator and eat everything on a coral reef leaving nothing for the reef or fisherman.
The only way that has been found to be effective in the removal of these lionfish is to spear them or catch them in some other way.
As an Eagle Scout myself, I was pleased to host young Aidan Edgar of Troop 23 (Chiles High School in Tallahassee) in his pursuit of his Eagle Scout rank.
Running a Lionfish Tournament is quite an undertaking. The tournament name is “Wanted, Lionfish” and in addition to being put on with the help of the FWC, it is being sanctioned by REEF Inc. a marine conservation organization. Wakulla Dive Center is helping host the event and provide a location for the Friday night Captain’s Meeting, Sept. 23, and tournament on Saturday, Sept. 24.
All of the fish turned in during the tournament will be donated to ReefSavers, a non-profit group that is working with local Florida chefs to stimulate interest in lionfish dishes and demand for the fish so that local spear fishermen can sell them, thus creating a greater market for these invasive threats to our marine ecosystem.
Aiden has a website, www.eaglescoutlionfish.com and a Facebook page that has generated a lot of interest.
Aidan and Kali Spurgin (FWC) are also going to present an educational seminar to the folks at Academy Sports on Sept. 17. They are looking forward to bringing this thing into the dock.
The biggest challenge now is to promote the event to begin registering participants.
If you have any questions please contact Aidan at aidanedgar1@gmail.com or (850) 766-5000.

Aidan Edgar contributed to this article.

Back to list of columns

September 01, 2016

Graffiti Underwater.

The art or criminal act of writing on a wall or other structure, called graffiti, has been debated over the centuries. Historians have relied on such markings to explain events dating back before and during the Roman culture, as evidenced in Pompeii, now excavated for all to see.
Early man, going back thousands of years ago, drew pictures on the wall of dry caves depicting their activity and that of the animals that surrounded them.
I have seen Petroglyfs, carved in Lava stones on the Island of Hawaii that describe family units, a practice that may be followed to this day. Dry cave explorers draw directional information on the walls at intersecting passages to better navigate in this subterranean realm.
Several years ago, when we were trying to encourage public access to our local cave diving sites, a public hearing was convened to review the concerns of the community. Numerous pictures depicting graffiti carvings in caves were presented, with suggestions that cave divers were to blame and would continue the practice if granted access.
Before the meeting was ended, it was apparent that the public had a very poor understanding of the culture behind cave diving and cave divers. Cave divers were frustrated that they were blamed for what they had preached against for decades. Such carvings were and still are an abomination!
Years before the meeting, a single youngster did carve graffiti at two sites. The cave diving community rose up in arms and tracked down the culprit and brought him to justice. Having been branded as part of the problem, cave divers are now hesitant to respond to calls to rally around other water management issues in our county.
It would have been better to make this community part of the solution.
I was diving at Morrison Springs on Sunday. There in front of my eyes was an open water male diver carving graffiti on the log that is draped over the sinkhole leading down to the cavern.
I went after this one, putting my hands over the scarred wood, glaring at the short haired youth, and pointed my finger in the NO gesture. He pulled back and moved away. He dropped his rock and went back to enjoying the dive.
When I returned several hours later however, the rock face below the log was now covered in graffiti! I was devastated.
Here are the guilty culprits that are used as examples of what cave divers do in caves. How wrong is that!
Cave divers take great care not to touch the floor or the fragile structures of a cave because destroying these features destroys the very reason they spend thousands of dollars to visit these sites in the first place. Communities that have embraced cave divers have benefitted greatly through the economic boost that comes with tourism.
The Merritt Mill Pond at Marianna and the caves along the Suwannee and Santa Fe Rivers encourage this international community to visit their respective dive sites, because the revenue they bring is in the millions of dollars per year.
But not Wakulla County!
Cave divers are not welcome here.

Back to list of columns

September 08, 2016

Lionfish Invitational at the Texas Flower Garden Banks.

By Travis Kersting

Some of you may have noticed a sign on our door recently, I left for a few days and the store had to be closed. I had an invitation from NOAA, via our local FWC lionfish guru Alex Fogg, to dive the Texas Flower Garden Banks. With Hermine spinning up we all figured the trip wouldn’t happen but the boat owners didn’t want to cancel and refund us. NOAA wasn’t about to cancel either. Estimated seas were 4-6ft and that turned out to be pretty accurate. Only a few times did I become airborn while sleeping.
The MV Fling is a former crew boat, built to take workers to the oil rigs, which was repurposed for SCUBA diving at the banks. It’s 100ft boat w/ bunks for 30 divers, 2 captains, 2 galley staff, and 2 dive masters. There were 3 heads (toilets) and 1 fresh water shower. The diving deck had a roof over it for lounging on during the surface interval. I suppose diving from the Fling is pleasant in calm seas but I felt very cramped and can’t see myself using them again, the food was definitely the best part. It took a solid 8hrs to get 110 miles off shore to the west bank of the Flower Gardens.
If you are used to the diving off the Florida Panhandle this is remarkably different. There is lots of structure for fish to hide in, coral towering 15ft or more in places. We didn’t see much for artificial structure besides some stands to hold data recorders. Spearfishing is banned in the banks though bottom fishing with hook and line is still allowed. We saw lots of species of fish, most I don’t know the names of but I was after lionfish and didn’t spend time site seeing. Grayson did find some massive lobsters which he was thrilled to see.
There were 22 volunteer divers, 8 research divers, and 14 scheduled dives from 60 to 100ft. Because of seas and some folks getting injured trying to get on the boat we bailed out of 3 dives or so, I bailed on 1 additional as I was not feeling well.
The mission was a little strange. They call it research and I called it a waste of money. Instead of deciding lionfish was a problem and letting us free for all on the little monsters we had designated areas to hunt in. They limited us to 45min dives too. We dove in pairs, one person recording and the other hunting. They tracked how long it took from first spotting a target to the time we harvested and bagged it. This provided data on hunting efficiency which mostly corresponded with experience.
In the end only 394 lionfish were killed (up from 317 last year), based on the size of the reef and that lions thrive in a depth zone outside of what NOAA permitted us to venture into, they can extrapolate that there are several thousand more on each bank (West, East, and Stetson). The ones we did remove will have saved several million prey species that are important to the health of the reef.
The data brought back is being used to monitor lionfish populations, model population growth, observe habitat changes, and evaluate the viability of letting “recreational” divers (those with little or no spearfishing experience) help during the regular excursions to the reef.
I’ll stick to short ventures off shore. I don’t have any desire to sleep on a boat ever again.

Back to list of columns

September 15, 2016

A Storm Underwater.

We have just experienced a hurricane in Wakulla County. Knowing the damage on land, can you imagine what happened underwater? Many monitored hurricane Hermine as it came across the Atlantic, into the Gulf of Mexico and turning northeasterly, made land fall just east of St. Marks.
Underwater, similar spiraling currents generated off Africa move to transport marine life across vast marine ecosystems. Agulhas eddies, or current rings, are some of the largest in the world transporting energy and creatures from the Indian Ocean to the South Atlantic. This Terra satellite photo documents such an underwater storm from space. Look familiar?
Since water is 800 times the density of air, we can predict conditions underwater during a storm can also be violent, but different than on land. Wind still generates waves based upon the extent of the fetch (distance over water that the wind travels). When these large storm driven waves reach the shallower depths, a wave surge moves the water (and creatures within) at depth back and forth violently. The greater the wave, the more violent the wave surge.
Turbulent eddies and other effects make the underwater storm a churning event, some describe like a hail storm on land. Ocean floor sediments are often picked up into the water column, taking weeks to settle out. Those creatures that can hide in burrows or flee to deeper water survive reasonably well. Those that get caught out, take a beating. I have visited reefs after a storm to find corals dislodged, plants ripped out and tumbling about and fish scared, battered by their impact with the reef. Injured fish are more vulnerable to predation.
Abundant rain water runoff is transported out with the tidal cycle reducing visibility on offshore reefs even further. No surprise that our off shore shelf is currently experiencing poor visibility. Yet hook & line fishing is very effective right now. Fish get hungry when they can’t eat during the underwater storm.
Storm surge (different from wave surge) is the water pushed in front of a storm, that when concentrated in a bay such as Apalachee Bay, will increase the water depth and spill over on to the land. Coupled with the tides, we can witness considerable flooding. Underwater, this can mean aquatic creatures get temporarily relocated and must find their way back or perish if they cannot adapt. Mullet can live in fresh or salt water, but Gag grouper are less capable.
Many fossil assemblages are believed to have been caused by underwater storms like this. The plants and animals that were living their lives in stable conditions were suddenly either buried in choking mud, or swept away and dumped in deep hostile environments.
In one famous example, the Burgess Shale of British Columbia, a community of very early creatures was swept off a shelf into deep, low oxygen water. They were buried in a fine mud that prevented decomposition.
Over millions of years, these creatures fossilized into finely detailed casts with most of their soft body tissues preserved as shapes and outlines in the rock. Paleontologists have spent years decoding and interpreting the remains of these early animals and creating a picture of earlier life on earth. It wasn’t a good day for those animals when the “storm” hit them, but it has preserved a fantastic legacy for scientists.
Just as we are busy rebuilding our homes after the storm, so too are the underwater creatures, returning to their territories, tending to their gardens and reestablishing their defended homes.

Back to list of columns

September 22, 2016

Priorities Under and Above Water.

When faced with a crisis, there is no difference in the outcome regarding where it happens, above or below the water. Crisis management is a matter of prioritizing resources in a time sensitive environment.
A perfectly reasonable road trip to Miami to pick up an inbound international student and his rebreather equipment, turned into a crisis when our vehicle’s alternator failed on the way south. The student’s 2:30 a.m. arrival time, lack of English fluency, and urgency to start intense training back in Wakulla, placed time restraints that began a cascade of changing priorities.
A diesel car usually requires little electricity to run, so the loss of the alternator required purchase of bare necessities: several large batteries, a way to connect them to the car’s circuitry system, a battery charger with extension cord and disconnecting power draining convenience such as daylight headlights.
Each battery is good for approximately 250 miles of operating the Jetta diesel. But the day has only so many hours of light before headlights are required! A rain squall requires electricity to drive windshield wipers. Traffic requires braking which use power for brake lights. Soon the plan falls short and priorities change to achieve the goal. A costly freeway becomes preferred, a dryer route is taken, and rush hour is avoided.
And I arrived at an airport hotel with a shuttle service and the ability to plug my car into a large battery charger.
By the time the student was intercepted and brought back for a good night’s sleep, the batteries were fully recharged for a reasonable return to Wakulla, complete with the still defective alternator.
A perfectly normal dive to 330 feet in a tropical Caribbean reef can have very similar consequences when the controlling handset of our rebreather implodes unexpectedly.
Just as above the water, we faced this crisis last year in the same rational way by altering priorities to still achieve our goal of a safe return to the surface 5 hours later. The only difference was that because we have no Walmarts in the ocean (yet), we had to carry enough open circuit breathing gas to complete the arduous decompression independent of the efficiency of the rebreather.
And when both rebreathers failed, even more backup systems were effectively applied.
On my way back from Miami last night, my student asked if our little travel crisis was part of the cave training he came for. I assured him that while it was not specifically planned, a similar exercise would be repeated underwater.
We call it the Mortality Exercise.
We contrive crisis (in a controlled environment) that require the student to figure out and implement an effective solution underwater.
He was quiet for a while before relating a similar underwater challenge that was described by a mutual friend.
He said the result was his friend’s overall attitude changed dramatically, both above and underwater. He came for training in search of a similar outcome.
Crisis management is a matter of prioritizing resources in a time sensitive environment.

Back to list of columns

September 29, 2016

Time Underwater

When I started diving in the mid-1960s, a scuba dive lasted between 30 and 60 minutes at a depth of up to 60 feet. Over the next decade I saw longer scuba dive times with larger cylinders, to a point that twin 104 cf steel cylinders were too heavy for most people to easily carry on land. People learned to breathe more slowly, and became CO2 retainers. When I tried it I got a headache!
Surface supplied breathing gas is older than scuba. Our Fisheries Unit made a garage lp compressor lubricated with mineral oil that was capable of supporting two divers at 75 feet to last as long the fuel on the surface lasted. Yes, we did need to mind the long umbilical that connected us divers to the boat. Saturation diving brought a different perspective of time underwater. By staying in a chamber at depth, we could scuba dive for as long as topside staff were willing to cycle full scuba tanks. We lived for weeks in a habitat, venturing out into our living reef laboratory for as long as we needed.
Then came the 1980s, and with it a change to our breathing mixture. We began adding oxygen and helium to the very familiar air breathing mixture. Depending on the mixture, we could now stay down on a scuba dive for up to three times what we could on just air. And we could dive deeper than ever before.
I would ask my students if I gave them a pill to put in their fuel tank that would give them twice and many miles as they got without the pill, would they be interested. Would they still be interested if they had to watch their temperature gauge closely so as not to overheat the engine. For twice the time, most said yes, and NITROX was born. I taught diving scientists to survey fish at 250 feet, once a major challenge on air, but with Trimix (a helium blend), a simple task.
With this breathing gas complication came the age of the computer. Now different blends of breathing gas were tracked with precision, not available before and multi-level diving added even more to our bottom time. Soon, recreational agencies quit teaching dive tables, requiring dive computers that gave more and better information, such as compass, depth, time, deco profiles and primitive games (entertainment for the lonely deco times encountered)! While the surface supplied Brownie diving system remained the most popular diver support technology in the 1990s at FSU, another paradigm changer that would rival the mighty habitat was coming.
In 1997 two companies produced a rebreather that promised 4 hours underwater producing Nitrox and Trimix blends permitting silent diving to depths down to 300 feet. The decade that followed brought dozens of Closed Circuit rigs of various price ranges, building a large reserve of used and inexpensive rigs available today. By 2010, several rebreathers could support a diver at any depth for up to 10 hours.
Two years ago I trained eight faculty and staff of the University of the Andes (Colombia) on rebreathers and a few now work at 100 meters. One member of a collaborating unit is here in Wakulla County this week training up on cave and Trimix diving. We just exited from Peacock Springs State Park today after a routine no-decompression (down to 70 feet) 4 hour dive that we will repeat in another cave site tomorrow.
I am awestruck by the change in available dive time that has occurred during my underwater career. My father, who started me off on a diving supported career when I was 16, just passed away last week just shy of the age of 99. He said the same thing about flying, his chosen life in the sky.

Back to list of columns

October 06, 2016

Panic underwater.

There is a limit for everyone, where a person loses the ability to reason with a crisis. We train people to avoid going there prematurely. Safety through education and experience is important underwater. Yet, crisis does occur underwater and can overwhelm when cumulative stresses sneak up on us. Consider the stress of Hurricane Hermene on family and staff, and on the environment we dive in. Add student schedules coming from out of the country and out of the state. High student expectations, limited available resources and a struggle to meet standards drives both students and staff to breaking points. Such was the back drop of this last month of September.
Mastering a rebreather takes more than 50 hours underwater and more than 25 long dives. But we find basic rebreather divers are usually a committed lot and our students are no exception. We then get them back one to two years later to move their training to deeper sites with more exotic gasses. Unfortunately to get to these depths here in Wakulla County, requires expensive boat trips that are plagued with weather restraints, or we can use our caves. Our caves reach down beyond 300 feet, sometimes very close to the entrance. This year we have had several such returning students taking the option to train in caves using their rebreathers hoping to also go deep.
A cave course using a rebreather is an 8 long day (12 hrs/day) program exceeding 1,000 minutes underwater and driving over 1,000 miles to find sites. In the winter our water feels warm. During the summer it feels cold. Yet the groundwater temperature does not change appreciably. Dressing for a dive during the summer offers an additional stressor of overheating as we dress before we get in the water.
With the Cave CCR completed, a proposed dive to 200 feet the next day led us to reach a crisis unexpectedly. Why did we not see the telltale signs of multiple equipment failures, lack of sleep trying to keep up with standards, and the time pressure resulting from flight schedules and incoming new classes. Against stated better judgment, a student pressed forward into the murky cave waters to reach their objectives.
Visibility was 1-2 meters, the cave floor very muddy, but no current and the lines were reasonably set. The dive was uneventful as we made our way down passages to the 200 feet deep turn around spot. Then, the student’s dive computer erupted in bright blinding red flashes alerting everyone of pending doom! The student appropriately bailed out on to open circuit gas but was so stressed by the blinding display he let go of the cave line (our way home)! Others quickly became distracted resulting in the complete loss of the line. This stress caused the student to rapidly breathe all of his bottom mix. Seeing a panicked person screaming and clawing the rock walls will never be forgotten.
A replacement supply of breathing gas was quickly provided. Circle searches did find the line and a hasty exit began. Along the way out a dangling unused regulator hung up on a the line creating more stress to untangle the student. But the student regained his senses and rejoined the group contributing to a safe exit.
As we exited the water, he said he had met his limits for the time being. He would be back to continue the training later.
Our post dive evaluation found 15 mistakes that contributed to a near tragedy. We were all pushing too hard against mounting stressors which has now caused us all to pull back a bit and reconsider our mortality.

Back to list of columns

October 13, 2016

Studying fishing down deep.

Last week I was pleased to train a student from Texas A&M at Galveston in the use of a Liberty Rebreather. His stated reason for investing in the most advanced space age technology currently available was his goal to study recruitment of mesophotic fish to shallower reefs.
While there is no specific depth designated to the mesophotic zone, it is generally considered to be deeper than 300 feet. My student is a junior with graduate school aspirations. As a combat veteran, he knows how to plan a mission and implement it effectively. He is also a natural aquanaut, making my job a thrill.
Our discussions quickly revolved around Dr. Steven Lindfield’s dissertation (Australia) which my student produced for reference. On long drives to dive sites, we considered observations in the paper that rebreathers permitted closer observations of fish populations, longer exposure times, access to greater depths and safer decompression on their return to the surface. I now have a copy of this paper for careful digestion.
My student is not the first to attend my classes to enable them to routinely study mesophotic depths. Several years past, Dr. Juan Sanchez began training on more primitive rebreathers for his coral studies off Colombia. I have trained eight of his staff, graduate students and colleagues on rebreathers. But my most recent student is the first to put in place a plan at such an early time in his career.
Currently, Dr. Richard Pyle in Hawaii (where I sent another graduate student after training), and Dr. Sanchez are the closest scientists using rebreathers for deep reefs that I know. Dr. Lindfield cites others in his dissertation with which I must now become familiar.
Fishing down deep is an increasing activity around the world, once shallow reefs populations become excessively exploited. Fish protein is an important component to a large part of the global human population.
Recruitment from these deep fishery stocks are considered important to the recovery from shallow reef exploitation. Deep reef management is a complex task based upon limited data due to the challenges of their remote depth.
Moato et al in 2006 suggested rather than viewing these deep populations as new fishery opportunity, deep water habitats should be regarded as new candidates for conservation.
Marine fisheries refugia have been described around the world as areas that serve as a source of recruitment to adjoining reefs.
The Florida Keys Marine Management System has placed into practice such no-take zones in shallow reefs.
Bongaerts et al in 2010 proposed the Deep reef refuge hypothesis based upon two principles: deep reef are less disturbed and can provide viable reproductive populations to shallower reefs following disturbances.
No species exemplifies this hypothesis better than the Lionfish.
A new generation of marine biologists are taking a keen interest in using rebreathers for IN_SITU research in the Mesophotic Zone.
In my day, with my mentor Dr. Bill Herrnkind, we fought to have recognized the benefit of in situ (Latin, meaning “in place”) underwater research.
I am pleased to tell him that we are now engaged in the expansion of that challenge into the Mesophotic waters near shallower reefs.

Back to list of columns

October 20, 2016

Jellyfish Invasion.

This past weekend found me at the St. Andrew’s State Park Jetties near Panama City Beach. I was there with a student wrapping up her final check-out dives. The north wind was up so the fetch was minimal as was the tidal change, making for a wonderfully clear and calm dive.
As we were swimming through the kiddie pool headed for the channel, I spotted a rather large bundle of tentacles in 5 feet of water. Once underwater I could see it was a jellyfish, but not one that I recognized. We kept our distance as the bell was a good 12 inches wide. Small fish swam through the undercarriage oblivious of the nematocysts (stinging cells) and then I saw the long tentacles that dragged behind for 5 plus feet.
Now I know about the Moon Jelly, Aurellia aurita, and the Cannonball Jelly Stomolophus meleagris, which are common enough that I swim through large schools when they invade our beaches. I also know that the abundance of Comb Jellies (Ctenophores) in the plankton, that have no stinging cells, are harmless to man and are of a totally different Phylum, not related to true jellyfish at all. But this new creature I observed is reported to eat the other jellyfish!
The Pink Meanie or Drymonema larsoni is a new species of a more common relative from the Mediterranean described as recently as 2000 in the North Gulf of Mexico area. This pulsing densely packed bundle had a pink canopy with purple and brown sub-structures (gonads and digestive structures) and white tentacles protruding out and downward.
The creature was mesmerizing until a trailing near invisible tentacle brushed up on my skin. I did not feel any sting, but it glued to my arm and began to pull me toward the canopy. I quickly pulled back away and made sure my student did the same.
We moved on over the jetty rocks and down to 50 feet to enjoy visiting with the passing population on the incoming tide. After 26 minutes, my student was ready to return to the Kiddie Pool and complete her first dive, where we found another Pink Meanie that had become shredded on the rocks.
As I approached I could feel the stinging cells of what was left of the Jellyfish now dispersed in the water column. Out we went in search of lunch on dry and protected land.
This training site also comes with a beach dive on the ocean side of the dunes. After lunch we made a beach entry only to meet up with several more and larger of these Pink Meanies in hot pursuit of their lunch: the Moon Jellies floating on the Long Shore current in 10 feet of water. During this dive you could see the long trailing tentacles that created a good 8-10 foot net around the central bundle of these creatures. Their bells were much bigger than those in the Kiddie Pool. Even when we dove deeper up against the rocks, these Pink Meanies were everywhere. I could not argue with my student when she gave me a premature up signal, but considering our company, she made a good decision to avoid any further chance of being stung on this beautiful day.

Back to list of columns

October 27, 2016

Start an aquarium.

Bring a portion of our ocean into your home and see the excitement grow around you. I have always had aquariums that have provided me with years of entertainment. I have been trying to get my two 100 gallon aquariums transferred to the store for a while now. But it took my son to bring in his smaller aquarium to kick start the project. For the past year folks have brought in what they find and we have tried to keep them alive. Gulf Specimen of Panacea has been particularly helpful with advice and support. RMS, a neighbor tackle shop, gave us a spotted eel that came in with a bait collection. Basic scuba students have collected starfish and snails. And I even captured two Lionfish to show folks what is challenging us offshore. The excitement is growing.
Children and adults alike will stop in front of the aquarium to see what’s new and interesting. The Spotted eel has survived the longest. It even ate a Lionfish. A slipper lobster is so well camouflaged that few can find it at first. Flame scallops are now kept in a smaller tank to feed better as we prepare for the twin 100 gallon tanks. And Travis, as part of his increasing interest in the ocean and Lionfish, has begun to bring back an assortment of beautiful creatures. Of the four Lionfish he brought back last week, two were consumed by other residents, including a larger Lionfish. A tiny Lionfish is now separated out with the scallops. So where to begin? There are many how-to books on the topic.
The smallest saltwater aquarium should be 20 gallons. A basic sub-sand filter with a tube up the back with an air-stone capture within provides filtration, circulation and oxygen. The beach sand that you put over a plastic plate on the floor of the tank will grow rich in microbes that will keep the water clear. A small and quiet air pump and a lid light are the only powered items you need at this small level. Ocean water taken offshore is best, but beach water will do. Replace half of this water periodically. The salinity can be adjusted with Instant Ocean or natural evaporation over time. Now let your aquarium rest for up to a month before capturing residents. Residents need to be small, such as Blennys or Top Hats and few in number, commensurate with the size of the aquarium. Snails will feed on algae that will grow on the aquarium sides. Crabs will redecorate your carefully planned arrangements.
Fish need to be fed sparingly and preferably with live food. We have been purchasing the very small shrimp left over from the bait stores like RMS. Or grow your own Artimia shrimp from eggs. As a younger person with cockroach problems, I set my 20 gallon aquarium up with a puffer fish. Above the tank, I attached a smooth funnel carefully laced with a dab of honey. The roach problem dropped but the puffer fish quickly outgrew my aquarium. Once each got too big, I replaced him back to the sea and captured a smaller replacement. Each learned quickly where the food was to be found.
There is an abundance of ocean creatures that you can accumulate in your aquarium. So many that you will eventually seek larger and more complex technology as your residence population becomes more diverse. We are adding protein skimmers, bio-ball sub-deck filtration using water pumps and special timed lights. You may need a saltwater license to legally collect your creatures. And there are laws regarding what is permissible to collect.
The experience can be thrilling and definitely supports your dive cravings.

Back to list of columns

November 03, 2016

Breathing air.

Have you ever considered where we get our diving breathing gases?
Hundreds of years ago, diving bells were replenished with fresh air by lowering weighted barrels that vented their contents from below the bell’s opening. Early helmet divers a century ago were ventilated by hand pumped devices that compressed air and delivered it through hoses.
As a young man, my father wrapped a valved sealed copper refrigeration pipe around his waist filled with garage air, used to fill tires in the 1930s, that allowed him to explore an underwater lake.
By the time I began my underwater journey, the air we breathed came from the base supply used to fill Pearl Harbor submarines. I often saw wisps of oil fumes come out of my nose and lay on the inside plate of my mask. Today, that should not happen!
Most compressors are lubricated with oil these days. But petroleum oil is not used any more. Thirty years ago non-toxic mineral oil was commonly used. Today, in large part because of Nitrox (oxygen enriched air), expensive synthetic oils that are oxygen compatible, are preferred. Many compressors come with a label that the machine by itself, is not to be used for generating air for human consumption.
Air intakes must be set high up (above the exhaust of passing cars and trucks) to pull in atmospheric air. There is a lot of water in our atmosphere that these compressor’s water separators must remove before releasing the gas to the filters.
Elaborate filters must then take the raw gas and scrub it of oil, even more moisture and contaminates like carbon monoxide. Filter pads remove dust and pollen, molecular sieves pull moisture and contaminants, activated charcoal improves taste, and silica pulls oil. My current scuba class complained of cottonmouth after breathing compressed air for several hours in the pool. That is the cost of extra clean compressed breathing gas.
Yes, hose diving is still used, either from an on-site compressor or fed by scuba cylinders. Hookah diving is a popular technology. The gas driven hookah compressor is mounted on a boat or in a tire inner tube that floats on the surface, providing breathing gas down a garden-like hose to the diver. Such systems are usually not lubricated by oil, have no filters and are subject to local air quality control. Their simplicity is undeniable.
We do not breathe air underwater. The content of what we breathe is altered by the pressure we are exposed to at depth.
Over the past three decades, oxygen has been added to air to improve the body’s efficiency and safety at depth. Blending the oxygen into air is where the real hazard exists, primarily at the compressor. Compressors must be kept cool, carefully maintained and monitored to prevent explosive fires during this process.
Filling and storing these breathing gases is equally hazardous, which is why fill and blending stations are off limits to customers.
State laws forbid employees under the age of 17 from entering the blending/filling station. Containment structures are encouraged to minimize injury should something go wrong.
State laws require diver gases be tested every three months, and are kept to a high standards.
As the saying goes, if you don’t know blending/compressing gasses, know who’s doing it for you.

Back to list of columns

November 10, 2016

DEMA again.

By Travis Kersting

The year has flown by and I can’t believe it’s already November! This means we will be headed to the annual Dive Equipment Manufacturing Association (DEMA) convention which is being held in Las Vegas this year. In the past I’ve written something about our trip or our goals at the event.
Usually I attend clinics to learn regulator servicing while Gregg networks. This year Eric will be taking the classes and I’ll be trying to negotiate better pricing and new dealership opportunities. We have noticed a decline each year in the number of booths and the number of attendees and although we are two weeks out, it seems like this year is following the same pattern. I don’t foresee much exciting to come from this DEMA and pricing will probably go up as it has in the past, but I am hoping to learn something new or make some new networking connections.
Sure, there will be new equipment, new training options, and some exciting trips available but “new” doesn’t necessarily mean “new” in the scuba world. The companies tend to discontinue an item and bring it back in a different color or with a different accessory kit. They repackage the product and try to make it look different but it doesn’t actually have different specifications. What one company discontinued will be advertised as a different company’s latest advancement. True innovation requires research and development of new products which requires new input and more money than what the diving community can support, so innovation can feel painstakingly slow. The scuba market is actually very small, contrary to what DEMA would like you to believe. For some comparison, DEMA and SEMA (an automotive convention) take place in the same Las Vegas Convention Center but there are 9,000 and 60,000 attendees respectively. Comic Cons can bring twice as many attendees as even SEMA show can.
The smaller community translates to fewer companies that actually make the products in scuba too. A good example is the company Oceanic. They will be revealing a new dive computer this year called the Pro Plus X. It’s actually just an Atomic Cobalt computer that has been rebranded for Oceanic. Scubapro and Atomic will both have diving masks that retail for over $120 but which are made in the same Asian factory, in the same molds, and assembled by the same workers as a mask we get unbranded and sell for about half the price of the name brand manufactures.
Even the rebreather technology that interests Gregg and I so much is getting to be little more than one company copying the features of another company’s product. Some companies have lost their original values and regressed to systems and technology that was once abandoned for being unsafe yet it’s still new in the eyes of most divers… so it sells. Without advancements in technology and research, these companies are limited in what products they can provide and sell to try and stay relevant.
An example of an innovative technology we finally brought in to our shop was the Shark Shield. We had to test it out first as the claims the company made seemed farfetched. Well, they proved to be true!
So far, most of the technology and gear has been very similar to what the dive community already utilizes. However, we are always on the lookout for truly new ideas and products that are made with pride using quality materials, even if it feels like these finds are few and far between. If anything really interesting does show itself at DEMA you will know as we will be very excited here at the shop to pass along the news. Wish us luck!

Back to list of columns

November 17, 2016

This column was a reprint of a column that originally appeared in November 2013.

Back to list of columns

November 24, 2016

Evolution of scuba education.

By Travis Kersting

The internet and with it social media have revolutionized the way people communicate with geach other and that includes the way instructors communicate with students. We’ve seen for the last decade a growth in online education programs for everything from college math courses to students completing their high school degree totally online.
Scuba hasn’t been much different. The first training agency to adopt online educational materials was PADI and though the courses were called online training there was still a component that required the student suit up and get in the water with an instructor for both pool and open water skills demonstration.
Virtually all of the other major training agencies (like NAUI, SDI, and SSI) have generated online training programs. Most now can be started on your phone or iPad and translate seamlessly to your computer without losing track of where you were in the program. Many integrate with social media to show progress to your friends and share the experience with other divers. All the certification agencies still require pool skills along with 4-6 open water checkout dives but the final exam is often part of the online materials.
The reasons people adopt online materials are obvious. The student can complete what is otherwise 8-16 hours of course work in the comfort of their own home and on their schedule instead of driving to a business during business hours. The online options have, for the most part, decreased the contact time with instructors which helps keep the cost of training down. Scuba training expenses have gone up for instructors and Scuba centers virtually every year but the average price for students, nationwide, has changed very little in the last 20 years.
For the older generation the online materials may not be as comfortable to them as a sitting in a class with a book and taking paper notes but the younger generation is what companies are trying to target. In most cases Agencies want to create life long divers so they target the youngest groups they can. This is typically in contrast to who can actually afford the training and equipment.
Insurance companies have a pretty big influence over what standards training agencies set though. For years the online materials have helped shorten courses but there has also been a rise in Scuba accidents after the adoption of online materials because students are not fully understanding the materials and their instructor contact time isso low. As a result of the influence of insurance companies the agency Scuba Schools International (SSI) is now actively pushing instructors to go back to a time where students attended class one day a week for six or more weeks before taking their open water checkout dives. This time is still not spent in lecture, it is spent in or around the pool. This gives the student time to build on skills and ask questions along the way instead of being fed information and demonstrating a skill one time before being released into open water.
The SSI training system will definitely raise the cost of courses because instructors aren’t free but SSI doesn’t seem to care. Their philosophy of creating lifelong divers is based on the concept of people being willing to pay more for a better experience and to become a better diver in the end.
On this trip to the Las Vegas DEMA convention Gregg and I have spent a good deal of time discussing the pros and cons of the various training agencies and their systems.

Back to list of columns

December 01, 2016

Helium underwater.

As you probably already know, we breathe a gas underwater that differs from that which we breathe on land, whether it is air or a gas that is enriched with oxygen before it is taken below the waves.
The pressure of the water changes the gas as we descend, increasing the density, and partial pressure of each component until limits are exceeded and the gas becomes toxic.
Such is the nature of diving Nitrox.
But add helium, and greater depth can be reached safely.
Yes, helium is the same gas that kids get in floating party balloons.
Helium is a very light gas that when breathed (in a mixture with oxygen) makes a person sound like Walt Disney’s Donald Duck.
But helium in its pure state without oxygen will cause abrupt unconsciousness as it soaks up the oxygen out of brain cells. Numerous injuries and fatalities have resulted from divers and children alike when mishandling this gas.
Why bother then if helium is so dangerous?
By blending helium into an underwater breathing mixture we call Trimix, this inert gas reduces the density of the overall mixture making it easier to breathe.
This mixture is more efficiently passed through our rebreather scrubbing canisters improving CO2 elimination.
Helium dilutes the oxygen content keeping it at tolerable concentrations, permitting us access to depths below 200 FSW. And, if that was not enough, helium displaces narcotic nitrogen for a reduction of the “rapture of the deep” or narcosis effect.
Wow! All that from one additional gas?
Divers can literally dial in enough helium to adjust their narcosis effect at depth. They call it their equivalent narcosis depth, where enough helium is blended in to replace nitrogen to an equivalent dose of nitrogen at a shallower depth on “air.”
Since a diver knows by experience what he can tolerate, they can now blend a gas to contain the equivalent nitrogen but at a much greater depth.
My dives to 100 meters (330 feet) were made with a gas mixture that had a nitrogen content of a 100-foot dive on air.
There are a few challenges that come with helium, which for the moment keep this gas outside the recreational diver’s limits.
The gas is not easy to blend and is very expensive. The gas is mined from the ground, not separated from the air like oxygen.
One day we are told we will run out of helium. Decompression schedules are more lengthy, requiring numerous gas changes to flush out the helium from the tissues on our return to the surface.
And the lighter gas tends to rob the body of heat more quickly than Nitrox (and air).
Simply put, helium mixtures are less tolerant than Nitrox mixtures on a number of issues. An uncontrolled ascent is usually fatal.
When I began my diving career, 100 FSW was considered deep.
Today, because of helium and improved blending and delivery technology, 200 FSW is considered shallow.
As a Diving Scientist, nothing could make me happier!

Back to list of columns

December 08, 2016

2016 DEMA Report.

By Travis Kersting

It’s taken a while and I still haven’t caught back up from our trip to DEMA in Las Vegas but I promised to let you know if anything exciting came of it.
There were a few wins this year but they weren’t many. As usual, the big companies took center stage with big booths but with relatively few product changes or advancements. Aqualung and Scubapro have new buoyancy compensators and Atomic Aquatics launched their first buoyancy system. Mares didn’t have any new products and the folks at Oceanic/Hollis really only had some minor changes to their rebreathers.
The much anticipated air integrated computer from Shearwater Research was released. This is a top of the line computer which has been serving the “tech” and cave diving communities for about a decade. It’s one of the easiest to use computers on the market and comes with features and functions that many computer manufactures were unwilling or unable to add. Shearwater Research adds a good bit of money into companies like the Diver’s Alert Network who are studying rebreathers and other SCUBA equipment for the advancement of the diving community. This new computer will tell you how much breathing gas is left in up to two cylinders via a wireless transmitter. It will then calculate remaining bottom time, among other things. I’ve been asking for this for a long time and so has the diving community. For the first time they have a product that should be well received in the open water diving community as well as cave/technical divers.
A company called “toothless” had a product which I walked by about a dozen times before stopping to look at. They make a system of small lift bags with stringers built in for spearfishers to send their catch to the surface immediately. This is instead of swimming around with the fish on the diver, among the sharks. The system was designed, built, and tested in Florida and is being used extensively by divers in the Gulf. The system is promising, to those willing to change their habits, but I fear the price will be a detractor. At about $400 for six lift bags, a hose to inflate them, a carry system (a velcro pad), and a bag to store things in it was too rich for me at the time. They also seem to require large volume shipments to become a dealer, from what I can tell, but I plan to try and get a few for the local divers to try. In concept it should improve safety, which I think everyone is in favor of.
One company had a dive computer that talks to your smart phone. There is one every year for the past few years. The difference, this one is less expensive. It’s also still in beta testing but they are selling units for basic air and nitrox with a plan for lots of new features in the future. The wrist mount computer is smaller than many but it has a built in rechargeable battery, which always bothers me. We are getting one to try. It connects to social media and does all sorts of other things to get people excited about the underwater world so that’s always good.
The last thing I noticed was several companies selling “virtual diving” options. This seems beyond strange for me, being that I’d rather be underwater than above it, but I suppose there is a place for it. Video games and virtual reality are taking over, why not in diving? That must be the current mentality because at least four companies had some sort of goggle based virtual system. I didn’t try it, I think I’ll stick with the real thing.

Back to list of columns

December 15, 2016

A different type of spearfishing tournament.

We’ve had a spearfishing challenge in Wakulla County for the past three years.
During that time, the diving community had a great time with the tournament.
In all cases, the event was held on one long day, fishing in the day and weighing in fish caught in the late afternoon.
A catering trailer was brought in to cook up the very fresh fish donated from the event. Live music, marine touch tanks, a live pelican and tortoise were all in attendance along with vendors like Shark Shield, NAUI, Tusa, the Coast Guard Auxiliary, the state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, and SeaTow.
Each tournament had different categories with different results both good and not so good.
A variety of categories for different species along with bonus points and wildcard species complicated the challenge. Prizes were often, unfortunately, awarded long after the sun went down!
First, a not-for-profit will be considered to both improve donation opportunity and reduce the financial burden of the event. A board of directors is solicited to help organize it. Such an approach is not uncommon within the state, an example is the St. Pete Underwater Club.
With increased Lionfish derbies state-wide, available dates for our tournament have diminished.
The proposal is to continue using Wakulla Diving Center as a physical location, but to remove them as the organizer.
The dates and format will be decided by this new company.
Several changes are being discussed. Among them is a longer proposed tournament that may extend over a weekend or two weekends, with a resident weigh-in scale being placed at the Center.
The terminal party may begin sooner and be over before dark. Additional categories such as underwater photography, may expand the type of participation in the event. A different meal structure may lesson the expense to the event and allow fishermen to keep their catch.
Contests such as ours do have a negative effect on the targeted fish population, a troubling issue as we promote more spear fishing.
I am proposing we consider a tournament with a diminished emphasis on the biggest fish, and focus on a more sustainable approach such as having a target weight and using “Bob Barker” rules.
Leaving the really big fish that produce a disproportionate number of eggs to sustain the species, we protect their overall population.
Details on how this may work are currently sketchy as we collect recommendations from fellow fish biologists.
We all want to see the resource continue to exist locally instead of seeing it diminish as it has in places like the Florida Keys, Caribbean, and much of the Pacific where overfishing and under regulation are of a major concern.
These alternative approaches from how our tournament has been conducted are under consideration and we are welcoming any and all thoughts so as to how to improve this event.
Please forward ideas to Travis Kersting at traviskersting@wakulladiving.com.

Back to list of columns

December 22, 2016

There was no column run for this week.

Back to list of columns

December 29, 2016

Marriage Underwater

Several friends of mine have held their weddings underwater at various stages of the ceremony. A popular place for divers to wed underwater is at the Paradise Island in Nassau, Bahamas, at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada, or anywhere in the Florida Keys off any of the thousands of shallow reefs just to name a few options. Most are held in shallow water with the presiding official also underwater seeing or hearing their vows, amongst family and friends. When held at an aquarium, guests can view the ceremony through windows, otherwise, everyone gets wet. In Barbados and elsewhere, a large submarine can take the wedding underwater while keeping everyone dry. At many resorts, large glass helmets permit the participants to keep their heads dry and capable of talking if they like. The internet is full of images of underwater weddings, complete with long swaying white dresses, flowers and even a procession. I would imagine, the water must be warm (search underwater weddings).
Many conduct their weddings on a beach, and then walk into the water, in full regalia, after the exchange of their vows. I recently attended a wedding on the St George Island beach, after which the bride and groom marched into the waves. I’m told such immersion is not to good for the wedding dress, but such dresses are seldom worn again anyway. The dress expands when fully submerged creating a striking image not unlike that of the tentacles swaying in the currents of a large jellyfish. It’s quite beautiful!
Almost fifty years ago, my wife and I were equally involved with an ocean wedding. She was completing her degree in Archeology with a field school excavation of a fishing village on the island of Hawaii. The team had identified the village’s heiau (Hawaiian temple) at the water’s edge. Most of what was left of the temple was the lava rock foundations. I could see myself diving into the ocean afterwards, but invasive kiave tree (a very thorny mesquite plant ) thorns littered the coastline. Determined, I refused to wear shoes. The school begged me to be safe, after all, between the sharp lava rock and large thorns, I would surely not make it to the beach unscathed. They offered to wear ties (unheard of for such an unorthodox wedding) to the village ceremony if I abandoned my plans. I wore shoes and they wore ties, mind you, no shirts, just ties around the neck, shorts and thick sandals. It was a memorable Hawaiian ceremony.
My daughter spoke at a public event several years ago regarding diving access to the Wakulla Springs, citing it was her temple of worship. I thought about that as the parental macerations surged toward a location for her ceremony. At the last moment, I checked in with the facility manager and found her date was still open so I jumped at it!. Last Monday, Nicole Stanton exchanged vows of marriage with Zachary Tuthill of Panama City, at Wakulla Springs State Park Lodge, the nearest she could be to her beloved temple water. Divers need to be close to water or they are not happy.

Back to list of columns