As a travel agent and a diver with about 10,000 dives under his belt, Bryan Cunningham knows the scuba travel business well. But he also knows it is an industry that is changing all the time.
Dive shops change. The condition of their dive boats can change. So do dive sites. That's why Bryan will leave his desk at Travelpath in Burlington, Ontario and relocate to the Caribbean. "I already know quite a few -- probably 40 different dive operators in the Caribbean," he says. "But things change all the time. You have to keep up to date."
In late June he will leave Hamilton, Ontario, in his Grampian 30 sailboat and begin his relocation trip to the Caribbean and its rich assortment of quality dive sites. He plans to settle in Antigua (in the Eastern Caribbean), where his ex wife and daughter live.
"I will island hop around the Caribbean and visit dive shops, which increases my knowledge (of good options for his scuba travel customers). Most the islands are no more than 60 miles apart."
He will continue to book the dive trips through Travelpath, but his "office" will be his sailboat.
His decision to buy the sailboat was based on both frugality and safety. The cost of diesel fuel to power a boat to Antigua is prohibitive. He can save a lot of money by sailing in the open seas, while using the engine to get in and out of ports. Rough seas can come up quickly in the Caribbean and the sailboat handles it better than power boats. The fact that the Grampian has a four-foot keel and a three-foot centre board that can protrude below the keel, also helps.
"It's a nice lifestyle. Your expenses are minimal.," Bryan says of life on a boat in the Caribbean.
But the bottom line is the opportunity to better serve his customers, not only from his knowledge of dive boats and dive sites but also of the quality of hotels where they will stay. He says most dive operators offer a commission to him as travel agent but he will pass that on to his customers as a discount, giving them a cheaper diving option if they book their hotels and flights through Travelpath.
"We will put them in the right hotels for diving," he says, adding that in booking through an Ontario company such as Travelpath, customers are protected by the Travel Industry Council of Ontario (TICO).
Geographically, the area he envisions serving runs from the Bahamas down the eastern Caribbean to the ABC Islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao. The advantage of this trio of islands is that they are below the hurricane belt. The last major hurricane to directly hit Aruba was in 1877. He also offers trips to other destinations worldwide.
NB:::::Bryan will keep kirkscubagear updated on his travels when he can. Watch for further articles on his trip.
A small fish nestled among swaying stalks of sea whip coral about 11 miles off the Alabama coast may be poised to shift the balance of life in the Gulf of Mexico.
While it has been less than two years since scuba diver Lawren McCaghren made the first confirmed sighting of a lionfish off Alabama, the animals are now so common that McCaghren said he routinely sees 50 or 60 during a single dive on local reefs.
The sudden colonization of the northern Gulf has scientists using words like alarmed, worried and afraid. First noted off the Atlantic Coast in the 1990s, lionfish swept across the Caribbean in three short years.
“The explosive nature of the population expansion is ominous. We’re getting reports of thousands of them documented across the northern Gulf and thousands in the Keys, all within a few years,” said Bob Shipp, head of marine sciences at the University of South Alabama.
“Whether they replace some of our native species on the reefs, or it is a temporary expansion that will level off, we just don’t know. They don’t have any natural predators. Perhaps some of our predators will eat them, but we have no indication of that yet.”
Lionfish, named for a lovely mane of elaborate fins that rings their bodies, are native to the Pacific Ocean. They are not native to the Gulf or Atlantic. The fish grow to about 15 inches long, but appear much larger due to the fan of fins that spread out around the body. The body is striped with bands of brown, rust, and white.
Scientists believe captive lionfish may have escaped from aquariums in south Florida during Hurricane Andrew in 1992. A few were seen off North Carolina around 2000, and reports of sightings began trickling in from the Caribbean around that time.
Within three years, lionfish had colonized the entire Caribbean and are reported to have eaten or displaced about 60 percent of the native species on reefs there. Lionfish have enormous mouths in relation to the size of their bodies, similar to a largemouth bass. They can consume fish nearly as big as they are.
The fish have become so prevalent in the Florida Keys that dive groups hold tournaments to see who can kill the most lionfish in a day. About 1,500 lionfish were killed in derbies in the Keys in 2011, a number scientists say represents a small drop in a huge bucket.
“Anywhere you go in the Gulf, you see them. Tanks and pyramids, they’re a given,” said McCaghren, manager of the Gulf Coast Divers shop in Mobile. McCaghren filmed a lionfish swimming on an Army tank off Alabama in September of 2010, the first northern Gulf sighting. Within a matter of weeks, divers reported encountering the fish on reefs off Florida and Louisiana.
“The natural bottom stuff, the Trysler Grounds, you don’t see one or two. You see 50 or 60 out there every dive. They’re on every outcropping,” McCaghren said, referring to an area of natural coral reef habitat about 20 miles off the Alabama coast.
McCaghren said he has killed about 100 using a small spear known as a “Lion Tamer.” Because each lionfish possesses three sets of venomous fins, he said he usually knocks them off the spear and leaves them in the water rather than trying to bring them back to the dock to eat.
A lionfish killed by the Press-Register on Tuesday yielded two small filets. The meat was firm and white and tasted delicious sauteed in butter. To clean it, the venomous barbs were simply clipped off with a pair of wire snips.
If you get stung by a lionfish, run the wound under hot water and seek medical attention. The telltale water stream from an outboard motor can be used to provide hot water if you get stung while offshore.
While federal officials have been encouraging people to eat lionfish, it appears unlikely that such a program will make a dent in the Gulf population. In part, that’s because the fish don’t typically take a baited hook, and in part it is because they have apparently colonized the deepest parts of the Gulf.
“No one expected to see a lionfish at 1,400 feet down, but that’s what we’re seeing,” said Thomas Jackson, an exotic species biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Jackson said he believes that lionfish are reproducing in the deep recess of the Gulf and moving in toward shore. Because the fish are native to the Pacific, he said, they are likely more tolerant of the colder water far offshore than many native species.
Shipp, with the University of South Alabama, said that might explain why most of the lionfish seen by divers in the Gulf are relatively small.
“These fish get up to 15 inches, but we’re not seeing that size. Most of the reports I’ve heard are juveniles,” Shipp said. “That’s alarming. If they are establishing themselves here as juveniles, without even reproducing locally, well, who knows what will happen if they start reproducing around here.”
A survey of scuba divers with spearfishing permits conducted by the Dauphin Island Sea Lab yielded hundreds of reports of lionfish in area waters. One fish was reported under a pier in Old River next to Ono Island, in just a few feet of water. Last week, a lionfish was killed in 11 feet of water at Fort Pickens in Pensacola Bay.
“I’m hoping this won’t be like the brown tree snake in Guam. You’re talking about an entire ecosystem that has these predators in very large numbers,” Jackson said. “Our systems are already stressed. Now we’re adding a very efficient predator.”
Jackson said that it is still legal to import a number of lionfish species in the United States, including species that have not yet escaped into the wild. “It is not a good idea to continue to allow the sale of these fish,” he said.
“I think it’s only a matter of time until the lionfish move into shallower water and get into our coastal ecosystem,” McCaghren said. “Fishermen don’t understand the threat yet because they don’t see them. They’re here now. And the difference they’ve made in just a few years is incredible.”
The lionfish is a hot item in SCUBA current events. Though beautiful to observe, the lionfish has infiltrated a marine ecosystem it does not belong to, causing devastating effects to coral reef systems in the Atlantic along the eastern cost of the US and the Caribbean. Local government and environmental agencies are beseeching SCUBA divers to actively hunt and kill the lionfish, which as it turns out, is a rather tasty fish that can be prepared in a variety of ways. So what’s the big deal about lionfish?
Lionfish is the common name for a genus of fish called Pterois, which features about 15 different species. There are 2 species which have invaded the Atlantic and Caribbean: P. volitans and P. miles. Originally from the waters of the Indo-Pacific region, lionfish have been a very popular choice for aquarium enthusiasts in the US for quite some time. There are several theories as to how the lionfish came to be in the local environment. One such theory is that the invasion was facilitated through the destruction of a southern Florida aquarium during Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Another tells of lionfish being accidentally released following the hurricane, and yet another proposes aquarium owners were deliberately releasing them into the sea, unsatisfied with the way the lionfish performed in the aquarium. Still others claim to have spotted the lionfish on local reefs even before Hurricane Andrew.
The lionfish has been able to reproduce at such profuse levels due to certain crucial factors:
Lionfish have no natural predators on the reefs of the Atlantic and Caribbean. Any creature that sits at the top of the food chain, unchecked by nature, will enjoy the privilege of populating an area with its own species. But this can have disastrous implications for the area as the system becomes more imbalanced.
Lionfish have a voracious, unbiased appetite for reef species. The lionfish is an indiscriminate predator, feeding on invertebrates, small fish, mollusks, and juvenile species in large amounts. Up to 6 species of fish have been found in a lionfish stomach at one time. They are aggressive and skilled hunters, using specialized characteristics of their bodies to stalk and overtake prey, which they do in one giant swallow.
Lionfish spawn at a highly accelerated rate. The female lionfish releases clusters of 2,000 to 15,000 eggs at one time, which are then fertilized by the male, and hatch 36 hours later. Within 3 days they are competent swimmers, and capable of capturing and consuming small prey. Within 20 – 40 days, the lionfish begins its metamorphosis to adult. Lionfish females can repeat this process on a monthly basis with no set breeding season, and the typical lionfish lives between 5 and 15 years.
Lionfish are hostile and venomous. The lionfish is covered in long, venomous spines that serve as a deterrent to predators in its natural environment, and are incorporated into the capture of some prey. The effect of the venom on prey is fatal, whereas the effect on humans is painful, and can bring about symptoms of nausea and fever, but is very rarely fatal. They are extremely aggressive toward other reef species, either chasing them away from the reef or consuming them in a territorial play.
According to research, lionfish are responsible for wiping out up to 80% of reef species in the Atlantic and Caribbean. A few studies have shown the Caribbean grouper to be a predator of the lionfish, but due to overfishing, there are not enough grouper to contain the wild spread of lionfish populations. That’s where SCUBA divers, snorkelers, and anglers come in.
If you live in these areas or will be traveling to one soon, check into local programs dedicated to controlling lionfish populations. Although complete eradication is deemed unrealistic, people with SCUBA training can be of immense assistance in keeping reef ecosystems from being ravaged by this most unwelcome visitor.
Football players wear them. So do people competing in hockey, baseball, cycling and a myriad of other sports.
But divers wearing helmets? And being supplied with compressed air via a hose at the water surface that connects to their helmets? Who would have thought it?
During a recent Caribbean cruise I experienced this interesting twist on underwater exploration during a stop at Coral World Ocean Park in St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. It is called “helmet diving.”
We boarded a bus in St. Thomas and were taken on a 40-minute drive on the wrong side of the road – at least what North Americans consider the wrong side -- to our destination, which they called “the cove.” Among the other attractions at this facility are snorkelling, scuba diving and encounters with sea lions, sharks or turtles, to name a few. Equipment can be rented or purchased there.
The helmet diving base is a large round covered area. After a brief introduction that included instructions and the usual signing of a waiver absolving the facility of liability, gloves and water shoes were provided. We descended a ladder three steps into the water, where a white helmet was placed over our heads, resting on the shoulders. It was the receptacle for the compressed air that was pumped down from the surface.
The helmet, which featured a clear mask, was large enough to enable us to wear our glasses. That was a bonus in clear water where the visibility ranged from 30 to 40 feet. We were told to stay upright to prevent water from entering the helmet. Breathing was normal, but we had to purge our ears. The helmet weighed 70 pounds, but with the buoyancy created by the water we experienced a weight of just 15 pounds when we were below the surface.
Descending the final steps of the ladder to the ocean floor 20 feet beneath the surface in 81-degree Fahrenheit (27.2 Celsius) water, we began our helmet dive walk. Two scuba divers guided us on the 30-minute trip. An added safety measure was a chain along the route; we were told to hang on to because the water was fast moving. Unfortunately, one of our helmet divers had to leave the water after experiencing breathing difficulty. While it should not be a problem for most people, those who have breathing difficulties or who suffer from claustrophobia might not want to try it.
Of the five of us taking part in the helmet dive, I was the only one who scuba dives. It struck me that helmet diving is an excellent opportunity for those who do not wish to go the scuba route to see some of the underwater world that thrills divers. But in exposing helmet divers to that same visual experience – especially in the clear waters of the Caribbean – it is also a vehicle to attract new people to scuba.
I would highly recommend helmet diving to anyone thinking of getting into scuba diving, or to those who just want a glimpse into a diver`s world.
