Roca Partida Archives - Page 53 of 55

Giant Mantas and a Whale Shark at Roca Partida

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro
Post date 2007-12-14

By Nautilus Staff on December 14th, 2007 in Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro

My last dive today was even more special. We were hanging off the north end of Roca Partida in the shallows with 10 or so divers below us and their bubbles streaming to the surface. The positioning of the divers was such that the bubbles looked like vertical curtains with a passageway between them. I was busy admiring this when a giant manta swooped in beside me and flew straight down the alleyway, twisting and turning around the veil of bubbles. It was beautiful. And then he turned around and did the whole thing over again leaving no question in my mind that this intelligent animal was clearly and deliberately playing in the divers’ bubbles.

Tags giant manta rays, Giant Mantas, giant rays, manta rays, Mantas, Roca Partida, whale sharks

Silky Sharks Swimming in the Moonlight

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Socorro
Post date 2007-11-29

By Nautilus Staff on November 29th, 2007 in Archive, Socorro

Two whale sharks. One was the size of a bus! 45 – 50 feet long and a little brother of maybe 21 feet. We also got visitedby giant manta rays. It was a good start and we had the whale sharks around the rock for the rest of the day. We also saw whitetip reef sharks of course but just a few Galapagos and silvertip sharks – likely because of the relatively warm water?! A good day. At night with no moon we were surrounded by about a 50 silky sharks chasing flying fish in the floodlights of the Nautilus Explorer.

Tags galapagos sharks, Giant Mantas, manta rays, Mantas, Nautilus Explorer, Roca Partida, sharks, silky sharks, silvertip sharks, whale sharks, white tip reef sharks, whitetip sharks

Quiet Scuba Diving Day at Roca Partida

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro
Post date 2007-11-18

By Nautilus Staff on November 18th, 2007 in Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro

We consider Roca Partida to be the crown jewel of diving Socorro/Revillaigedos but by the very nature of Big Animal diving, it’s not always going to be super hot. Current scientific thinking is that the local population of giant manta rays actually traverse a 1200 km route that takes them by San Benedicto Island, Socorro Island, Roca Partida and then up and across to the west side of Baja California before looping south again.

Tags Giant Mantas, hammerhead sharks, hammerheads, manta ID, Manta Identification, manta science, Mantas, Roca Partida, silvertip sharks

Whale Sharks in the Sea of Cortez

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Captain Mike, Sea of Cortez, Socorro
Post date 2007-11-15

By Nautilus Staff on November 15th, 2007 in Archive, Captain Mike, Sea of Cortez, Socorro

We saw five whale sharks at El Mogote and our two local pangas were busy dropping off and picking up our divers. A 6 metre whale shark stopped to feed and positioned itself vertically in the water, completely indifferent to our snorkellers. This provided a great opportunity for photos and videos. Pelicans reportedly dive bombed the bait fish that the whale shark was feeding on and thousands of the fish ended up hiding in the exhaust bubbles from the underwater main engine exhaust of the Nautilus.

Tags el mogote, Nautilus Explorer, pelicans, Roca Partida, snorkeling, whale sharks

Scooter diver buzzed by a Giant Manta Ray

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro
Post date 2007-04-24

By Nautilus Staff on April 24th, 2007 in Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro

We’ve been watching one poor old Galapagos shark with a fish hook and leader stuck in his gill plate all season. I’ve become quite certain that Galapagos sharks are resident rather than transient because we see this guy every time we dive Roca Partida. The sad thing is that he has been getting skinnier and skinnier and now looks quite emaciated. The alarming thing is that his behaviour is changing and he is now coming in VERY close to divers. He swam up to me this afternoon and it’s the first time that I had a gut feeling that I had better “watch out” around him. An understandable behaviour I guess if he is sick and starving to death. Damn, I wish there was an easy way to get rid of the illegal longliner fishing boats.

Tags galapagos sharks, Giant Mantas, hammerhead sharks, hammerheads, Mantas, Roca Partida, scalloped hammerhead shark, sharks, silky sharks, silvertip sharks, white tip reef shark

Illegal tuna clipper at Roca Partida??

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro
Post date 2007-04-08

By Nautilus Staff on April 8th, 2007 in Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro

We checked the radar and discovered a large (225ft??) target doing tight circles off Roca Partida and clearly in the Biosphere Reserve. I suspected that it was a large tuna clipper and that they were watching us through their binoculars because as soon as we launched one of our inflatables, all the lights on the other ship blinked off. The illegal boat then started jinking around at high speed (15 knots plus), apparently doing it’s best to stay away from the inflatable.

Tags Biosphere Reserve, illegal fishing, jacks, open ocean crossing, Roca Partida, sharks, tuna clipper

Mating mobula and manta ray??

Post author By Nautilus Staff
Categories Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro
Post date 2007-04-07

By Nautilus Staff on April 7th, 2007 in Archive, Captain Mike, Socorro

One of our divers reported seeing extraordinary behaviour with a very large male mobula ray (which is still dwarflike in size compared to a giant manta ray) pursuing a female chevron giant manta. While we have seen a lot more female than male mantas this season, the males are definitely here and we sometimes observe what appears to be mating behaviour with the male pursuing the female from behind and the two of them soaring and dancing through the water. It’s hard to tell if they are both enjoying it (not meaning to anthropomorphize the behaviour too much) or if the female is simply trying to get away from a doggedly determined lustful male!! Anyways, Roberto is quite sure that the pursuing ray was a mobula as its mouth was not located terminally. Soooooo, the question is whether he might have witnessed a prelude to interspecies sex!?!

Tags galapagos sharks, giant manta, jacks, Mantas, mating, mobula ray, Roca Partida

Nautilus News