Upwellings: Dotties and Turttle Heaven July 7, 2020

Rolling the dice on a beautiful Kona morning...where to go? Dotties and Turtle Heaven were dialed in. We couldn't have known what good choices those were, Dotties is always good, but the highlights were the Eel convention at Turtle, the Dragon Moray, and the great structure Kona Honu Instructor/Capt Janine Maira found in both spots.

Dotties is a dive site in North Pine Trees, Kona, with something very unique: soft coral. The beautiful Protopalythoa corals are only here, as far as I know. And they are not the only attraction at Dotties: there are arches and nudibrach festooned canyons, and on good days you can get Eagle Rays and other big Pelagics out by the drop off.

Here's a look at the soft coral from today.

Soldier fish hiding under a soft coral ledge

Heading out toward the dropoff we found a Tiger Snake Eel out in the open, a couple of banded Coral Shrimp, and a couple of nudis. The second one a beautiful Red Spotted Nudibranch. My first ever! And Janine found a Wire Coral Gobie.

Pustulose Nudi

Red Spotted Nudibranch

We weren't likely to find any Harlequins today so I left the Linckia Stars alone.

Here are the fun fish we found enroute to the Eel Convention.

Long Nose butterfly

Transitioning Yellow Tail Coris

Orange color trumpetfish

And then this happened: Eels everywhere, Undulated eels, Yellow Margin eels, White Mouth Eels. Some just hanging out together.

As if this wasn't enough, next we found a Dragon Moray deep in a hole and an endemic Lionfish in an unlikely place; Antler Coral at about 35 feet. Usually they are deeper out in rubble.