UK Diving » Plymouth » Diving from Bovisand

Sally had some seafans to investigate which seemed like a great excuse for a trip to Devon until we rolled up at the gates of Fort Bovisand to find that the MOD police had locked the place up... luckily we have friends in high places and had soon upgraded our accommodation thanks to Sally. The next day everything was sorted and we enjoyed our stay at Bovi and got 4 good dives in, with a free funfair ride back from the first! The windy was icy but the water was warm! Many thanks to Sally and Danny for a really enjoyable weekend.

The November waters off Plymouth were still quite clear, and the kelp still lush	Here's Dawn lurking in the Obelia coated kelp	We were mainly here to check out a new area of Pink Seafans - Eunicella verrucosa - which Sally wanted to check out	They are colonies of cnidarian polyps within a hard skeleton - which acts like a branched skyscraper lifting them up into the current above the seabed	Although they are called Pink Seafans they vary quite a lot in colour from pale pink to orange - this one is a peachy pink
As well as being interesting in their own right they also provide accomodation for other animals - mainly bryozoans and hydroids	Sometimes just a light covering of the bryozoan Obelia (probably geniculata)	Sometimes the covering is a uniform afro - although you can still see the coral	And sometimes the coral is completely covered by growth and is decorated with other bits and pieces, here notably a Dogfish - Scyliorhinus canicula egg case	Here a colony of long stalked ascidians is living on the tip of a seafan
This is a feathery hydroid, the polys often form zig zag colonies but accurate ID will have to wait until the new Seasearch guide book comes out...	There were lots of these little (2cm) Cushion stars - Asterina gibbosa - about, mostly on the kelp	As noted by experts (Such as Trevor Norton) the Common Sea Urchin - Echinus esculentus - is much happier when it has found something to wear as a hat, however feeble	Bomb! Not every shell we found had a hermit crab in it. Danny said these were duds and threw them back in for someone else to get excited about next time	Yellow Staghorn sponge - Axinella dissimilis can take this bowl form...
...or grow in one plane	This close up of a Devonshire Cup Coral - Caryophyllia smithii - unusually shows the delicate ripple in the white plates at the base of each feeding tentacle (they are retracted)	No trip to the South West is complete without seeing a Tompot Blenny - Parablennius gattorugine	This one was posing on the platform by the breakwater tower in Plymouth Sound	We were intrigued to see this holiday maker, a Striped Blenny - Parablennius rouxi - normally a Mediterranean resident but just as nosey as a Tompot
There were lots of Double Spiral worms - Bispira volutacornis	They vary in colour and pattern, this one shows the corkscrew centre of their feeding fan unusually well	Another nice example, each 'spoke' of the fans has filaments like a feather to catch passing crud	The red Organ Pipe worm - Serpula vermicularis - is much smaller and more delicate than the Double Spiral ones	This glutenus blob is a Red Sea Squirt - Ascidia mentula - retracted after a bit of a scare
This used to be 'Ross coral' but its now more accurately known as a Potato Crisp bryozoan - Pentapora foliacea - as it never was a coral	Even being a bryozoan doesn't mean others won't grow on you. Here Obelia geniculata grows on the crisp-like plates of a Pentapora foliacea	Seen close up urchins have an array of special feet between their spines - stabber, nipper and suckers - often just used for finding and fitting a really cool hat	This cup coral has collected a couple of hitch hikers - Megatrema anglicum - barnacles which are specific to these colourful animals, even the pink ones	At the moment this Acanthodoris pilosa nudibranch doesn't have a common name - I'm aiming to popularise 'The Scotty dog slug' - but works hard eating the unattractive Finger or Jelly bryozoan - Alcyonidium diaphanum
They are generally white or this pale gold...	and lay these spirals of white eggs on the Finger bryozoans	Although usually grey Spiny starfish can occur in a variety of colours	Like their echinoderm cousins the urchins the Spiny starfish - Marthasterias glacialis - carries a tool kit on their backs, athough they don't share their fetish for hats	Two Spot Gobies - Gobiusculus flavescens - are devilishly hard to focus on. They dart about about a foot off the bottom taunting divers
They are quite easy to overlook as their bright colouring needs good light to be seen	This is a very red little Goldsinny wrasse - Ctenolabrus rupestris - which stalked us down the gullies and thought it was out of sight amongst the rocks	The Sand Gobies - Pomatoschistus minutus - in Devon seemed very jumpy	Although this looks like a sponge it's really (fingers crossed) a colonial ascidian (seaquirt) - Diplosoma spp. (probably spongiforme) - which makes it very slightly more interesting. According to the books you can see the individual zooids inside.	It's the blue blob which is the item of interest here, it's a Blue Encrusting sponge - Terpios fugax - one of two seen around the UK and the rarer one to boot!
Dawn hanging on her reel waiting to surface	See how happy she is to be back on the surface? It was a different story in the morning when a swell arrived whilst we were submerged	Some people can make anything look miserable...	...at least the boat has arrived :-)	The view from our bunker at Fort Bovisand

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