A review of Many Things Under a Rock – The Mysteries of Octopuses, by David Scheel

In recent years we have been spoiled with octopus books and films. From fascinating meditations about their intelligence and what it means for our understanding of evolution, by Peter Godfrey-Smith in Other Minds, to charming tributes to the joy and life-enhancing experience of encountering them underwater in the documentary My Octopus Teacher.

David Scheel’s riveting book adds another dimension. His perspective is the unsentimental and calm gaze of a working scientist who has spent decades studying these elusive and baffling creatures.

When he started his career, it was nigh on impossible to raise any funds for research into octopuses. But his groundbreaking work on the giant octopus in the cold waters of Alaska started to reveal the wonder of these highly intelligent animals, and the rest of the world has caught on.

You may also like:

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• Review: The Mountain in the Sea, by Ray Nayler
• Review: Spring Tides, by Fiona Gell
• Octopuses fire blasts of debris at sex pests

Today we are rightly fascinated by stories of their cunning intelligence, marvel at their ability to shapeshift and are keen to find out more about their short but complex lives.

Most of the obvious questions you have about octopuses and many more you will not have considered are covered in this excellent book by Scheel, who is the world’s leading expert on this most unusual marine creature.

Many Things Under a Rock – one of the indigenous names for octopus – is a thorough and lucid exploration of our state of knowledge about one of the ocean’s most enigmatic creatures, based on the hard grind of years of hands-on, field research.

The post Review: Many Things Under a Rock – The Mysteries of Octopuses, by David Scheel appeared first on DIVE Magazine.

By Max James

One drop of most sunscreens in 15 million litres of water is all it takes to damage a reef. And as 90 per cent of divers and snorkellers visit just 10 per cent of the world’s reefs, we are dumping a lot of toxic chemicals on a concentrated area of reef – as much as 6,000 tonnes a year!

This has led to Thailand, Hawaii and others to ban certain sunscreens. As divers, protecting reefs is always a priority – so what can we do? First, we need to understand the problem.

Nearly all shop counter sunscreens contain chemicals that are harmful to coral reefs. Recent research established that the harmful agents include oxybenzone (a sunscreen), octinoxate (a sunscreen) and 4-methylbenzylidene camphor (a sunscreen) and butylparaben (a preservative).

The chemical names can be confusing, so watch out for any of the following  BP-2, BMDBM, BZ, MBC, OMC, OCT, BEMT or any compound with the term benzene included. Also, look out for the use of any paraben as a preservative.

Oxybenzone is found in more than 3,500 sunscreen products worldwide – that is most of the popular brands. Be aware that some products labelled ‘reef safe’ contain oxybenzone – always check the listed ingredients and if any of the above are listed they are definitely NOT reef safe.

A study by Dr Craig Downs showed that oxybenzone encourages coral bleaching and damages coral DNA, grossly deforming juvenile corals.

Another study by Roberto Danovaro showed that sunscreens cause viral infections to develop in the coral symbiotic zooxanthellae leading to coral bleaching.

Be careful with the term ‘biodegradable’ – the research that established that these chemicals damaged coral also made clear that the damage is done very quickly – well before the substances biodegrade. So the fact that they do eventually biodegrade in the ocean is of no help to the corals.

Even some of the products that don’t contain the known harmful agents are not problem-free. Two of the most common barriers used in ‘safe’ sunscreens are zinc oxide and titanium dioxide – neither is known to have a direct negative impact on coral.

However, they can be manufactured as ‘nanoparticles’ – minute chemical structures that are 100,000 smaller than the diameter of a human hair. And nanoparticles are a hazard for all types of marine life and should be avoided.

If the ingredients say the zinc oxide is ‘uncoated’ you can safely assume that nanoparticles are not being used.

So what should you be doing as diver? Here’s a couple of sensible tips:

•  Wear a  long-sleeved rashguard with built-in UV protection rather than using lots of sunscreen
• Apply any sunscreen sparingly if essential before getting in the water and at least 15 minutes before a dive giving it time to absorb into your skin
• Avoid using any sunscreen with the above chemicals in the ingredients. Check out the list of preferable products below.

There is a growing range of sunscreens that are based on natural ingredients such as beeswax and various natural oils. Here are a few examples …

Evoa Organic

These award-winning sunscreen creams contain nyamplung oil; organic shea butter; beeswax; organic sunflower oil and, the French manufacturer says is 100 per cent of natural origin. Easy to apply and comes in SPF30 and SPF50 strengths.

visit Evoa Organic’s website

Aethic Sôvée

The London-based producers of what they call ‘Ecocompstible Sunscreens’ say they are the first marine safe certified sunscreens and contain no petrol-based chemicals, no alcohol, no titanium dioxide and no zinc oxide. They contain olive oil, beeswax, and coconut extract and have an SPF15 rating. Even the bottle is made from a corn-based plastic and no glue is used on the fully recyclable packaging.  visit Aethic Sôvée website

And there are some products which rely on uncoated zinc oxide such as…

Badger Balm

The family-owned producers of this environmentally friendly range of organic sunscreens and other products are based in New Hampshire, US. They only use organic plant extracts and natural minerals (zinc oxide) to make safe sunscreen. The company has just released a clear SPF 35 sports sunscreen using uncoated zinc oxide, sunflower oil, beeswax, jojoba and natural vitamin e. One of the problems with zinc oxide is it leaves a white hue on the skin after application – but a new generation of products seems to have solved the issue.

visit Badger’s website.

Raw Elements

Developed by ocean lifeguard Brian Guadagno, this sunscreen uses uncoated zinc oxide as its lone active ingredient. The company produces a wide range of eco-friendly products such as lip balms and moisturisers.

visit Raw Elements website.

The post What sunscreens are safe for divers & reefs? appeared first on DIVE Magazine.

By Max James

Okay, it’s a kids’ film. True, it is a tad anthropomorphic, and yes, it is slightly cutesy. But watch this Netflix special. The cinematography is incredible. Stream it on the largest, best-quality screen you can access, and sit back for just over an hour to be amazed and entranced.

Award-winning Australian documentary director Nick Robinson and cinematographer Pete West have captured in astonishing detail the life history of a sharp-nosed pufferfish from tiny larva to mature adult, on the Great Barrier Reef. Using super-macro techniques developed by West’s BioQuest Studios, who are at the cutting edge of underwater filming, this rivals anything being broadcast by natural history filmmakers.

Much is filmed on the reef and then melded with the stunning work produced by BioQuest’s indoor studios in Queensland using microscopic filming.

The slow-motion sequences and the careful editing create a stunning package.

Marvel as a seahorse hunts tiny crustaceans, then be knocked out when the cameras close in even further, and you see the microscopic crustaceans feeding on seagrass flowers. Watch a cone snail devour, in gruesome detail, a zombie snail. Stare into the eye of a frogfish in extreme close-up. Delight at a coral-spawning sequence. 

Australian actress Rose Byrne narrates and, considering this is pitched at children, does a fine job of explaining the complexities of the eat-or-be-eaten world of the coral reef. 

The post Review: Puff: Wonders of the Reef appeared first on DIVE Magazine.

By Max James

False Bay in South Africa used to be one of the few places on the planet that divers safely protected by cages could reliably encounter great white sharks.

Along with Guadalupe Island off Mexico’s west coast and around Port Lincoln in South Australia, False Bay developed a thriving shark diving tourist trade.

But in recent years the sharks have stopped turning up to feast on the still plentiful fur seals in the vast sandy bay just east of the Cape of Good Hope and Cape town. As many as 500 great whites sharks were estimated to hunt in the bay.

In 2017 the cage dive operations reported a dramatic drop in sightings around False Bay and Gansbaii.

From 2010 to 2016, white sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) were sighted in False Bay an average of 205 times each year, according to conservation and research organization Shark Spotters. In 2018, the sharks were seen just 50 times; and in 2019, none. In January 2020, the first great white shark in 20 months was seen in False Bay.

‘I’ve spent my entire life in the field watching these animals on a daily basis,’ local cage dive operator and wildlife photographer Chris Fallows says.

‘When the waters go quiet, both above and below the surface, and these predators are not there, it sounds huge alarm bells.’

Scientists are baffled.

‘The reality is that we have way more theories than we have facts to support them at the moment,’ says marine biologist Alison Kock, of South African National Parks who has been researching white sharks in South Africa since 1998.

The first problem is understanding the size of the great white shark population around the whole of South Africa. Recent research on the genetics of great white sharks in the area suggests that there is just a single population and individuals roam from feeding site to feeding site.

However, the same research also indicates that the population may be as small as 500 with a study in 2009 to 2011 suggesting that this may only include 300 breeders. It is thought you need at least 500 breeders in a great white shark population for it to be viable long-term.

Sara Andreotti of Stellenbosch University said: ‘So our population was in real trouble already.’

In 2017 a dramatic development caught people’s attention. Reports of great white sharks and sevengill sharks (Notorynchus cepedianus) found with their livers ripped out started to surface.  Orcas are the only animals known to hunt in this highly effective way – the liver, which can weight up to a third of the total of a great white shark, is highly nutritious, being rich in fat.

A pair of orcas known as Port and Starboard were first spotted in False Bay in 2015. Another pod arrived at the end of last year.

A study partly written by Kock established that orcas have been responsible for the attacks and great whites and sevengill sharks in the area and noted that similar predation by orcas had been observed in the North Pacific. The report warns: ‘Both sevengill sharks and white sharks play an important role as apex predators in the ecosystems they inhabit. A reduction in their numbers due to direct predation from killer whales, combined with their prolonged absence from traditional aggregation sites, is predicted to have cascading effects throughout entire coastal ecosystems.’

However, while orca predation may have played some part in the disappearance of the great whites in the area, many fear that it is only part of the story. 

Fallows, who has been putting researchers and film-makers in the water with sharks for nearly 30 years and has taken some iconic photographs himself of great whites leaping into the air with fur seals in their mouths, argues that Port and Starboard may have had some impact but they cannot explain the complete disappearance of what had been an apex predator for so long in the area.

He believes the culprit to be what is known as demersal longline fish where bottom-dwelling species such as gummy and school sharks are targetted with hundred of kilometres of lines with thousands upon thousands of baited hooks. These small sharks account for 60 per cent of the diet of great white sharks and are a particularly important food for juveniles. The small sharks are sold to Australia where they are popular in the fish and chip market and known as ‘flake’.

While great whites are protected in South African waters, their prey isn’t. South African shark scientist Enrico Gennari has been working with Fallows to improve the monitoring of the longline industry. They have footage which shows longline vessels illegally fishing in marine protected areas and even the landing endangered hammerhead sharks.

Fallows says the fishery is ‘destroying one of the world’s great marine ecosystems, and all for a plate of fish and chips!’

However, other researchers are more cautious about the link. One study noted that while great white sightings have plummeted in the Western Cape, they have spiked in the Eastern Cape where there is even more longline fishing.

Kock says: ‘You have to be careful, because you can have unintended consequences … for people’s livelihoods. It’s really important, particularly for people in the decision-making sphere, to have evidence-based information, so that they can make the right decision. And at the moment, in terms of the white sharks disappearing, that needs a lot more work.’

The post What’s happened to False Bay’s great white sharks? appeared first on DIVE Magazine.

By Max James

More often than not, when it comes to technology, simple is best. The elegant, functional, and extremely easy-to-use Deepblu Cosmiq+ dive computer surely proves the point.

If you have no ambitions to use complex mixed gases, nor do you plan to push the limits with multiple-stop decompression dives, then this is the computer for you. And, let’s face it that covers a large number of sport divers.

As the iPhone has shown, you can go a long way with providing customers with what they want and need in a well-designed and attractive package. Also, just as Apple’s remarkable success indicates, you can often persuade them to pay a premium for services and functions people hadn’t even realised they desired.

This really is the dive computer for the iPhone generation.

What you get

It is neatly packaged in a useful travel case, comes with two nylon wrist straps, a magnetic USB charger and a basic get-going leaflet. There are currently five different colour configurations.

While it is wrist-mounted and could pass as a natty smartwatch, it is not meant to be used as a watch nor to be worn except when diving or free-diving. In fact, it recommended not to switch it on during air travel as it will assume you are on a dive during the plane’s descent.

It is powered by a built-in li-ion battery which you cannot replace. The manufacturers say its performance will be sustained for at least 500 charges before the 7-12 hours of use per charge depending on brightness settings may decline. The obvious advantage of a closed unit is that it is one less thing that can go wrong – no O-ring failures flooding your computer while changing batteries.

The charging cable locates with a grooved plastic head on the back of the case and a satisfying magnetic clunk as it connects. However, be careful when charging as I found it was quite easy to dislodge if the unit or the power source is moved. It was most stable with the computer face down, and you can easily see if the connector is correctly in place.

There are two relatively large push-buttons on each side of the unit which move you through the basic modes available: Watch, the default which shows time and battery level; Scuba, the diving interface; Bottom Timer, depth gauge and timer only; Freediver, depth, dive time and various alarms; Log, previous 25 dives and Sync, for connecting to the Deepblu app.

On activation, the major difference with other diving computers becomes apparent. For this is the first diving computer where you can quickly adjust the setting for the various modes not by clicking through layered menus on the unit but by an easy-to-scroll-through app on your smartphone using a Bluetooth connection.

As I said, this is the dive computer for the smartphone generation. While this might seem to some Luddites as a further irritating invasion of the phone into every aspect of their lives, it is, in fact, a remarkably efficient and quick way to adjust your settings.

Altering your nitrox mix takes seconds, unlike many computers I have used in the past.

The first scroll-down menu allows you to adjust general settings such as units of measurement and backlight brightness. The Scuba menu lets you pick one of three settings for the decompression algorithm – conservative, normal or progressive. The basic algorithm is the Bülhmann ZHL-16C. However, there is little or no guidance as to the impact of the settings on your dive.

I used the conservative mode during an intensive, four-dives a day, liveaboard trip far from a chamber and there were significant differences with my usual computer, particularly at depths over 25m with up to five minutes being trimmed off no-decompression dive times. Probably, no bad thing in the circumstances. In normal mode there were only marginal variations with my control computer.

The app also allows you to alter your PPO2 setting from 1.2 to 1.6, your nitrox mix from 21% to 40% and to set depth and time alarms. The audible alarms are not the loudest I have ever heard – in fact, I struggled to hear them. Personally, something I welcome as I find the constant beeps and buzzes of some computers a pain and the visual alarm displays of the Cosmiq+ are clear and easy to understand, and they should be what we are diving to rather than relying on audible prompts.

Another minor niggle is the stripped back options offered in the app are quite limited. For example, there is no way to alter the duration of safety stops. The house suggestion for safety stops on the liveaboard I was on, was for five minutes at five metres rather than the standard three minutes. However, as the screen is so clear, it was no problem to add a further two minutes using the dive time read-out when your three-minutes was completed on the safety stop count down.

You can use the side buttons on the unit to adjust your nitrox mix when in Scuba mode if you wish and you can change depths and alarms when in Freediving mode using the same method. However, the ease of use of the app makes this more of a backup than a regularly used option.

Underwater

A neat feature is that you can set the default mode in the app to either Scuba, Bottom Timer or Free so when you get beneath a metre or so the unit automatically switches to the correct mode – no fiddling about as you descend because you left the unit on Synch between dives.

I found the tough, nylon, wrist-strap perfectly serviceable. It uses a ‘NATO’ double threading style method of attachment which seemed a bit overkill as you would have to destroy the unit’s plastic case to detach it from the strap. Pulled tight, I rarely felt the Cosmiq+ slipping down my wetsuited arm. On the few occasions it did (when I had failed to pull it tight), it was easy to push the computer further up your arm to keep it secure. It has an extremely low profile and doesn’t get tangled even when putting on or taking off your BCD.

The Cosmiq+ has one of the easiest to read faces of any small, wrist-mounted computer I have used – better than many with far larger, bulkier screen. Even the smallest legends, such as water temperature are legible, and the information displayed on the rectangular face (4.5cm x 5cm) is well organised in a coherent hierarchy. Your depth and no-deco times are the largest numbers on the screen.

On no-deco diving, all was a breeze. However, checking out what happens if you slip over is a bit more confusing. The Cosmiq+ very clearly flashes Ceiling, alerting you that you now have to make a stop, but working out the display at that point was it bit more taxing than I would have liked. First, it displays your recommended stop time as both minutes and seconds, which seemed unnecessary, and it took me a while to decipher. While it clearly shows your ceiling depth, it doesn’t give you a total ascent time. Once you work out what it is telling you, it does effectively take you through the process. However, this is not the dive computer for planned and regular decompression diving. Instead, it is an extremely easy-to-use one, ideal for dealing with those times when you are distracted or forced to slip into decompression by circumstances beyond your control.

But to be fair, that covers an awful lot of the diving that goes on in the world. Most holiday divers stay inside their no-deco limits, and a computer that is easy to set and even easier to read is probably safer and more appropriate than having to wade through complex menus and unintelligible displays more suited to mission control than pottering around a coral reef.

The adjustable backlit display of the DeepBlu Cosmiq+ dive computer is a big plus. It is permanently on, a boon for night dives (no more shining your torch on your wrist at just the right angle) and in bright sunshine, you can easily cup your hand around the screen to see the display.

The app

Central to using the Cosmiq+ is the Deepblu app which is well designed and packed with functionality. Not only does it allow you to alter a range of settings for the computer, it also connects you to a rich social media world where your photos and logs can be shared (this is optional for those who wish for some diving privacy), a growing range of user-generated content, some curated content and very usable digital logbook.

The computer itself only holds 25 separate dives in its logbook so it is assumed you will be downloading to the app at regular intervals. Uploading a dive is helped by the ever-growing amount of data supplied by other divers – the most obscure dive sites are readily accessible and you can input a wide range of pre-set options such as type and nature of the dive plus your more personal notes and photos. It is a doddle to quickly build-up a detailed personal history of your diving and, if you wish, share your adventures with the world. You can link to selected buddies and send messages.

The app also keeps you in touch with the free firmware updates Deepblu releases.

Conclusion

There are cheaper basic dive computers on the market which offer all the functionality the Cosmiq+ offers underwater, but none which combine the simplicity of use, an excellent backlit screen and the quality and fun of a first-class app with logbook and social media. If you are looking for a good dive computer to use for no-decompression diving on your travels plus a first-rate digital logbook and handy social media built-in then this should be top of your list.  Highly recommended.

Specifications

Water resistance:  100m (330ft) • Fresh or highly saline waters • Gases: air & nitrox (21% to 40%) • PPO2: 1.2 bar to 1.6 bar • Altitude: Above 3,000m (1,00ft) •  Battery: rechargeable lithium-ion • Data transfer: Bluetooth 4.0

RRP US $399

Check it out on Amazon

To find out more or order, visit bit.ly/cosmiq-ukdive

The post Review | Deepblu Cosmiq+ dive computer appeared first on DIVE Magazine.