Hi everyone would love to hear your ideas on how you would set up a bonfire or shallow reef black water. I will be heading on an expedition at the border of yemen in oman will be setting up camp next to remote reefs and planning to give a try at bonfire. I have set up a few blackwater dives and am planning to put some big lights around 3-5m pointing to the outer sea and go for the dive after maybe 20 min. On the shallow reef black water dive i am planning we are diving from a boat i am planning to put a buoy next to the reef ( reef is at 12-15m) with lights attached to it at different heights probably last lights will be set at 5m on the line. Would you set it up any differently ?
Thank you
Alex Tyrrell wrote an excellent article on DPG discussing just what you want but at a different location:
thx thomas i had seen that article but it covers more bw photography set up in deep water rather than bon fire or shallow reef set up ...
On 12/27/2022 at 8:22 PM, nomadadv said:
give us a call Chris
On 1/1/2023 at 4:53 AM, nomadadv said:
thx thomas i had seen that article but it covers more bw photography set up in deep water rather than bon fire or shallow reef set up ...
The Manta dives in Kona, Hawaii are done in shallow water where there is a sandy bottom between reef formations. My dive computer recorded 37 feet for the last one I did so in the 10-15 meter range. The "bonfire" consisted of many dive lights in a large diameter pile on the bottom as it appeared that each boat donated one dive light - DM dived down with ours b4 we splashed. There had to be 2 dozen boats of all kinds at the time. I did not see the plankton the lights attracted because the divers were kept away by being placed in a large circle with divers facing towards the lights. The Mantas did barrel rolls above the lights and were presumably feeding on the attracted plankton.
There is a possibility that you might attract Mantas as well!
