Now we get to the interesting part of the Inlet Dive.
It was way cool. At Manasquan Inlet, on the Point Pleasant side, there is a park where people can walk along the seawall, crab and fish or sit on benches and watch the boats go in and out. At the end of the park is a rock jetty where people sometimes fish and at the end you can see the ocean.
We jumped off the seawall into the inlet and went down. I actually stayed down after one of my dive buddies stuck a 5lb weight in my suit.
Under the water down the wall and on the rocks along the side of the inlet was a whole different place. Gazillions of mussels (no that is not an exaggeration) are stuck to everything. I understand I can harvest them and you can eat them although you want the mussels closer to the ocean (cleaner) but they weigh a ton to bring up (remember part 1?) so I wont be doing that just yet.
There are different color algae and plants growing, not just the green stuff. There were these really cool red ones that looked like red ruffles stuck to the rocks. I will have to find out what they are called. In the crevices of the rocks all these fish and eels are hiding. They back into the crevices and so when you shine your light on them you see their faces first. They have really big eyes. When the light hits their eyes sometimes it blinds them and they shoot out at you but not too often. There are oyster crackers which you do not want to put your finger in their mouth and striped things, I don’t know what they were.
There were also some little baby manta rays swimming about, if you didn’t pay attention you wouldn’t see them. I understand that in another couple of weeks there will be seahorses and some tropical fish like puffer fish that get carried in with the warmer currents.There were hundreds of starfish in every size everywhere. They are bright orange underwater.
And there are blue claw crabs in every size just swimming around and when you put your hand on one cause you are not looking, they bite and you have to snap your hand and fling them off like in a cartoon. I guess I never considered what they eat. I kinda thought they were like scavengers and lived off chicken people tied to string and threw in, I don’t know. But we were looking around and came across this really big blue claw crab really working at something and stopped to watch. This crab was pulling mussels off the rocks and would separate a good one from the bunch and then using its pinchers pried open the mussel. It was really a struggle between the two of them. Then when it got the mussel open it used its pincers like chop sticks to eat the mussel. I guess I never really saw a crab open up its mouth up close before. I’m pretty sure I saw teeth. They are pretty agile and use their claws and pincers like arms and hands putting things precisely where they want them. It was really interesting and they taste good with garlic too.
I think this is where they grow fishing lures too. There were several patches of them in the crevices of the rocks I saw as we swam along.It was kinda cool.
I will do it again.
Cheryl