Nudibranch traversing seagrass
John Bunker ready for a sunset dive to be heading in between two hours before and four hours after high water( Portland), when the current is wafting eastward toward Cogden and West Bexington, rather than westward to Freshwater and West Bay.
Care should be taken by the entry point toward the crumbling western cliffs; while the site is generally shallow, the beach does shelve off deceptively quickly at the water’ s edge. Upon entry, you descend down onto a mixture of pea-sized gravel and larger boulders. These extend into a reefy‘ arm’ that leads you gradually southwards away from the shore.
Completing my 300th dive here back in July of 2018, myself and my buddy entered at sunset, just as the denizens of the rocky reef were starting to make their appearance. With the bloom having dropped off, sunbeams streaked through the water and we grinned at each other, thrilled at the prospect of having it all to ourselves.
Out on the sandflats, blonde and small-eyed rays glided by, with roving lobsters, young congers and nurse hounds likewise cruising for a meal. To our delight, we found the softer sand by the reef yielded scores and scores of little cuttles, readily engaging in fierce turf wars and erupting from the seabed only to bury themselves back in it as we came by. As we circled the flats and came back up the beach I was buzzed by a huge grey mullet in the shallows, apparently attracted by our lights as we clambered upwards.
Painted goby on the substrate
A common dragonet eyes the photographer
Debrief: With so many of Dorset’ s beaches increasingly overfished these days, Hive Beach at night offers something of a haven for biodiversity, with a range of habitats and species guaranteed to put on a show.
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