scuba dive the Poor Knights Islands New Zealand with
POOR KNIGHTS ISLANDS , TUTUKAKA , NORTHLAND , NEW ZEALAND
The Gardens
The
gardens at the Poor Knights must be one of the most densely populated marine
habitats in the world. The area has been a reserve sine 1980 and the fish that
live there are thriving, both in numbers and size.
It is an area where you can never be sure what will swim past, from a pod of orca feeding on stingrays, to a thresher shark slowly cruising past.
Starting
at the top end, you first have Mary's wall, a sheer underwater cliff that meets
the sand at 27 metres and rises to an undercut at 5 metres, home to many pink
mao mao, and the occasional copper moki. The wall itself is densely packed with
encrusting sponges and gorgonian fans, sometimes with attendant pacific winged
oysters.
Trevor's
rocks are a series of pinnacles, some of which break the surface at low tide. It
is a great place for nudibranch hunting, or you
can just hover and marvel at the huge schools of fish moving past. There are
swimthroughs at 22 metres where you can find diadema urchins and
toadstool grouper among otherthings. Back towards the cliff there is El Torito
cave, a great place to finish your dive or snorkel. Here it is not uncommon to
find juvenile black angelfish, looking nothing like their older relatives.
Further south you have the great wall, another sheer cliff where schools of demoiselles and butterfly perch pick at drifting plankton, and large kingfish often congregate. Penetrating the cliff is Bigeye cave, so called because thousands of bigeye fish make it their home during the day.
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