Any marine biologists on here?

Nick_H

Nick_H

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www.ybw-boatsforsale.com
During crossing from Corsica to SoF today we went through lots of large patches of fish scales floating on the surface. At several of them we saw large-ish sea creature(s) with fin flapping slowly from side to side on top of the water. They seemed to have a bulbous front end, but dissapeared underwater if we went too close. At first we thought they were dolphins in lazy feeding mode, but we also had the pleasure of a pod of dolphins joining us, and it's clear they weren't the same.

Any ideas?

We also saw a couple of game fish jumping later in the trip. so a fab journey all round, and more sea life in one day than i've seen in previous 2 yrs here.
 
Sounds Like a Sunfish, It's fin flaps from side to side like that.

IMG_0181.jpg
 
Yes, agreed, definitely sunfish. Plenty around at the moment - we saw them twixt Antibes and St Trop at the weekend
Glad you had a good trip. Looking forward to pictures. I'll be there Saturday-Monday
 
Interesting. I immediately thought they were Sunfish, having a distant memory of what they looked like from TV programmes, but when we got to port I googled and it seemed to suggest they weren't native to the Med. Anyway, it seems they are, and i'm now very sure that's what we saw. Shame we couldn't get a closer look.
 
thx. Love the new avatar, did you get snapped by Pictureplus.eu at St Tropez? They snapped us on our delivery trip from Toulon a couple of years back, the quality of their pics were superb, but the boat was filthy from the sea crossing, and we had ropes everywhere, stuff in the tender etc. We've chased the 'copter round St Tropez since, trying to get them to take some more, but we've not been able to attract their attention. I would love to get some good aerial shots of our boat.

We have to fly back Friday unfortunately, as we're being made homeless next Wednesday.
 
Some years back we came across a large whale mid-way between Nice and Corsica. SWMBO saw a water spout and asked if it could be a whale, but I didn't believe there were whales in the Med. She said "There's something out there."

About 5 miles on at 23 kts, it surfaced alongside us and then turned away. It was huge - bigger than our Cam. 47. I turned and followed it for a short distance (with a very concerned SWMBO) and it disappeared.

Later, we saw a ferry in Calvi with its stern gear damaged by a whale.

A couple of years later, we saw a smaller one surface in front of us in the same area.
 
I saw something very similar to the fish in the picture in the summer of 2006 off the North Coast of Anglesey. I first noticed the dark fin that appears as if it is waving at you, when I went closer the fish was not troubled by the boat at all and continued flapping on the surface, maybe 3ft in diameter.

I mentioned it to a fisherman on my leg at Conwy and he said he had heard reports of a fish called Mola Mola migrating to colder waters to feed on the jelly fish that are prolific around Anglesey but had never seen one.
 
Two years ago SWMBO and I were kayaking by ourselves in the Pacific Rim National Park on the west coast of Vancouver Island (see other thread as to why we use an Icom 72 with the Canadian frequencies) when a humpback whale passed about 25 mtrs away. Its back came further out of the water than we were and it suffered from haitosis !!

I was so gobsmacked I forgot to take any pictures (shorthand for c**pp**g myself!) but what a tick in the box.

Another of life's great experiences.

Tom
 
hmm ... you've got me thinking now ... In my first post I mention seeing a game fish jump. What I actually saw was a load of water shoot up in the air and assumed there was a fish in there somewhere, but I suppose it could have been a whale blowing water out at the surface. I'm kicking myself now that we didn't go and have a closer look.
 
Apparently, between Corsica and SoF there is a whale sanctuary. I didn't know that at the time, but the Bloc Marine almanac has drawings of different kinds, the biggest of which grows up to 25m long!!!
 
Wow, didn't know that fatlady. I'll look it up in Bloc Marine this weekend. I've seen loads of dolphins and sunfish there but never whales. But I know plenty of people who have seen whales there, so it all rings true. 25m is a big lump of animal - hope they show on radar, or get out of the way (at night)
 
Hiya. Yes, got snapped at St Trop on Saturday, by www.flypictures.com rahter than www.pictureplus.eu but it's the same game

I've just this morning haggled them down to a not so outrageous price (their asking is €700, sheesh) to buy all the high res files outright. I'll post on here when they arrive (by email, soon i hope)

Yes I remember your thing with untidy boat! Bad luck that. Fortunately I was quite tidy this time as we had guests. A mate/bloke was on the foredeck but I can photoshop him out and put Pamela Anderson on instead, and all will be fine.

They told me they do shots every day in the summer about noon and 6pm. Yellow chopper, blonde girl pilots it, very skilfully so far as I can see. They speak english and are nice to deal with on the phone. They said if you particulary want photos then email or call in the morning, give them your boat details, and they will make sure to get pictures. They prefer these "warm" leads becuase of course most of what they photograph doesn't get back to them and they make no money from it

My shots are 7pm and the sea is dark blue. Quite nice. But next time I'd do it at noon to get bright blue sea and sunshine


IMG_3500LR.jpg
 
Have you tried a kite-cam?

Very hit and miss I understand with the cheaper versions. More complicated versions use a rig mounted off the main line to dampen movement and position the camera better.

Not expensive and sort of frustrating fun I'd imagine!
 
Yep, sounds the same kind of thing. Pictureplus wanted 500 EUR for the images on CD, but that was 2 yrs ago. I thought that was sort of OK, as they do have to keep a chopper in the air, and as you say it's a bit hit and miss whether they get the sale or not.

Did you get your flybridge screen sorted? I guess you probably have something in hand by now, but there's a guy in Antibes who makes new screens if you wanted someone local to the boat. I took mine there for repair today. Just in case you need him, guy is Dominique Gristi, co. name is Plexi Creation Marine, address 12 Av. Pasteur, tel. 06 23 17 16 10.
 
Goodo

Thanks for that info. I'm still midway thru my screen job. I'll have the toblerone sections in a week or two (milled from solid white nylon 80mmx80mm ingots) and then I can make the screen template in cardboard. I might then contact your man to cut and fold the perspex- I could do it myself but I'm very short of time and this job has to fit aound a lot of cruising. So thanks for ther name/number

After the perspex is in I need someone to make a 30mm dia stainless tube around it, but I can mock that up and get it done in UK, unless I can find a good guy locally. The bend will be tricky becuase it has to be a long bend about 4m radius, not a bend done around a former...

Let me know how it goes with M Gristi and how expensive. How much English does he speak?
 
I'm afraid he speaks v little english.

I can bend the tube for you, we have CNC benders at work, send me a sketch when you know what you want. Can also get brackets/studs etc welded on by top quality welder.
 
Ah, fab, CNC bender, just what i need. Thnaks loads. I'm going to try to keep the bent tube all on one plane, so I can make a bend template in flat plywood, but will the CNC bend it in two planes (from a template consisting of a piece of gently bend plywood, held in its bend by banana shaped wood frames? screwed to the plywood)?
 
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