Last week, Phil and I took our trusty 105mm lenses to Torrance Reef, where we often find something unusual in the way of nudis. Plus this is the only site where I can find the San Pedro auger snail. As soon as he dropped, Phil found a nice size halibut, but otherwise it looked like it might be a blah dive. I finally spotted a single sheep crab scuttling across the sand, but Phil one-upped me by pointing to an aggregation of a dozen small sheep crabs clinging to the reef. As we swam further across the reef, we saw both single and groups of small sheep crabs everywhere!

There we were, sporting macro lenses during a unique opportunity. I got creative and managed to eke-out a few images (included here), thinking that it might be our only chance. We returned several days later to shoot WA, but few crabs remained.

As many crabs as possible crammed themselves under the ledges.

Sometimes a crab would break away from the safety of the reef.

These crabs had just evicted a lobster.

California halibut

• Re: SHEEP CRABS and the agony of diving with a 105mm lens seahunt 06:57:36 10/14/23 (0)