2007
In May I dived Leybourne Lake with two of my UK dive buddies, Graeme “Spotty” Hastings and Dee Smith (my dive 1431) my aim being to familiarise myself with my new Bare drysuit and also to test my underwater camera system. I’d had some problems with my camera on my previous two overseas trips and with an exciting
Bahamas
shark diving trip little more than a week away, I wanted to reassure myself that my camera was working flawlessly. Unfortunately it was not. So post-dive I contacted Ocean Optics for some advice, made some changes to my Subal housing setup and returned the next day with Ashford Dive Club member, Chris Powell. This time there was not a hint of a problem but to be absolutely certain I dragged Spotty back 48 hours later for another successful test dive. About 50 minutes into this dive, at a depth of between 2.1 and 2.4 metres, a larva (either a Common Blue Damselfly or a Small Red-eyed Damselfly) settled on Spotty’s glove. As ambush hunters, these species tend to hang around in the centre of lakes waiting for possible prey items to pass by and Spotty’s glove was an ideal vantage point for this. The adults of both species egg-lay into aquatic plants that sink during this part of the year. This might explain the depth that we found this larva in. Dr Pam Taylor, President of the British Dragonfly Society subsequently advised that while this was not an unusual place to find such a larva, this was certainly an unusual encounter and to the best of her knowledge, the British Dragonfly Society had never received reports of larvae before from divers. To comply with the Leybourne Lake Dive Centre’s closing time, Spotty and I needed to be out of the water no later than
so I occasionally checked the accruing dive time on my dive computer. We had spent ages in really shallow water as we attempted to photograph pike and I failed to notice that my computer was discounting this as “dive time”. Eventually at the furthest point of the dive it occurred to me that the dive time seemed to passing very slowly. Admittedly in Spotty’s company time does appear to go slowly! But a quick press of my computer controls revealed that it was almost
There was insufficient time to fin back to our entry point so we exited the water and began an undignified brisk jog back to my car.
In August Ashford Dive Club member, Rick Stewart and I had intended to dive Stony Cove in Leicestershire but at the last minute, Rick was unable to take a full day off work so we returned to our “local” lake instead (my dive 1480) where we were joined by Chris Powell. By way of an experiment, I used my 17-55mm “land” lens but this was unable to focus close enough to successfully photograph some juvenile pike and we were unable to find any adult pike for which it would have been ideal. A few days later the bad weather that blighted most of the
UK
’s 2007 summer again ruled out sea diving so I headed back to
Leybourne
Lake
(my dive 1482) with fellow Ashford Dive Club member Roger Still. I again took my 17-55mm lens but added a +4 dioptre which I anticipated would allow me to focus closer to the small juvenile pike. Unfortunately the ghastly weather ensured that we had poor natural light and far worse (I assume because of run-off) there were copious amounts of small detritus in the water. At the far end of the lake I briefly saw two large roach, too far away and too fast-moving for me to attempt to take photographs in what were in any case, challenging conditions for underwater photography. A few days later Roger and I dived the lake again. Fortunately underwater visibilty had improved somewhat. It had occurred to me that perhaps we might have more chance of seeing skittish subjects such as roach if we spent more time at the far end of the lake which few divers visited and where the water was clearer. Roger was happy to humour me and our long walk round to the far side of the lake was rewarded with a sudden and brief close encounter with a startled roach and the distant sighting of four more roach.
2008
Keen to try out my Tokina 10-17mm lens in
Leybourne
Lake
, Rick Stewart and I visited our “local” lake in July for my dive 1551. To our delight an adult pike stubbornly refused to leave “The Thistlegorm”. If only all fish were so willing to pose! My next dive in the lake was just 24 hours later, with Ashford Dive Club member Paul Hymers. This time we unsuccessfully searched for pike, giving up the hunt after 82 frustrating minutes. A week later, with the 2008 UK summer proving even worse than the 2007, sea diving was once again out of the question so Paul and I returned the lake and trekked round to the far end in search of some skittish subjects. Suddenly I spotted a 30 cms long terrapin. I had no idea that there was one in the lake and was quite startled. So was the terrapin and it shot off! Subsequently I learnt that other divers had claimed to have seen one but Pete Simmonds, owner of the Leybourne Lake Dive Centre had not seen it in 15 years of diving the lake. However as I had managed to take two quick snaps before it disappeared, there was now proof of its presence. It was a North American red eared terrapin with a green flattened tortoise-like shell and body with yellow stripes on its chin and neck and a red “ear” behind its eyes. Its diet would consist of both aquatic plants and animals like fish, amphibians and invertebrates. Although these are quite a common sight in
UK
ponds where they are often released as unwanted imported pets, this red eared terrapin clearly did not want to encounter divers and given the size of
Leybourne
Lake
, I am not surprised that it has rarely been seen.
In September, my friend Lesley Rudd needed to test her dive kit before diving in La Herradura, Spain with me and we spent a happy 84 minutes pottering around the lake spotting amongst other life, roach and Chinese mitten crabs. I had never seen a crab before in
Leybourne
Lake
. Chinese mitten crabs are considered a delicacy in its native south-east Asiabut since the early 1990s its numbers have run out of control in the
UK
. They are a huge environmental menace eradicating domestic breeds such as the resident mussels which have helped to keep
Leybourne
Lake
's water clear and elsewhere have burrowed deep into muddy river banks, causing the banks to collapse.
In December Chris and I dived the lake, my dive 1586 and my last dive of the year. I suggested that we start the dive at the far end of the lake and we were immediately rewarded by the most camera friendly pike I have yet to encounter. It stayed with us until we eventually tired of photographing it, even nuzzling my Subal housing’s domeport! I was so obsessed with the pike that I did not realise that Chris’s drysuit had completely flooded when we had entered the lake. Friendly pike or not, I know I would have wanted to get out of the 5 degrees water immediately. As we finned north-east to our exit point I spotted a Chinese mitten crab but just as on my previous dive, it burrowed itself into the silt before I could photograph it.