Los champiñones

Diving from boat – easy level.
Two rocks in mushroom (champiñones in Spanish) shape gave the name to this dive site, which is in located in the bay of Las Galletas.


The captain of the boat warns us: this morning, a slight current is notable. The water entry is thus fast, and without waiting we go down along the anchor line and we find the rock plateau at 14m depth. Many Seabream are present on the site, in particular school of Zebra Seabream.




We continue the descent along the drop off. It is a vertical wall from about 10 meters height, the starting point of another dive site: the canyons. But we do not follow this wall, not today, we swim over a twenty meter width’s sandy area in the direction of the south, at greater depth. A rocky bar whose end curiously looks like a mushroom, offers us protection against the current. This bar will guide us until the sandy bottom which lays at 30 metres depth. On the way we will cross 3 perpendiculars rock bars, paradise of moray eels and arrow crabs.



Indeed, it is almost impossible not to cross some moray eels in this squaring of rocks. The underwater life is rich in this underwater landscape, the site is composed of many overhangs, holes, recesses… An ideal place to find some anthozoas or other Cnidarias.




When we arrive on sand, we go along the rock formation on the left hand side. Garden eels are present in numbers and disappear in the horizon. The dive group gathers. In a hole, a beautiful anemone (Telmatactis cricoides) is deployed. Impressive by its size, it has a foot of at least 20cm length and 10 cm diameter. Faithful at its station, a couple of cleaning shrimp (Lysmata grabhami) seems to take great care of it.






Before starting our ascent along the second bar rock, also ending in the mushroom shape, our guide inspects a net cage, laying on the sand at about thirty meters depth. It seems abandoned and does not have any rope to be lifted up. I come closer to find out as well myself that it is empty. This discovery is hardly unusual in scuba diving, we can find in a permanent way one to two fisher man cage nets on each dive site in the south of Tenerife. The impact of traditional fishing is thus enormous on the dive sites. The inspections of the Canarian Government ministry of Fishing are as rare as the presence of identifying plate on the net cages, which, it should be highlighted, are however non-existent but obligatory as the law stipulates it in the Canary Islands.

It is while thinking about the video shot by a friend, that I’m joining the dive group which already started its ascent. It is really time that the lobby of “traditional” fishing agrees with the Canarian Government and the Tenerife Scuba diving lobby in order that actions on short, medium and long term actions are implemented in order to bring prosperity to each one and especially, especially a responsible management of the marine resources before it is too late.

We follow the rock bar up until the drop off and we find the anchor without difficulty. A life line was placed at the prow of the boat to help us during our safety stops because the current did not decrease during the dive. Patiently, each group of divers delays its water exit, by staring at the blue in search for marine turtle. In 2008, a green turtle was living in the surroundings, there are months now that we do not see it anymore on this dive site, but who knows? Nature holds many surprised...