There has never been a better time to care about the ocean than now. The ocean provides us with so many things – half of the air we breathe, an amazing variety of things to eat, a place of beauty and refuge and sometimes fury. This year the New England coast line was pummeled by tropical storms and Northeasters, reminding us yet again that our glorious ocean is powerful, relentless and unforgiving. Despite our ingenuity and technical know-how, we live in a natural and changing environment and need to better plan and protect our ocean ourselves going forward.

We used to think that the ocean was so big, and life in it so abundant, that nothing we did could harm it or exhaust its resources. But now, because of us, the ocean is changing fast and in dramatic ways. It is getting warmer, more acidic, and ever more crowded – as we consider new uses like tidal and wind energy development in addition to our historic ones like fishing, shipping, sailing and other recreation. The fabric of New England’s ocean ecosystems is changing, too. Previously depleted populations of sharks and seals are on the rise, while other species like Atlantic cod and yellowtail flounder have plummeted. And there’s evidence that the changing ocean chemistry will profoundly affect the entire food chain, from tiny plankton on up.

The time to care is now. With climate change affecting our oceans in ways we are only beginning to understand, now is the time to restore the health of our ocean so that it can be as resilient as possible to the changes that are coming. Ocean conservation has been part of our work at CLF since the mid-1970s when we were a scrappy little organization on Beacon Hill fighting the federal government and the oil industry over oil and gas drilling on Georges Bank – New England’s most important fishing grounds. We won that case, then won it again and again as the oil industry kept knocking on New England’s door. Ocean conservation is part of our history and is embedded in our DNA, and we are still working hard to  protect our ocean and keep it thriving for future generations of New Englanders in many ways:

• Keeping vital habitat protected – special places like Cashes Ledge, a breathtakingly beautiful underwater mountain range 80 miles off the coast of Cape Ann, home to the largest coldwater kelp forest on the North Atlantic seaboard. Cashes Ledge provides rich habitat for many of our most amazing and iconic sea creatures – Atlantic cod and wolffish to bluefin tuna and North Atlantic right whales. Some of these species are on the brink of existence in our waters, and truly need places of refuge to sustain and rebuild their populations. CLF has recently gone to court to keep current protected habitat areas, including Cashes Ledge, closed to destructive trawl and dredge fishing gear.

• Working for an end to overfishing – all the habitat protection in the world won’t help a species recover if the fishing pressure is too high. CLF has been fighting for sustainable New England fisheries for decades, and we still aren’t there. Cod numbers are currently at a very small fraction of what a healthy population would be. We have asked for a moratorium on directed cod fishing until their numbers recover – in opposition to the current political push to increase catch limits. Can you imagine New England without cod? Neither can we – which is why we have gone to federal court against fisheries managers to stop them from increasing catch limits on cod and other imperiled groundfish until the populations are better recovered.

• Supporting our nation’s first regional ocean plan – New England is leading the nation in ocean planning. With the increasing pressures on our rapidly changing water, we need to better coordinate all of our uses to minimize conflict and make decisions based on the whole ecosystem, as opposed to individual uses. CLF has been involved in ocean planning from the start, advising and supporting our states on the Massachusetts Ocean Management Plan and Rhode Island Special Area Management Plan. And now we are actively supporting  development of the nation’s first regional ocean plan by the Northeast Regional Planning Body – made up of state, federal, and tribal representatives and convened pursuant to the National Ocean Policy.

• Celebrating our beautiful ocean – Our New England Ocean Odyssey campaign is all about showcasing the amazing, breathtaking, important, and often strange things that lie beneath our waves. We have one of the most productive, diverse ocean ecosystems on the planet right off our shores, and we hope that by bringing you the gorgeous photography of Brian Skerry and others, and engaging stories, you will be inspired to help us protect it.

• Restoring historic river herring runs – After 18 years, ocean-going alewives (also known as river herring) can return to their ancestral spawning habitat on the St. Croix River in northern Maine and eventually make the St. Croix the largest river herring run in New England once again.  CLF fought for this right on two fronts.  First, we successfully filed suit against the EPA last year to enforce water quality standards, successfully arguing that a 1995 law excluding alewives from parts of the St. Croix river conflicted with the river’s Class A water quality designation under the Clean Water Act. Second, CLF worked with other environmental organizations and the Passamaquoddy Nation to support emergency legislation in Maine to repeal the alewife exclusion law. The alewife, is a “keystone species” that provides food for many animals, birds and larger fish species native to Maine’s marine and fresh waters, and restoring it to its native river habitat is a wonderful reason to celebrate.

We will continue to fight these battles for a healthy ocean so we have more to celebrate next World Oceans Day, and the one after that, and beyond. Please stay with us on our voyage and be part of a better ocean future in New England.

Originally posted on New England Ocean Odyssey.

Flowers, a heart-shaped box of chocolates, a warm and tender love song, and a glittery card with completely over-the-top sugary sentiment…these are the tokens of affection we most recognize on Valentine’s Day. If you’re one of the lucky ones, that special someone will deliver a heartfelt token that makes your day even more meaningful.

It could be surprising to many people that in our complex and amazing world of ocean animals there are several creatures known for displaying the type of deep affection and commitment of which only romance novelists can dream. Tropical angelfish and at least one type of Australian seahorse are not strangers to life-long love beneath the waves. (And, by the way, is there any name more apropos to a day celebrating intimacy and devotion than that of the deep-sea sponge known as “Venus’s flower basket?”) There is even a small unglamorous freshwater fish known as the convict cichlid which pairs off into a crevasse made into a home to raise their children.

Without a doubt, our own Atlantic Wolffish exhibits the special bond of love suitable for Cupid’s attention. Male and female pairs (who reportedly mate for 3 to 6 hours at a time and practice internal fertilization, a rarity in fish) seek out their own special love nest under a craggy rock, or maybe down along the hull of a sunken wreck, just big enough to guard the egg mass laid by the female. The male wolffish, exhibiting no scientifically observed “commitment issues,” stands guard at his cave haven ensuring the protection of the growing larvae and juvenile offspring. The male is so devoted that he stops eating for as long as he is on guard, sometimes as long as four months. Not only is the wolffish pair committed to each other, they are highly loyal to their habitat.

Without a place to call their own, the wolffish love story could have an unhappy ending. With wolffish numbers having declined drastically in the last three decades, the connection between wolffish and their undisturbed habitat is even more important. Wolffish are still caught as bycatch in trawls and, possibly even more damaging to their long-term survival, their rocky habitat gets swept away by trawls and nesting areas can be buried in the sediment stirred up by trawling gear. Recreational anglers often catch wolffish, but it’s proven that the wolffish can be safely returned to the sea with the proper “catch and release” practice. (Wolffish do not have a swim bladder that “blows up” on the surface.) For both recreational and commercial fishermen in federal and state waters in New England it is illegal to possess or land Atlantic wolffish. If enforced properly, this can be a great step forward for wolffish conservation.

Now, it may be said that the Atlantic wolffish has a face that only its mother could truly love. But isn’t that the mystery of love itself – finding one’s counterpoint in the ocean of uncertainty can be anything but predictable.

A red cod swims in the healthy kelp forest on Cashes Ledge

Note: This blog was originally posted on One World One Ocean as part of their National Sustainable Seafood Month Campaign. 

When you buy a piece of cod, do you wonder how many are left in the ocean? Are you curious about what kind of gear was used to catch the fish? Gillnets? Hooks? Or, maybe it was a bottom trawler? Do you consider a different choice – maybe there is a more sustainable fish to buy?

These are important questions to ask, but there’s something more basic to consider as well. Where do these fish live? What essential requirements do these animals have to survive and thrive in the ocean?

Figuring out what “sustainable seafood” means is a familiar dilemma for New Englanders. We have some of the most productive fisheries in the world, but we also have some of the most heavily fished areas in the world. New Englanders work very hard to manage our fisheries, and there is much we are still learning. Yet, there is one simple fact that scientists and many fishermen are very confident about – if fish don’t have healthy habitat, then we don’t have fish.

We have some very special ocean places in New England. Cashes Ledge, an underwater mountain range about 80 miles off the coast of Maine, is home to the deepest and largest continuous kelp forest in all offshore waters along the US east coast. Stretching 22 miles long and 17 miles wide, Cashes Ledge provides food and shelter to an enormous diversity of creatures – from bottom-dwelling tube worms and sponges to endangered North Atlantic right whales and highly migratory blue sharks and Atlantic bluefin tuna. Cashes Ledge is also rich in a variety of groundfish including Atlantic cod, white hake, monkfish, haddock, and redfish. Many kinds of offshore sea birds can be found dining here, such as sooty shearwaters and Wilson’s storm-petrels.

The reason for such enormous diversity and richness lies in the mountain range itself, whose pinnacles interrupt the primary Gulf of Maine current and create a stunning oceanographic phenomenon known as internal waves, which carry high levels of nutrients and oxygen from the sea surface to the sea floor. This unusual circulation pattern results in an incredibly productive ecosystem. It’s no wonder that scientists have used Cashes Ledge as an oceanographic research lab for decades. It represents one of the healthiest existing marine habitats, and if more of the ocean was like it, there would be a lot more fish.

In 2002 many habitat areas in the Gulf of Maine, including Cashes Ledge, were protected from harmful bottom trawling, and these areas have begun a slow recovery. But as large reductions in the catch of cod, yellowtail flounder, and other groundfish loom in New England, there is increasing pressure to open these areas again. Places like Cashes Ledge must be protected if we are going to keep relying on our oceans to feed us and allow our ocean ecosystems to regenerate and thrive. These are irreplaceable resources, and the permanent protection of marine habitat should be a top priority for any sustainable fisheries management plan.

While it is important to think about fish in numbers – how many we catch, how big they are, how many are left – it is equally important to consider the ecosystem on a larger scale, with all its moving parts, dependent on each other for survival. When do the plankton bloom, and where? Where are the currents taking the food? Where will certain fish spawn if their favorite ledge is dragged? How will the animals adapt to our warmer, more acidic oceans?

So, as we celebrate National “Sustainable” Seafood Month, take a moment to consider where your seafood lived before it was on your plate. The ocean ecosystems that produce the oxygen in 2 out of every 3 breaths we take, regulate our climate, drive tens of billions of dollars of economic benefits, and provide us with considerable recreational activities won’t continue to produce such benefits unless we do a better job at protecting the basic components of a healthy ocean. And, while you enjoy the good decision you made about your sustainably caught fish, also be thankful that the fish came from a good home, and do what you can to help keep it that way.

Help support habit protection for special places like Cashes Ledge – click here. 

Brian Skerry and Luis Lamare get ready to photograph Cashes Ledge on their recent dive. Photograph by Christian Conroy.

What’s so special about Cashes Ledge? In this second of a planned series of dives on this New England biodiversity hotspot, Brian Skerry was joined by marine ecologist, Jon Witman, an expert on Cashes Ledge.  Jon has been studying Cashes Ledge for 35 years, and has been watching how the diversity and abundance of sea life has been changing there, and how it has responded to its current limited-protection status. We talked to him and found out more about why Cashes Ledge is so important to the Gulf of Maine, and what we can do to keep it thriving.

Robin:

Why have you spent so much time on Cashes Ledge?

Jon:

Cashes Ledge is a fascinating and wild offshore place that helps us understand how marine ecosystems tick. It is also a unique storehouse of Atlantic marine biodiversity. Cashes Ledge provides an opportunity to understand why biodiversity matters in an ecological sense. Unfortunately, we are losing marine biodiversity in the world’s oceans faster than we can study it.

Currently, I’m trying to figure out how the whole benthic ecosystem out on Cashes Ledge – from the fish, to the kelp forests and the diverse invertebrates communities have changed over the past decades. I’m particularly interested in how resilient the system is to human disturbance and to climate-related changes in the oceanography.

When we studied Cashes Ledge intensively in the 1980’s, it was like a time machine providing a fleeting glimpse of what New England marine coastal communities might have been like hundreds of years ago, when lots of large predatory fish – especially cod,  were commonplace close to shore. We videotaped over 100 cod an hour going by an area of bottom about the size of a large picnic table on Cashes Ledge, compared to no cod seen at the same depth at coastal sites in the Gulf of Maine.

I actually saw a whale cod as long as a diver and schools of Atlantic bluefin tuna while diving on Cashes Ledge then. There have been substantial reductions of predatory fish since then, which is something I’m studying, but Cashes Ledge is still a vitally rich ecosystem compared to coastal ones that have been more heavily impacted by humans.

Robin:

What other kinds of interesting animals have you seen on Cashes Ledge?

Jon:

There are layers of marine life on Cashes Ledge, including minke, right, humpback and pilot whales, blue sharks, basking sharks, atlantic white sided dolphins, big schools of bluefin tuna chasing herring, whale cod, red cod, pollock, wolffish, torpedo rays, squid, strange feather stars called crinoids, and unusual sponges and sea squirts typical of sub arctic areas of Scandinavia.

Robin:

Can you talk about the internal waves and why they are important?

Jon:

The top of the ridge on Cashes Ledge is an incredibly dynamic place – layers of plankton in warmer overlying waters are driven right down to the bottom as much as 20 times a day by these phenomena known as internal waves. This is a big deal because the downwelling plankton layers are pulses of concentrated food that sustain bottom dwelling organisms and, in effect, fuel the food web.

We stumbled across this phenomenon in the course of our scuba dives to the top of the ridge at 30 m. One dive team would go down and report that the water on the bottom was cold and beautifully clear but the next team an hour later found pea soup visibility in greenish warm water. This, of course, turned out to be the plankton layer pushed down onto the bottom like a yo-yo by internal waves.

The temperature increase was so large that we could feel the warm water through our drysuits. At that time, the prevailing view of the subtidal zone was that it was a stable place with nearly constant environmental conditions, compared to the rocky intertidal zone. But out on Cashes we were documenting as much as 5 degree centigrade temperature increases in 10 minutes right on the rocky sea floor at 30 m depth.

Internal waves are like a sine wave travelling along the boundary between the warm surface waters and the colder layer below. They can be huge – spanning 50 m vertically in some parts of the world and 30 m high on Cashes.  I’ve seen these downwelling green water waves approaching the ridge on Cashes Ledge while scuba diving and sitting off the ridge in the Johnson Sea Link submersible – it’s one of the most spectacular things I’ve seen underwater.

Robin:

What makes Cashes Ledge so unique?

Jon:

There are at least three things make Cashes Ledge so unique. First of all, it is the largest continuous kelp forest in offshore waters on the entire east coast of the US. The kelp grow unusually deep there, beyond  30 m depth. The forest and the ledge itself provide many valuable goods and services to keep the offshore Gulf of Maine ecosystem healthy, vibrant, and productive. For example, it’s a nursery habitat for commercially valuable groundfish. It’s also an energy rich food source for marine life living in habitats both on the ledge and far away from it – in the form of detritus as the kelp breaks down.

Secondly, the Cashes Ledge ecosystem contains a wide range of different bottom types – it isn’t just all rocky ledge. Just like on a mountain slope in the Green or White Mountains in New England, there are cobble and boulder fields on the lower sides of rocky slopes on Cashes Ledge. Deeper down, the sea floor is covered in sand and gravel that grades into soft bottom areas of silt and mud in the basins. So what you have in the Cashes Ledge underwater landscape is a representative collection of most of the major types of bottom habitats found in the Gulf of Maine, but in an incredibly compact area, as ecosystems go.

Each of those different habitat types has its own community of species that do especially well in that particular habitat. For example, there are pink northern shrimp, clams, and tube worms living in the muddy basins at the edge of a boulder field, then communities of soccer ball-sized yellow sponges, bright red sea anemones, and little upright calcified candelabras called bryozoans that look like miniature coral reefs, attached to the boulder tops. Different habitats enhance biodiversity overall. If you sum up all the different species living in each of these different types of habitats from kelp forests to the muddy basins, you have some of the highest biodiversity levels in the Gulf of Maine right on Cashes Ledge.

Finally, as an abrupt topographic high in relatively clear, shallow, sunlit waters, Cashes Ledge is an especially productive offshore ecosystem in the Gulf of Maine. I mentioned the role of the kelp detritus exporting food to adjacent ecosystems, but the dynamic oceanography of the ledge itself also contributes to the productivity of the bottom community in the way that internal waves push concentrated layers of plankton to the top of the ridge.

I think both mechanisms help make Cashes Ledge such a productive area for many species – including groundfish and marine mammals. We’ve seen minke whales feeding in the slicks of internal waves on Cashes Ledge, presumably due to high concentrations of food there.

Robin:

What kind of protection does Cashes Ledge need and why?

Jon:

As special as it is, Cashes Ledge is a very vulnerable marine ecosystem. Right now Cashes Ledge has a small amount of protection from certain types of fishing activity as an Essential Fish Habitat and as a Habitat Area of Special Concern. This is laudable and a real achievement by fisheries managers in New England. However, this protection is only temporary and it could be eliminated at any moment.  It could be opened to fishing practices that further deplete stocks of groundfish, damage biodiverse communities, and decrease the sustainability of the kelp forests.

Because it is such a unique, valuable, and diverse New England marine ecosystem, the rocky ridge, adjacent bottom habitats, and the overlying water column on Cashes Ledge need permanent protection from human impacts. It has been shown many times that marine protected areas help exploited stocks recover and can ensure the sustainability of biodiversity and other goods and services that keep our oceans healthy. We also know that really small protected areas don’t do these jobs very well, so it pays in the long run to preserve larger areas containing different types of habitats.

Globally, we aren’t doing a very good job of protecting the oceans as less than 2% of the worlds oceans are fully protected, despite all the scientific findings showing that marine ecosystems are under ever increasing levels of stress from all sorts of human impacts.

New England is as famous for its coastline as for its fish – but what lies beneath New England’s waves goes largely unseen and unremembered. One of these unknown treasures is Cashes Ledge, a 25-mile long underwater mountain range which lies 80 miles off the coasts of Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire and shelters one of the most distinctive marine ecosystems in the Atlantic. But Cashes Ledge is as sensitive to human interference as it is important to ecological diversity. With limited protection against increasingly destructive fishing techniques, Cashes Ledge remains vulnerable.

Atlantic Riches

Cashes Ledge hosts a remarkable diversity of marine life, from the Atlantic wolffish and rare blue sponge to the unusual red cod. The reason for such diversity lies in the mountain range itself, whose pinnacles interrupt the primary Gulf of Maine current and create a stunning oceanographic phenomenon known as internal waves, which carry high levels of nutrients and oxygen from the sea surface to the sea floor. This unusual circulation pattern results in an incredibly productive and diverse ecosystem. Cashes Ledge boasts the deepest cold water kelp forest in the Gulf of Maine and possibly the North Atlantic and has a rich array of invertebrates including sea anemones; bright orange, red, yellow and blue sponges; horse mussels; sea stars; brittle and feather stars; sea squirts; worms and northern shrimp. Atlantic bluefin tuna can be found pursuing herring on Cashes Ledge and blue sharks are common during the warm summer months. Humpback and Northern right whales often stop off to feed on the abundant supply of plankton. Cashes Ledge is also rich in a variety of groundfish including Atlantic cod, white hake, monkfish, haddock and redfish. A variety of offshore sea birds can be found dining at Cashes, such as sooty shearwaters and Wilson’s storm-petrels.

Cashes Ledge is also a rarity in New England waters. Though the ledge’s jagged, rocky formation has protected this particular habitat from significant human interference, other areas in the Gulf of Maine have not been so lucky. Cashes Ledge is unique in the greater Gulf of Maine system because its mountains shield one of the few remaining examples of what an undisturbed and thriving ecosystem in this region could look like. It’s no wonder that scientists have used Cashes Ledge as an oceanographic research lab for decades.

Under Attack

Up until the late 1900s, the rocky seafloor surrounding the Cashes Ledge mountain range prevented fishermen from trawling the ocean floor for their catch. Today, modern fishing gear equipped with “rock-hoppers” is more effective and more destructive, and poses a serious threat to this ecological treasure beneath the waves. Certain species are especially at risk. Bottom trawling could easily wipe out certain populations of sea anemones, and scientists estimate that it would take over 200 years for the population to recover and return to the area. The kelp forests are also prone to shredding from simple fishing gear like lines, hooks, and traps, and bottom trawling could remove entire sections of the kelp forests – requiring years to recover. Any sustained damage to this delicately balanced ecosystem could last for decades or more.

Inadequate Protection

Though a portion of Cashes Ledge is currently protected by the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC), this protection is very limited. A part of Cashes Ledge has been designated as a habitat protection area and much of it is currently closed to fishing for cod, haddock and other groundfish. However, Cashes Ledge remains open to fishing with certain kinds of gear such as “mid-water” trawlers, large offshore lobster pots and seine nets that can seriously impact this sensitive ecosystem. Furthermore, the NEFMC is now considering modifications or elimination of these already limited protections – threatening the diversity of ocean wildlife and the unique habitat found on Cashes Ledge and the long-term health of this important and vulnerable ecosystem.

CLF Action

CLF has taken the lead in campaigning for the permanent protection of Cashes Ledge from damaging fishing gear. It is clear to us that the real value of this special place lies in preserving this treasure for ocean wildlife and as an open sea laboratory for the world’s scientists.

CLF is also committed to raising public awareness for Cashes Ledge and other ocean habitats through the recent launch of the New England Ocean Odyssey, featured earlier in this issue. This five-year program is just one of many ways CLF remains dedicated to conserving New England’s oceans.

Protecting Cashes Ledge is more than an environmental obligation – it is an opportunity. Preserving this area of natural beauty offers the chance to create another legacy for New England – one that recognizes its biodiversity and provides a thriving environment for generations to come.

Note: This article was originally pulished in Conservation Matters, CLF’s quarterly publication. Find a copy of this issues, as well as archives, here.

Here they are! Some of Brian’s first ever pictures of Cashes Ledge. Every picture tells a story – but we are lucky enough to have some real stories to tell about these awesome pictures. We caught up with Brian shortly after he visited Cashes Ledge and asked him about the dive. Brian filled us in on some of the exciting details of this bona fide ocean odyssey:

Robin: You’ve never dived Cashes Ledge before, what were your first impressions?

Brian: As always when I am diving in a new place for the first time, all I see is chaos when I first get on the bottom, but over time I begin to zero in on specific behaviors to start making order and begin to put the puzzle together.

The kelp is beautiful, the stalks are 6-8 feet high, then they have fronds that lay horizontally for probably 10-15 more feet. They create this sea of kelp, literally a bed of kelp that you see when you first come down from the surface that looks like the bottom but isn’t. The descent line we sent down just disappeared through it. You’d follow it down to the kelp bed then you’d have to go another 6 or 8 feet to get to the bottom. It’s a false bottom of kelp fronds. It’s a lovely golden amber color, and there’s another species of kelp that’s sort of reddish, growing on the amber ones. It all looked good and lush and thick – very colorful and healthy looking.

There were lots of fish circling around. We saw quite a few red cod. There are a lot of pollock and quite a number of cod mixed in, and some of the cod are more traditionally colored, but some have the distinctive red/orange iridescent coloration.

Robin: What other kinds of wildlife did you see?

Brian: Besides pollock and cod, there were a lot of juvenile fish. We found out later they were cunner. They are bright orange when they are small, quite stunning, like the garibaldi in California. We saw quite a few whales on the surface, minke whales porpoising and coming up for air, but not close enough to photograph. There were invertebrates on the bottom, on ledges below the kelp. It’s definitely worth a lot more exploration. This is clearly a unique habitat.

Robin: Was this dive different from your expectations?

Brian: I’d heard about the Cashes Ledge kelp forest for years. People always say it’s not like California, so I expected an area that was covered in kelp on the bottom, but the brown kind that I usually see inshore, just a lot more of it – low-lying, a foot off the bottom. I didn’t expect anything like this. Stalks of kelp that were 8 feet high and long strands at the top that made this golden bed. It was very unique. The fish stayed localized, always in the area. They weren’t passing schools; they sort of hung out there. The kelp forest is probably a square mile or so – it’s a big area. But the fish were always there – in the background, silhouetted. It was very different from what I expected.

Robin: Did you see evidence of human activity in the area?

Brian: There was a tremendous amount of fishing gear out there. We tried to dive away from gear. But everybody on the trip remarked that there were a lot of fishing buoys on the surface. I think they were lobster traps, but I’m not sure. They were everywhere. This was surprising. Nobody expected this. A friend of mine remembers diving Cashes in the 80s, and said the fish used to be so thick that you couldn’t see your dive buddies. It’s not like that today, so the biomass must be down. But there was a good population of fish. I think a place like this with proper protection could come back to those levels that my friend observed 20-30 years ago.

Robin: Were there any unexpected difficulties?

Brian: No, but the currents got quite strong on Sunday and we had trouble getting to the dive-line buoy. Wearing a dry suit and 120 pounds of equipment you have to swim really hard against the current. We couldn’t get to the buoy, so the boat picked us up and we tried again and made it.

Robin: What was the water temperature?

Brian: Pretty warm for New England, probably 50 degrees.

Robin: Did the weather cause any problems?

Brian: No, the weather was really good. It progressively improved. Early Saturday it was fine, small waves, a little bumpy, but it got better and by Sunday was really calm. If the waves are big it’s hard to get back in the boat after the dive.

Robin: Was visibility low from the recent northeaster?

Brian: I don’t know why visibility was low. It was very typical of New England conditions. Turbid, but not terrible. Visibility was 20-25 feet, but hazy, not crystal clear. I tried to work close in and make some pictures that would still come out well.

Robin: Will you do anything differently next time you go to Cashes?

Brian: Not necessarily. I would like to have more time. To produce pictures in these conditions takes a lot of repeatability and serendipity. My M.O. is to dive a place over and over and keep working it, if I can. I could spend hours and hours working those fish. I’m very intrigued by the red cod. They are highly unique and beautiful with the golden kelp backdrop and green water. I would just like to do more of it.

Are you intrigued by the red cod, too? We will give you a look at those fascinating fish soon. In the meantime, enjoy some of these other sublime pictures Brian made in this vibrant special place in the Gulf of Maine!

This post was originally published on New England Ocean Odyssey.

Brian and crew back from Cashes Ledge. Copyright Brian Skerry.

“I didn’t expect anything like this. Stalks of kelp that were 8 feet high and long strands at the top that made this golden bed… This is clearly a unique habitat.”

Success! After two prior attempts foiled by bad weather and rough seas, last weekend Brian Skerry at last reached Cashes Ledge and was able to explore this extraordinary, ecologically important seascape – a first for the peripatetic Skerry. For two days Brian and his crew swam in Cashes’ unearthly kelp forests, among its waving amber fronds and remarkable red cod, making pictures that will reveal the mysteries and beauty of this unique New England treasure so far unknown to most.

About 80 miles off the coast of Massachusetts, Cashes Ledge is a submerged mountain range that nearly pierces the surface of the ocean and is home to the deepest kelp forest in the North Atlantic. Fields of anemones and brightly-colored sponges produce a fascinating marine landscape surrounding Ammen Rock, the highest peak of Cashes Ledge and New England’s underwater equivalent of Mount Washington.

Cashes Ledge is important not only to marine organisms but also to people hoping to learn about the history of New England’s oceans – many scientists believe that Cashes Ledge represents the best remaining example of an undisturbed Gulf of Maine ecosystem.

We will be sharing some of the extraordinary pictures Brian made – and the stories that go with them – next week. Stay tuned!

This is also published on New England Ocean Odyssey, which can be found here.

Breaching North Atlantic right whale. Copyright Brian Skerry.

On the occasion of World Oceans Day, it is worth reminding ourselves about how utterly dependent we are on the ocean – for the fish and shellfish that grace our dinner tables, for our summer recreation – on, in, and alongside our ocean – for the tremendous untapped renewable resources of the wind, waves and tides, and for transportation of people and goods. Oh yes, and the air – up to 70% of the oxygen we breathe is produced by the plankton in the ocean. That’s more than from all the world’s rain forests combined. The ocean absorbs about half of our carbon dioxide emissions and over 90% of the heat trapped by greenhouse gases. The ocean covers 70% of our planet and regulates the earth’s climate. Unfortunately the ocean is facing a host of troubles from climate change and acidification caused by all that carbon dioxide absorption, not to mention overfishing, seafloor habitat destruction and pollution – we need to be better stewards of this incredible resource.

As I walked on Crane Beach last weekend thinking about all of this, an early summer Northeaster whipped the ocean into a froth and unusually high tides threw up a wrack line of seaweed reaching as far as the wind sculpted sand dunes – leaving just a sliver of a beach. I was reminded that the ocean truly is the master and commander, and once again I felt humbled by the sea’s strength and beauty. I was also a little frustrated by it. Why? Brian Skerry, weather permitting, will go on his first ever dive to one of New England’s most special places – Cashes Ledge –  this Saturday and Sunday.

Cashes Ledge, located 80 miles northeast of Gloucester, Massachusetts, is a 25-mile long underwater mountain chain that hosts one of the most unique, dynamic and ecologically productive areas in the Gulf of Maine. The highest peak, Ammen Rock, rises steeply off the ocean floor from 460 feet below to within 40 feet of the ocean’s surface.  There is an unbelievable diversity of ocean wildlife in this special place: North Atlantic right whales, blue sharks, bluefin tuna, herring, cod, Atlantic wolffish, sea anemones, brittle stars, brilliantly colored sea sponges, and the deepest kelp forest in the Gulf of Maine. But most of us have never seen this underwater jewel and probably never will. Unless, that is, someone goes diving and brings back spectacular photographs.

Brian’s planned dive on Cashes is just one of the many that he will be doing as part of the New England Ocean Odyssey – our 5 year partnership to bring to light the magnificent beauty that lies beneath the surface of New England’s waves. Despite all that we know about the ocean and its role in our lives, it still holds tremendous mystery. And I am happy for some mystery in these days of ceaseless information flow coming over our personal transoms 24/7 through our computers and smart phones. There is still so much we don’t know about the ocean and so much we can’t see. So gazing out to sea on that cold windy day, I wondered about what lies beneath the surface of those wild waves. My curiosity will soon be bated – at least for one special place in the Gulf of Maine.

With any luck Brian will show us just what a magnificent place Cashes Ledge is. I say with any luck, because, well, the weather has been challenging as of late. I have been electronically tethered to the Cashes Ledge weather buoy – a remarkable device that sends hourly reports on the wind, waves, water and air temperature, atmospheric pressure – hoping it brings us good news!

At the height of this week’s Northeaster sustained wind speeds at the buoy reached 25 knots with gusts up to 35 knots. And the waves reached nearly 14 feet.  Not good for diving!  But the weather seems to be moderating and we are hopeful that Brian and his dive crew will make it out to Cashes this weekend. If not this weekend, he’ll get out on another. And I can’t wait to share his photographs with you!  So today, on World Oceans Day, make sure you take the opportunity to thank our oceans for the mystery they still hold and for all that they do for each of us.

This is also published on New England Ocean Odyssey, which can be found here.