Weather
Compliments of the season to you all! December got into full swing, everybody was in great spirits and the weather behaved itself with beautiful sunny days being the norm.

Marine Life
We have had some amazing snorkelling trips this month - with sightings of loggerhead, green and hawksbill turtles along with a very special sighting of a leatherback turtle just off Island Rock. We have also seen up to 10 raggies (ragged tooth sharks) around Island Rock. The warm summer months have brought out the rays - round ribbontail, sharpnose, eagle, devil and blue spotted rays have regularly been seen on both our ocean experience and diving trips.

We were delighted to find some small residents had returned to Aerial Reef - the pineapple fish! (image). These little guys are tiny - around the size of your baby fingernail - and have been taking cover in the small cave on Aerial. We saw five the first time, but unfortunately they must make a tasty meal because there were only two spotted by the end of December.

We've also seen a couple of teeny tiny juvenile box fish - which almost look like small yellow snowflakes floating in the water.
A rare sighting of a Zambezi or bull shark, seen off Pineapple Reef, was cause for great excitement amongst the divers too this month.

The new addition to our family of potato bass on Pineapple Reef has been named Cheeky. We've been watching a smaller potato bass taking a keen interest in the divers over the last few months, but he had not yet built up the courage to actually come right up to them. This all changed towards the end of December? Tony van Marken was on the sand and Boris was enjoying the attention from the divers, when in came the new little guy. He gave Tony the fright of his life when he came in close and opened his mouth inches away from Tony's face! After that, Michelle decided to nickname him Cheeky.

The only thing we haven't seen this month is the whale shark. Hopefully January will bring us some magical moments with these gentle giants.

Yours in diving,
Darryl, Clive, Michelle & Ondyne
The Rocktail Dive Team

Special thanks to Mark Parker for the image.