Diving Lamma Island, Hong Kong

by Keith Wilson

When I arrived at the Aberdeen Boat Club and asked Tom Winstanley, Dive Marshall for the trip, where we going to dive, he apologetically proclaimed, due to time and weather constraints it would be south Lamma. The prospect of diving at south Lamma in early autumn did not overwhelm me with enthusiasm. I remembered a dive a couple of years back at the same time of year, when the visibility was zero. Then, it was not a question of how far you could you see, more a question of what shade of green was the murk? - light green at the surface and blackish-green at the bottom. After twenty minutes of diving by 'braille', groveling over mud and rocks and abandoned fishing gear, the dive was abandoned. About the only dive I remember abandoning anywhere.

So with the sun already dropping behind Mount Stenhouse we arrived and anchored in the soon to be shaded mid-west part of Sham Wan Bay. Tom would have anchored further in the bay, but speed-boats and other recreators kept us well out of the popular inner sheltered bay spot.

Tom informed me I would be on the second flight. Oh good - zero viz, lots of swell and no sunshine, I pondered dismally to myself. I had just made ready a wide-angle camera and a macro camera and thought about packing it all away again. But I have learned a couple of things about Hong Kong's water clarity and that is you can never predict visibility and it can change rapidly from one day to the next.
The first two divers were in the water, Tom and Calinna. I could see Calinna's fins but not Tom's on the end of his 6'4" frame - not a good sign. In the end I left the wide-angle behind and took just the one camera; a housing containing a Nikon F90 with 60mm - you just never know.
I was buddied up with Canadian, Todd, from the Underwater Club. We duly grovelled about at 12 metres in pale grey soup and quickly ascended to about 6 metres where viz was about 2-5 metres. Nothing brilliant, but not too bad, and far better than I anticipated. The interesting observation during the first 30 minutes of the dive was the extent of the boulder scree that had formed underwater. All these boulders had rolled off Mount Stenhouse, which is 353 metres high, and formed huge and extensive, underwater piles of boulders. We found one very impressive isolated pile and spent the rest of the dive chasing fish around giant boulders at about 2-5 metres depth. The pretty fish included good numbers of various Cardinal fish, damselfish, the mainly yellow Hong Kong butterflyfish (Chaetodon wiebeli), the Oriental butterflyfish (Chaetodon auripes), lots of Stripeys (Microcanthus strigatus), lots of Sergeant majors (Abudefduf vaigiensis), a single dinner-plate sized Blackspot sergeant (Abudefduf sordidus), which is not so common in Hong Kong and an adult Flagfish or Spottedtail morwong (Cheilodactylus zonatus) which is certainly not a common fish.

The Spottedtail morwong is restricted in range from Honshu (Japan) down to Taiwan and Hong Kong. It is a busy wary fish and quite tricky to photograph. I managed to crack off a few shots of the morwong before I realized that I had been using the flash on manual at 1/16, which meant all the photos would be pitch black. Fortunately I had a couple of shots remaining and the morwong was still hanging around after being chased back to familiar territory by Neil Hambleton.

It has a weird shape with distinctive diagonal stripes. The local name of Jaam saam doh means the three knife chops fish - very much a culinary attitude towards this tasty and expensive fish. The local price is about HK$25 per tael, which amounts to HK$400 per cattie, making it one of the most costly fishes to buy in Hong Kong, which reflects its good taste and rarity. At this price it is even more expensive than So mei, the Humphead wrasse (Choerodon schoenleinii), which is currently available at around HK$ 320 per cattie). The fish at Sham Wan, in the photo was about two catties i.e. 1.2 kg. I wonder what it tastes like. At these prices I'll never know.


South China Dive Club

Hong Kong main page