Hendo’s and Cherub’s are two of the most spectacular dive sites off Brisbane. Located on the exposed eastern side of Moreton Island, they are generally only dived over the winter months when cool westerly winds blow providing calm conditions, but this is also the time that the grey nurse sharks are in residence.
One of the few charter boats that regularly operates to Cherub’s and Hendo’s over winter is Nautilus, an 18m long vessel run by Nautilus Scuba Centre. This vessel is great to dive from at any time of the year, but over winter you really appreciated the large warm cabin/lounge area.
Nautilus is moored at Scarborough; about 45 minutes drive north of the city. I arrived at the boat at 7.30am on a cool, but clear, July morning. After loading the gear and a safety briefing, we were on our way across Moreton Bay. I do a free camera clinic on Nautilus once a month, so provided some of the entertainment as we headed to the dive site, but I was soon out performed by several humpback whales.
The one and half hour run to Hendo’s passed very quickly and we soon anchored, gearing up and listening to the dive brief, which included the grey nurse shark diving regulations. I buddied up with Nautilus Instructor Kim Fisher, on his day off and keen for a pleasure dive.
Kim and I were first in the water to find a slight current and poor visibility, only 15m, not the normal 20m to 30m you usually get out here. We hit the bottom at 22m to find a large banded wobbegong resting near a ledge and schools of fusilier and other reef fish darting about. Hendo’s has some fascinating terrain, with a large ridge of rock cut by gutters, ledges and one large cave. We headed up the side of the rock, pausing to look at blue tangs, moray eels, crayfish and some of the lovely corals here.
As we got closer to the cave we could see a grey nurse shark hovering above a ridge. The shark dropped into the gutter beyond and as we got closer we could see it had three friends. Getting into position on the ridge Kim and I watched these magnificent sharks as they slowly patrolled the gutter. As I snapped photos I could see we had three males, all around 2.5m long, and a larger 3m long female. This female was shyer than the males, and from the bulge on each side of her belly appeared to be pregnant with twins.
Kim and I clicked off photos as we slowly moved along the side of the gutter. I was hoping for some nice portrait shots of the sharks, but they were a little wary of me with my large DSLR housing and strobe set-up, but more interested in Kim with his tiny P & S camera, or maybe he was just more attractive. Time and time again the sharks would cruise towards both of us, only to veer off towards Kim each time.
With the sharks showing more interest in Kim than me, I had a look at some of the other marine life around me, including a school of yellow-finned goatfish, squirrelfish, emperor angelfish, a Spanish dancer nudibranch, trevally and a green turtle. However, I was most surprised to find an eastern toadfish in a crevasse, I haven’t seen one of these cute fish north of Sydney before, pity I had my wide angle lens on, but I was after shark photos.
By now the other divers had joined us, and the sharks were getting a little nervous. So Kim and I explored more of the rocky reef to find large black coral trees, a school of surgeonfish, more wobbies and a group of batfish. We then returned to the sharks for a few more photos before heading back to the surface.
After a filling lunch, provided as part of the charter, and more whale watching, we headed one kilometre north to Cherub’s Cave. Kim and I were again first in the water to explore the maze of gutters and caves at this site in depths from 18m to 25m. We first explored some of the caves and ledges, which are packed with black corals, soft corals and tubastra corals, finding crayfish, wobbies, squirrelfish and a feeding hawksbill turtle.
As we headed up a gutter we also encountered a large school of surgeonfish, trevally, a lone jewfish and a rather large groper. We then headed towards the main gutter where the grey nurse prefer to hang out. In the past I have found that if the sharks are at Hendo’s then they aren’t at Cherub’s on the same day or visa versa. So I was quite surprised to see a grey nurse disappear around a large rock. Kim and I followed to see not one, but four huge grey nurse sharks hovering in a narrow gutter. These were big sharks, all female and all around 3m long, and at least two of them looked like they were pregnant.
We moved to the edge of the gutter for some photos and again the sharks were heading towards Kim, I was starting to think he had a tuna carcass stuffed down his wetsuit. While the sharks ignored me I snapped off some
photos
of the spotted wobbegongs sharing the ridge with us.We stayed with the sharks for over ten minutes as they weaving in and out of the gutters around us, but they always returned to the narrow gutter. After a few nice side shots, and several tail shots, I finally got my chance for a portrait photography.
One of the females was heading up the gutter and this time it looked like she was heading towards me. The shark was getting closer and closer, but worried that she would veer off between the two of us I shot one quick image. However, the shark kept coming, getting closer and closer, she was heading straight for me. I wanted to drop the power in my strobe, so I didn’t over expose the shark’s head, but I didn’t want to frighten the shark with any sudden movements, especially as it was right on top of me. I clicked off my portrait image just before the shark cruised straight over my head, its belly almost scraping my head. With my portrait image safely in the camera and our dive computers telling us we were close to deco, Kim and I headed back to the boat.
We had a great day diving with the grey nurse sharks at Hendo’s and Cherub’s and it was especially good to see that none of the sharks were wearing fishing tackle jewellery in their jaws. The Queensland Government does some silly things at times, like proposing shark finning on the Great Barrier Reef, but they sometimes get it right, as they have fully protected five of the major grey nurse aggregation sites in the state. Now we just need that backward New South Wales Government to do the same and fully protect the habitat of these wonderful, but critically endangered, sharks.