The sun was shining as divers gathered to join in our World's Oceans Day underwater dive clean up.

Selecting one of our favourite local dive sites within Wellington Harbour - Mahanga Bay.
Mahanga Bay has the remains of an old wharf, a car wreck and as the site of a scientific research station we have a few retired mussel lines. All of these manmade structures provide homes to a great variety of marine life. Common species include leatherjackets, seahorses, stargazers, masking crabs, white anemones, octopus and a conger eel.

Our divers headed out in buddy teams to explore the site and gather rubbish as they went. Fortunately there was not a lot out there but everyone came out with something. We found plenty of fishing line, hooks and sinkers off the point. There were a few old bottles, food wrappers and a cap.

One team helped remove fishing line wrapped around some sea weed and a seahorse! Our best deed of the day.

Once back in shore all rubbish was checked for marine life and we returned plenty of crabs, cushion stars, chitons and a baby octopus were returned safely to the ocean.