Neil Burgess, Ysabelle Hubert and Tyler Radford enjoyed a dive on 2 July 2022 one week after the capelin started to “roll” on the beach. This is the annual spawning event for capelin. The beach was full of capelin eggs and dead adult capelin. Hundreds of people come to Middle Cove beach when the capelin spawn to collect capelin for food. Newfoundlanders fry, salt or smoke capelin. Capelin are a keystone prey species in the northwest Atlantic. They are food for northern cod, humpback whales and millions of seabirds that come to nest on coastal islands around Newfoundland each summer. The capelin eggs laid at Middle Cove beach attract hundreds of hungry flounder, sculpins, sea ravens and skate, which eat the eggs.
About Middle Cove, Newfoundland
Middle Cove is a town in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. It’s about a 10-minute drive from downtown St. John’s, just before the town of Torbay on the eastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula.
The first settlers of Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove were mostly Irish immigrants from Kilkenny, Waterford, Wexford, and Cork. The majority of the Logy Bay pioneers came from the town of Inistioge in Kilkenny. The easy access to the excellent fishing grounds just offshore, as well as the good farmland that dotted the region, drew these early settlers to the area.
The Irish had established themselves by the 1850s and had begun to shape the landscape. Irish heritage is still evident today, as evidenced by religion, folkways, music, and dialect.
Dive Report
Details for the 2 July 2022 dive at Middle Cove Provincial Park beach:
Max depth: 34 feet
Dive time: 46 minutes
Water temp: 8°C
Lat/long: 47.650879° N, 52.695970° W
No swell, surf or surge (this location can get pounded by large swell and surf on some days)
Neil Burgess
Thanks to Neil Burgess for Submission of the video.
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