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DanOblacksmith September 14, 2010 at 12:56 pm

Nice bud!

Dave & Janet on ALEGRIA July 2, 2011 at 1:10 am

Hi Angie & Bruce,

In muddy or dark water, having fish, sometimes large fish, bang into the hull is very common. Especially at night. I assume that they see the bioluminescence of a smaller fish moving near the hull and attack it at a high speed, not realizing that the 'brick wall' of your hull is right behind the prey.

In warm waters, lots of fish hunt this way at night. We were anchored in the Gulf of California, outside Puerto Escondido one VERY calm night and were watching the bioluminescence and the drama of “no matter how big and mean and hungry you are, there is always someone bigger, meaner, and hungrier” next to our boat.

We accidentally discovered that if I stomped my foot on the deck of our 38' sailboat, that the entire sea for over 100' in all directions would erupt with a feeding frenzy! It was quite amazing.

Another mystery noise is made by pistol shrimp. They have a special claw that makes a loud for its size noise that stuns the shrimp's prey. For more info:

In many harbors, there are lots of them and the sound carries, so it sounds like high pitched popcorn or a crackling sound as hundreds snap. Each snap is one shrimp, but the snap is 200 decibels, louder than the Concord jet engines, if you are close to one of the tiny shrimp.

A friend invited us to spend the night aboard the wooden sailboat that he'd just bought. As we were laying there, going to sleep, he asked what that crackling noise was.

Ever the comedian, I said, “Teredos. And from that much noise, you must have a lot of them. Didn't you get the boat surveyed?”

(Teredos are a marine worm that loves to eat wood and riddles unprotected wood with holes, that as the worm grows, can be big enough to put a man's finger into. One of the terrors of owning a wood boat.)

Well, I'd over done it and he was terrified! It took about an hour to calm him down and get to sleep.

We enjoy getting your news. If you need any 'scare the aluminum boat owner' stories, just say the word.

(In case that actually worried you, aluminum has its special needs, like any material, but is arguably the best boat material as it is VERY tough in the engineering sense of being able to withstand rocks and collisions without leaking. Or as I like to put it, “A metal boat allows the captain to make one more mistake than any other hull material. They have hit reefs in mid ocean, been bounced over the the reef by the surf and then sailed almost 2000 miles to a harbor for repair, without taking on any water. Amazing stuff!”)