Tobermory, Scotland, United Kingdom

Calve Island

Calve Island lies just off Tobermory in the Sound of Mull and is one of the most popular intermediate dive sites on the Scottish west coast. The southern shoulder of the island drops in a series of stepped rock walls and gullies onto a clean rock and silt bottom at 25 metres, with sheltered conditions inside the bay. The walls are densely covered with plumose anemones, dead man's fingers, sponges, hydroids, feather stars and pink coralline algae, with kelp forests of Laminaria hyperborea on the upper margins. Resident species include wolffish, conger eels, pollack, ling, ballan wrasse, cuckoo wrasse, lumpsuckers, lobsters and the occasional Atlantic grey seal. Visibility is reliable in the Sound, often 8 to 15 metres in summer, and water temperatures vary between 8 and 14 degrees Celsius. Currents inside the bay are weak. The site is dived from Tobermory charter boats and is often combined with a wreck dive on the Hispania or Shuna in the same day. Suitable for AOWD divers in drysuits.