Placencia, Stann Creek, Belize

Silk Cayes

The Silk Cayes are a trio of small sand islands roughly 30 kilometres east of Placencia, sitting directly on the barrier reef inside the Gladden Spit and Silk Cayes Marine Reserve. The dive sites around the cayes consist of patch reef, coral pinnacles and a wall edge in 5 to 22 metres. Reef fish life is dense and includes large schools of yellowtail snapper, schoolmasters, French grunts, sergeant majors, blue chromis, queen and French angelfish, midnight parrotfish and a wide variety of butterflyfishes. Spotted eagle rays cruise the reef edge, southern stingrays rest in sand patches, and resident loggerhead and hawksbill turtles are common. Caribbean reef sharks and nurse sharks pass along the deeper edge. Visibility is consistently 20 to 30 metres and currents are mild to moderate. The reserve is most famous for the spawning aggregation of cubera snappers, dog snappers and mutton snappers in March, April and May, which attract whale sharks to the area for plankton feeding.