Entrance Submarine Canyon

The Entrance Canyon is a 100 m deep canyon subject to strong tidal currents entering and leaving Port Phillip Bay through the Port Phillip Heads. The seascape is highly complex with steep with highly eroded faces, ledges and caverns. There are deep holes, pinnacles, bombies, gullies and mazes of ridges. The canyon is a biodiversity hotspot for sponge gardens, corals, hydroids and bryozoans. There are many unique species and there are also many different community types. These include the massive brain sponges near bombie basin, The arborescent sponges of Lonsdale wall, the pumpkin sponge patch at the base of the Plateau and the jewel anemone carpets heading into Uelmans Deep. The species and communities present in the Canyon are not represented anywhere else in Australia and it is listed as a protected community. The Canyon is very difficult to survey, requiring a rapid deployment of ROVs during slack water and in between shipping passing overhead. The vertical scale here is as it appears to the ROV pilot.