Cat Rock

Cat Rock is a sea stack standing about eighty-one feet above the water off the south side of Middle Anacapa Island, with a small bay beside it that boats use as an anchorage. The dive site wraps the rock and the reef around its base, with depths from twenty to sixty feet on a mix of healthy kelp, exposed rock, and a deeper bottom carpeted with brittle stars. Giant black sea bass, a fully protected species, are sometimes seen here.

The site sits on the south, or seaward, side of Anacapa, the side that faces the open Santa Barbara Channel. Both of Anacapa's marine protected areas, the reserve and the conservation area, cover only the north side of the island, so Cat Rock lies outside reserve protection. The shallower depths and the protected anchorage make this one of the more approachable boat dives on Anacapa, suitable for divers of all skill levels.

Giant kelp anchored on the reef around the base of the rock and growing up through the water column to the surface makes Cat Rock a kelp forest biome. A rocky reef biome runs between the kelp patches, across the exposed rock and the brittle-star bottom at depth.

Access is boat only. Charter dive boats run to Cat Rock from Ventura, Channel Islands Harbor in Oxnard, and Santa Barbara, with the crossing about an hour and a half from Ventura.

Fishing and spearfishing are legal here under standard California recreational rules, since the south side of Anacapa lies outside both the Anacapa Island State Marine Reserve and the Anacapa Island State Marine Conservation Area. The SMCA's southern boundary lies a few hundred yards north along the island, however, so the position should be chartplotted before harvesting.