Coral Reef Painter

No pictures?

2010-09-29T15:29:00.001-04:00

I haven't been diving in nearly a year now, since last February. Guess I should get wet, hey? I've been growing Desert Roses, instead. Have had some health issues.

OK, I'll be back eventually. Bye for now.

Been too long...

2010-06-21T14:00:00.000-04:00

Last year I entered a few paintings, just dinky little 10X8 inch images, in a little art show that I didn't respect, sold several at give away prices, and I haven't touched a paintbrush since.

Bad me.

I don't know why I get so upset at selling.

A friend went to the same show this year, several weeks ago, and he told me that everybody was asking about, "Where's the artist who sold the cheap paintings last year?"

Ah, well, see you again soon.

Hum.

2009-12-28T07:57:00.000-04:00

A round sponge, perched on a bit of hard substrate, out in the sand. Sponges have holes. Sponges are animals! They are filter feeders. Very simple, and in an evolutionary 'dead end' because of this simplicity. They are made of cells that act as a kind of skin, cells with little whips that draw in water, cells that distribute food particles, and interior cells for structure. No circulatory system, blood or lymph, no lungs, no senses, eyes or ears. Yet somehow, they do reproduce, all at the same time. The male and female sponges simultaneously releasing eggs and sperm into the water. They look like they're smoking, sometimes a very dense 'fog' rising up from the central hole.

A very old 'clump of sponge...

Silt is always a problem I'm not sure how sponges deal with silt. Corals make slime and silt falls off. A lot of effort for the coral polyps.

A yellow Tube Sponge, a very large, old animal. And a brown tube sponge on the side.

Hmm, all for today, see you tomorrow! Thanks for stopping by.

2009-12-27T13:40:00.000-04:00

A most amazing rainbow Christmas morning, seen from my front deck.

Go for a car ride, folks enjoying the beach. I don't 'beach' much, I dislike sand!!

Some folks laugh at the tiny beaches here, they're used to the humongous continental beaches that are thousands of miles long. But I say we have 'Designer Beaches', each with a special charm of it's own. This is Cane Bay Beach, where I most often dive. I get in the water by that boat ramp.

This another beach, Butler Bay Beach. I went to Thanksgiving day dinner here, a great picnic! The big blizzard that snowed in the USA a few days ago came here in the form of big ocean waves, washing away a lot of sand, see the edge? The sand will slowly build back up, a natural process. Ha, big waves here are two feet high!
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Lovely big brown Senepol cattle. A breed created here on St Croix, from Angus, Brahma, and some others. They don't mind the tropical heat, and they get huge!

These cows were shy, and turned away, this is a sort of telephoto photo

The road leading on past the estate where those lucky cows live. The big trees are Mahogany. Most roads are two lanes here, and the Island speed limit is 35mph, for the most part.

Another estate, I've been inside this one. The construction is massive. The outside walls are four feet thick, and the interior walls are three feet thick, solid stone. You feel like you're going through a tunnel between rooms!

The entrance to the estate. Old old walls built by slave labor two hundred years ago

More old stuff, ruins of a rum factory.

Another driveway. The families that own these estates almost never sell them.

Oh boy, these pretty pink blooms are on the Coral Vines. An invasive plant from South America. Pretty, but it takes over like Kudzu and Wisteria

A view of the Carambola resort. A very nice golf course, and expensive homes. There are two other golf courses on St Croix.

One more 'ruin' they seem to have filled in a doorway. I guess the slaves with the donkey cart went off to find stone, brought back a load, then went off in another direction for more building material. Old buildings are made of every kind of rock on the island, and coral 'stone' also. The bricks are Danish, brought from Denmark as ballast in the sailing ships long ago. When the ships left, they left the yellowish bricks here, as they were loaded heavily with rum.

OK, all for today! Thanks for stopping by. My next lot of photos will probably be topside also, as the sea is so stirred up with the high surf that underwater photography won't be very successful for the next few days. I'll be gardening for the most part. Cheerio!

Christmas morning

2009-12-25T11:31:00.000-04:00

Well, surf's up, dude. I uploaded all the photos at once, and don't yet know how to work with them, maybe I can't. Ah, well.

Thanks for stopping by! I'll get moving again eventually.
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try again...

2009-12-24T08:56:00.003-04:00

try again...

2009-12-23T19:33:00.002-04:00

A sandy place

2009-12-21T08:54:00.011-04:00

Hop off the boat, descending slowly, floating slowly down in forty feet of depth, 12 meters, here comes a Southern Ray. Big ray, about four feet, more than a meter, from wingtip to wingtip. I guess you call them wings! He's really green.

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Cruising on by, several Jacks in attendance. When the ray stops to dig in the sand, the fish hope to grab anything that the ray stirs up, that the ray misses; crabs, little bottom fish that hide in the sand...

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whoa! smelled something? turning quickly...

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found something to check out...

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Ok, a bit of digging, they use their whole body rather like a plunger, making a vacuum under their noses, where the mouth is located. Some sand stirred up, and then awayyyyy he goes!

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Pertty Sea Star! Their eyes are on the ends of their arms. This one isn't soft at all, very 'hard'. I don't handle them, but sometimes just touch with one finger, lightly.

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LOL, the next photo comes on top, so I need to write backwards in time. This blogging is something else.

The little yellowish fuzzy thing is a small Pillar Coral. A big old one looks like a Disney castle. If you look close(I'll get a better photo soon) the polyp's tentacles look like a wheat field, waving in the breeze, or sea currents.

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Ok, what do we have here? Confusing, this blogging. I find I must upload photos one at a time to be able to write in between them. Next, to learn if they will post under, or above as I go along. I guess a blog is a permanent learning curve. Every time I get used to Blogger, they change a little, improving?

This coral is one of my (many) favorites. One name is Maze, but I like Butterprint, maybe because it's food. I haven't photoshopped these pictures, too blue! I'm still getting accustomed to this new computer, but very happy with it!

OK, off to do a slow slow dive, to get lots of photos to share with you. That big snowstorm that pounded the East Coast of the US will be sending me big ocean waves from the west, hum. Small world!

Thanks for stopping by!
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A few photos...

2009-12-20T16:20:00.000-04:00

.Some photos from yesterday's Lionfish hunt, unseccessful, which is good. I paddle along taking quick shots of everything I see. Well, not really, I see a lot more, but cameras are limited. I'd rather be off by myself, people underwater aren't very interesting to me.
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So, some scenery, some closer photos of just stuff, you know, coral and sponges. When i go on these Lionfish hunts, I have to stay with the group, and they go so fast! wowee, I smear a third of my photos because I'm not holding still long enough.

OK, Holidays fast approaching, Guess I need to go diving!
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Cheers, and thanks for stopping by!

2009-12-18T11:37:00.000-04:00

A couple of sponges for you this morning. I just don't have any decent photos for this blog right now, I MUST go diving! Especially before the sea cools down for the winter.
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I'm trying to get my painting studio all finished with the remodel, so it'll be an enjoyable place to be. The floor needs paint!! it's stained, old, black and white squares of linoleum, I dislike it intensely! makes me nervous or something. I'll have it finished in a few days, a nice, light neutral. Funny, i found that old linoleum was made from linseed oil and chalk. I use linseed oil in oil painting.
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OK
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Thanks for stopping by!
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Hum haven't posted in a while...

2009-12-17T11:43:00.003-04:00

Oooo, is there a Lionfish in there? We haven't found any in a while here on St Croix(croy). Seems there were nine or ten caught, over a year's time. Each one was bigger than the last. The very first sightings were one one dive by a tourist that took photos of eight or more, all about three inches long. These were reported, not caught, booo. It's looking like that was an isolated invasion.

The Island of Bonaire is having the same thing happen, all of a sudden there are little Lions all over the place. The park people there are doing their best to catch them.

In the Bahamas, the Officials didn't realize what a devastating effect these fish have on the population of reef fish, and they dawdled with any attempt at control. There was a Lionfish Rodeo a few months ago on one of the islands, and in one day, 1,400 lionfish were brought in.

OK, all for now. I'm designing my studio to be able to paint efficiently, so I'll be an artist someday soon!

Thanks for stopping by!

2009-12-10T21:47:00.000-04:00

A blurry image of a Pillar Coral. They can grow to be ten feet tall, or maybe even more. The polyps, when extended, feeding, look like waving fields of grass or wheat.
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A Barrel Sponge, they do this sometimes, grow in a group. The bushy-looking things aren't plants, they're Gorgonian Corals, Animals. Hum.

Oh boy!

2009-12-10T09:06:00.003-04:00

Experimenting here, still learning the new computer. We're having "discussions" Does no good to disagree with a computer!!

How about some salad?

2009-12-09T10:59:00.006-04:00

Oops! Two of the same image! I don't know if Blogger has changed, or if it's this new computer that I'm still learning. Can't seem to delete, owell!

Sometimes photographer call these kinds of photos 'salad' because they don't have just one big subject splat in the middle. This-is-a-fish This-is-an-octopus

I rather enjoy the mess.

Thanks for stopping by!

A bunch of barrels

2009-12-08T10:34:00.005-04:00

Barrel Sponges perched on this 'hill side'.

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Barrel sponges, or sometimes called Basket Sponges, can get huge. Big enough for a diver to sit inside, but that's a very bad idea because, even though these are sponges, they are very brittle and break easily.

OK, thanks for stopping by!

Groovy sand

2009-12-06T19:39:00.000-04:00

This is a formation seen in the Sea often, a "groove" of sand. I guess the sand settles in low places, then constant wave action keeps the sand moving back and forth so coral polyps and other things(sponges, zoanthids, etc) cannot settle and start building reef structure. There are pathways on reef slopes like this, and they almost always lead to deeper water, or shore, depending which way you follow them. Oh, usually currents go across them sideways, bringing more sand to settle, hey?
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Mother Nature or Neptune or somebody doesn't work with a backhoe and a blueprint. This one has a dead end! Or a beginning? This photo is looking toward shore.
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Oops, not very good focus, but you get the idea. There can be dramatic overhangs.
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And sometimes the sand areas aren't very well defined into little valleys.

All for now! These photos are from two dives done this morning on a Lionfish Hunt. Successful hunt! None found. Gadzooks, I took 680 snapshots! More tomorrow, they're not ALL out of focus.

Thanks for stopping by!
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Friday photo

2009-12-04T13:10:00.003-04:00

Sea Stars. The last one is eating something. I didn't grab him and wreck his day just to satisfy my curiosity.

They do have eyes of a sort, on the ends of their arms.

OK, thanks for stopping by.

Today's photo

2009-12-03T14:25:00.000-04:00

I'll at least post a photo a day as I get up and running here. I haven't even been diving much lately, even though the sea is still quite warm. Along about February and March it gets cool, for me, and I shiver getting in! So, 82 degrees fahrenheit is my comfort zone.

Mr Barracuda hanging out in the lee of a big Gorgonian Coral.
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Thanks for stopping by!

A barrel Sponge

2009-12-02T17:51:00.003-04:00

OK, I'm getting this new computer figured out. Gee, it's been a long time! And during this month of December, there are plans for some nice additions around here. Artwork, believe it or not.

Finally!

2009-12-02T17:39:00.002-04:00

New computer

2009-11-26T03:50:00.000-04:00

Just got back online a half hour ago. It's been nice to not be glued to a screen, but I am re energized as to what I will do in the next year. So, OK, a post now, and some visual stuff later/soon!

Cheers!

Starvation

2009-10-13T10:20:00.001-04:00

OK, choose my shell. The little crab in that huge, to him, shell must be starving to death, literally. I'll chop some food, I have some frozen calamari, and stuff the shell, and take it to the crab. I am silly, yes, I know.

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OK, there's the bit of reef, a bommie the Australians would call it.

Garden Eels down in front, looking like bits of waving wire. They face into the gentle current, catching bites of food floating by. I don't know what. Eelie hamburgers. ha

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I turn up the big shell that the crab is in, an ancient Milk Conch that passed away. The conch shell must weigh half a kilo, a pound. The crab couldn't weigh 5% of that.

I set the Whelk shell, stuffed with the food, so that Crabbie could go get a meal, and hopefully come to his senses and move in to the smaller shell that he could move around in.

The fish are saying, "Food! Food? Food! We smell it, where is it? Food! Food??"
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Tug, I'd decided to move the show to the coral, out of the open sand. "Oh, no you don't!" said Crabbie, he was really strong, holding his bounty.

His claw and legs should be a dark purplish brown, with white speckles, but digging in the sand, seeking the food that wasn't there, and maybe even trying to move that gigantic shell, he's worn off his colors. Skin?

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Nestled in a crevas. But then much too visible, I don't want a strange Bubbling Monster to do any shell collecting! And lurking around there was a Graysby fish, maybe big enough to steal the Whelk shell and Crabbie's food.

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OK, there. I hope to go back this afternoon, and find the conch shell sitting there, and the little whelk shell gone away, taken by Crabbie happily into the sunset to live happily ever after.

If not? Groan, I'll have some more food. Owell, silly me. This is how I play. No casinos or card games for me.
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OK! Thanks for stopping by!
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Speechless again!.

2009-10-09T12:24:00.002-04:00

Damselfish. Trying to decide if the Big Bubbling Monster needs to be bitten.

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Blackbar Soldierfish, trying to decide if they should run and hide. They did.

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Elkhorn Coral. Meditating.

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Brain Coral, trying to look like a loaf of bread. Spiny Urchin trying to hide, but I see him.

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Sea Fans waving in the gentle surge, enjoying the company of an attentive Brain Coral.

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Pillar Coral, playing with his fish, Black Durgons.

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Thanks for stopping by, I'll find some wordiness for you again soon.
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2009-10-08T12:35:00.000-04:00

Some scenery, about 45 feet deep, 14m.

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How about that? A right brained post! No words! I have company that's keeping me busy, better posts to come! Thanks for stopping by!
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Predators

2009-10-06T08:32:00.001-04:00

Definitely a preditor, and he has his eye on something, a Barracuda. Massively strong, see how thick his body is, all muscle. When they hunt, they settle to near the bottom, and dress up in camouflage colors. They don't move until the time is right, and then they charge forward with such a lightning strike that you cannot see them go, they simply disappear. Hard to believe unless you've seen it happen. No, they don't zip away, they are simply there, then they are not there.
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Two more predators, but only frightening to a critter one millimeter big! A Goldspot Goby in front, and a Bridaled Goby in back. Funny how they sit on the bottom. You normally think of fish as swimming around.

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And a mix of critters that eat. I guess anything is a predator if it eats!

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Must a predator move around in order to eat? This purple bush-looking thing is an animal, a coral, a 'colony' for lack of a better word, of polyps functioning as one individual. A Sea Whip of some sort, I'd have to memorize the descriptions and look closely, or be lucky and get clear close up photos. The polyps extend from the edges of the flat blades of the branches. for food, they grab whatever they can that floats close enough.

Animals that look like bushes and trees, but are slow growing and so delicate that a slight touch by a human can cause injury. This one could be forty years old, or more.

Oboy, Have fun when you can! Thanks for stopping by!
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fishy Monday

2009-10-05T09:15:00.000-04:00

Some fish today, a Redband Parrotfish chomping at the -- whatever they chomp. You can actually hear their teeth grinding the coral rock, which is soft calcium carbonate.

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A pair of Banded Butterflyfish. They generally go around in pairs.

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One of the tiny jewels of the reef, a Fairy Basslet. about an inch long, 2cm. They orient themselves to the surface they're near. If they are under a ledge, they're upside down! But that's right side up for them. I would get dizzy.

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Another view of the same fish, now headed up, he's on a verticle surface. I really don't know what's right side up for him!

Oh, my, all for today! Thanks for stopping by!

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2009-10-05T06:44:00.000-04:00

Gallery

2009-10-02T15:56:00.000-04:00

Just some random photos today.
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Ha, I was going to call this guy a plain brain, but the book says it's a Symmetrical Brain coral, Diploria strigosa. OK. Kind of a lot of silt around the bottom. Not a funny looking rock, a 'colony' of hundreds of tiny animals, on the surface of their skeleton laid down under their bodies. They are kind of like a living rug on the surface. Sometimes people say that polyps can hide down in their little holes, but that is not true.

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Dee-ah-Demma. Or usually called Spiny Urchin. These spines can penetrate and sometimes cause humans problems when the human blunders into the poor little boogie and breaks his spines, causing injury and much dismay to all involved! Fire coral in the background, best to stay away from that stuff, too. But remember, these things cannot chase you.
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These are called Sea Rods, I thimmk. Pretty.

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Ah, and my favorite, a Sea Plume. I was once lucky to snorkel a little bay on the Venezuelan island Blanquilla. There were hundreds of these there, and they must have been fifteen feet tall! I've SO wished to go back there on a dive boat! Looking down from the surface is just not the same. This Sea Plume is about six feet, 2m, tall.

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Blurry female Bluehead Wrasses, in front od a sponge. They swim so fast, difficult to get good focus.

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Like many other fish, and some insects, these Wrasses are born all females. As they grow, they stay in loose schools, and after a while, the biggest one changes into a male. This is a teenage boy, I guess.
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One insect that's born all female is the Aphid. In the spring, for the first fifteen generations! No wonder they take over your garden so quickly! Males are born in late summer for egg making.

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Here, for sure, is the "Terminal" male Bluehead. They swim by sculling their pectoral fins, not flapping their tail or wriggling their whole body. They seem to be a little 'negatively bouyant', they sink, because they bob up and down slightly with each stroke. They really go fast. When this fish is eaten, or something happens to him anyway, one of the females will change sex and color to replace him.
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.Ah, Thanks forstopping by!
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Crazy

2009-10-02T15:09:00.000-04:00

This is crazy, I cannot answer a comment, meaning I cannot comment on my own blog, signed in even! Here's my comment, grrr.
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So, Laurel,
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Yes,Thank you for the compliment!
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For me, reading is escapism. I just about cannot put a book down until I've finished, even though I usually read non-fiction, history, travel and personal accounts.
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I certainly am paralyzed while reading! And am not painting or taking care of day-to-day Life while I'm reading. And most time spent on the Internet counts as reading.
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Once, I found out that if I have a room painted white, with nothing in it but a chair, and I spend time just sitting there, then I become more creative and productive. This room I'm in right now has an old black and white checkered floor, ugh, and lots of clutter. Maybe that's why I'm not painting any lately! Plus some other things are going on.
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Dreaming is fine. Try, sometimes, to have a sketchbook in front of you. Hmmm.
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OK, once again, thanks for the compliment, and for commenting!
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(Posted by Melissa, not Anonymous, I and others have been having troubles posting comments here. ???) Rather----not posted as a comment!! grrr!

What today??

2009-10-01T12:56:00.000-04:00

Some shallow scenery. Fire corals, and a purplish sponge, and the little yellow Wrasses zooming around. A Damselfish in the corner. The willow-looking tree in the background is an old Gorgonian coral. Hum, not a tree, will I ever get used to that?

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Closer upper. The two Wrasses over on the side look like they're talking to each other. Damselfish rushing for cover. Another Wrass sponge diving.

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More Wrasses, checking out the Tube Sponges. Zoom they go!

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They're looking at me! The coral lump is one of my landmarks when I'm paddling around Cane Bay. Some spots on it survived the bleaching in 2005. It's about 4 feet tall? a little over a meter.

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A little lump, several years, or more, old. About the size of a bowling ball.

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It's called Elliptical Star Coral. Here I go again, pretty polyps! Bumping and jiggling against each other in slow, slow motion.

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Another lump, a Mustard Hill Coral. About the same size as the Elliptical guy.

These 'mustard' polyps are teenie tiny! Hum, I didn't get the color quite right. More magenta and less cyan next time!

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Oh dear, a mob of Bubbling Monsters! I'll go the other way. I feel OK about diving alone for a lot of reasons. I've dived Cane Bay for twenty years, hunderds of dives. The sea is warm and gentle, most of the time. I don't dive when it's at all rough. I trust my gear. I used to lead introductory dives here, hearding around six beginners, who was my buddy?? Yipes!

OK, so here I go! Have a great day, and thanks for stopping by!

Spots

2009-09-30T09:50:00.000-04:00

Calm water! Looks like I'm a long way offshore, hey? I thimmk someone is starting to build a house on the pointy top of the mountain. If it was MY house, I'd be really happy. But otherwise, I don't want a house up there!

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Stop a minute to take a photo of this little spotted guy. Smooth Trunkfish. They usually have a honey comb pattern on their side.

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Puff, puff, puff, what's for lunch!?

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Where the sand meets the dropoff. There is an edge of corals, then the 'wall' that goes down, down, down. Can't be photographed, really. You had to have been there. Oh, or maybe you've stood at the edge of a tall building, a skyscraper, and looked over, down. Like that but you cannot fall!

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A Spotted Moray Eel. I do believe he's showing his teeth. They can get a little aggressive sometimes. The only kind of eel that's been a little pushy with me, but only when I pushed first, by trying to take too many photos, too close. But I've never come anywhere near to being bitten. People who hand feed them sometimes get bitten.

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A Squirrelfish. Just plain old Squirrelfish, no descriptive name. His, her?? dorsal fin, spines, are yellowish. That's how you quickly tell them apart from the other kinds of Squirrelfish. I'll have to start collecting photos of the different kinds. Most of them that I see are the Longspine, that have white tips on the dorsal spines. Hum.

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Off to the post office with me. Need that new camera housing! Thanks for stopping by!
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Hmm, what to post?

2009-09-29T11:02:00.001-04:00

Funny how I am a bottomless pit for new images. My poor computer has only 6% of its' space clear. 200 to 450 photos in every one hour dive, clickkity click. Tho' I await a new housing for this trusty little camera, the shutter button just refused to work again. No dives for days and days now, "oh poor me" And poor you, because I've decided to go for colorful pictures, but haven't a stock. Most of my photos aren't very bright. Haha
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Some Flower Coral. Hmm, I need a nighttime photo, when they have extended their tentacles.

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Nearby, Two little Blue Chromis fishies are checking me out. The Big Bubbling Monsters don't usually go so slow.
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The juvenile Grunts in the background are pretending to ignore me. And I don't know what that Brown Chromis is dive bombing.

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Glaring at me with his other eye. Looking as grouchy as a Barracuda!

Brown and purple sponges, a Star coral that seems to have expelled some of it's zooxanthellae. The fuzz is a Damselfish's garden.

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Now the Grunts are openly staring. Pfft, French Grunts.

Even the finger coral seems to be peering at me with surprise and suspicion!

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A discussion, and a decision...

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"We're outta here!"
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Ha, away they go.

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And away I go. Have fun when you can, and thanks for stopping by!
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Another shell,

2009-09-28T15:03:00.000-04:00

Now I've got me going ever more slowly over the sand.
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Hum, a pointy bit! I wonder if it's a...

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Yes, a Carrier Snail. They must go dormant or something occasionally, because their shell gets bits of coral or sometimes shells embedded on the surface. They'd have to be stationary when the shell grows, to have the the coral or shell stick so completely to the snail's shell. This little guy is actually as big as I've seen them. His collection is so heavy!
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OK, Gastropod. It's a Gastropod.
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His portrait, upside down, then I turned him over and left him to struggle along under his heavy load.

I saw one (the shell, the critter was long dead and gone) in a sea shell store window once that had a $200 price tag! It was amazing, a perfect spiral of pretty little sea shells. No lumpy dead coral like on this fellow.

I always wanted to get a lot of these guys and keep them in a bin of shells, so they'd all have pretty collections. But I've never figured out how to do that.
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What else do we have here?
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I see you!

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Swish, swish away some sand, then gently and carefully dig my hand under the side, and...

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Ta Da! A Red Heart Urchin. A big one. They shove their way through the sand just under the surface all day. Using all their zillions of short spines for propulsion, somehow. They come to the surface at sunset, something about there not being enough oxygen in the sand without sunlight.This guy really is big.

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Upside down, to his dismay. Or are we a her? Ha, I can't tell, and don't really care. I'm not even really sure what's the front end! But I think it's at the top of the photo. The spines are wriggling frantically in a slow sort of way. Red Heart Urchin races would be terminally boring to watch!

The spines on the bottom are in patterns for moving about, and picking through the delectable eatery in the sand. I read that Urchins as a whole are picky eaters. And one more thing, that white spot on the right?

A tiny crab that can often found on this kind of urchin. Called, what else, a Heart Urchin Pea Crab. I've seen two on one urchin, but usually only one, never several or many.

And one fish. This female Peacock Flounder is either full to bursting with eggs, they're in mating season now, or she ate a fish that she could only barely get into her mouth. Fish do that all the time, take really big bites. They don't have my Mom around to tell them not to.

Ah, well, sorry I'm so late this day, gosh, it's afternoon! Where does time go? Thanks for stopping by!

Yeow! What happens to empty shells.

2009-09-25T13:53:00.002-04:00

Another kind of Conch, or seashell, or Gastropod, a Milk Conch. Doesn't look quite right. The sand is stirred all around. Conchs don't do that.

Queen Conchs are larger, have a more flared 'skirt', and are pink/yellow inside. Milk Conchs have a soft white color inside, until they get really old, then the nacre that the animal puts down starts turning gray.

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Suspicious me, I slowly turned up the shell. And, found like I thought I might, a hermit crab! A most ambitious crab, to be in a shell that big! He had gone all around digging food from the surrounding sand. I put the shell back right, but a few inches away so crabbie can find some food. Should I take him a shell that'd be a better fit? I don't know if he would move out of his 'ego shell'!

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And some activity in an empty Queen Conch shell, some little Cardinal Fish have found shelter. And down in front, a rather long way out into the sand, a yellow Banded Coral Shrimp.

I settle and watch for a bit...

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The shrimp sensibly got back to the shell.

There was one larger Cardinal Fish deep inside the shell. The smaller fish would try to go inside, and the bigger fish kept chasing them out.

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The shrimp inside the shell. I should have extended my hand, and maybe th shrimp would have come for a meal, they are amongst the little critters that 'clean' bigger critters of lice and fleas and whatnot. I don't think I had any flea for the shrimp.

Both the shrimps. Sorry, guys, no food from me.

What a life, nothing to do all day but try to find something to eat.

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OK, all for now, and see you Monday! Thanks for stopping by!
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Let's have some color!

2009-09-24T11:48:00.000-04:00

A Bicolor Damselfish darting around the Maize and other corals and sponges. Sponges have holes, y'know. I've said that before!

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A white Fan Worm of some sort, living with the orange Elephant Ear Sponge, and the stick-like Arrow Crab.

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A closer look at Mr. Crab. Looks grouchy, 'crabby' hey? Pretty blue claws, which I respect. One of these guys drew my blood once with those sharp-as-razors claws, even though they're only about 1/8 an inch long! A couple of mm's? five, maybe.

The crab has all sorts of stuff on top of his pointy little head. I wonder if he cares?

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.More orange Elephant Ear Sponge, holes? And a coral, a Massive Starlet, or Siderastrea siderea. Red Cyanobacteria, that I used to think was algae.

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A Star Horseshoe Worm. Bright little guy next to the hairy looking tentacles of the Encrusting Gorgonian.
Bluish sponge below, and star coral above.

This is a little piece of healthy coral reef, life squabbling and pushing over every bit of space.

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Whee, a blue sponge that's actually a lumpy form of Branching Tube Sponge, Pseudocerantina crassa. This sponge comes in different colors, sometimes yellow mixed in with the blue, purples, browns and yellow orange mixes. But always with that peculiar texture.

Not really much blue color on the reef.

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Another Branching Tube Sponge, different colors. Beside a Maize coral, one of my favorites. Also called Butterprint coral. This one has the polyp's tentacles extended some. After dark, when they're really extended, feeding, the coral is white and fuzzy, like a shag rug.

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OK, all for right now! I'll look for more colors tomorrow. Thanks for stopping by!
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The rest of the story...

2009-09-23T11:08:00.000-04:00

So, I'm dtzzing along, I need some new words here, and taking pretty pictures as they occur to me.
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I like how the sunlight is shining from the other side of this Gorgonian. It's purplish, the 'flesh' color of the "rind" it's called, the body of the coral that the polyps live in. In which they live. But, anyway, the brownish colored polyps aren't out feeding today, wonder why? I don't know.
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Aha, a type of 'plate', or 'sheet' coral, in a shallower, sunlit place. Usually this is found in deeper water, where a flash would be needed to catch the color. Their skeleton, the hard white part, forms flat, like, well, dinner plates. I know my photography is not what I'd like, as for detail in an image like this one, so I stop to try to get some detailed close ups.

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Just for fun, I include a little fish, a cleaner Goby of some sort. There are maybe fifteen different kinds, with sometimes very small differences.

Hmm. Where's the book? I am sort of keeping an eye out for one kind of plate coral, called Sunray, Helioceris cucullata but I haven't noticed any since the bleaching event of 2005. Oh, this one's Latin name has been changed lately.

I'm guessing this one is a Agaricia lamarki OK!
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Ha, another close up, and Mr. Fish is peeking around the corner watching me.

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And there he is on the other side. A Coney. A type of small grouper. Hmm, the first photo looks more like a Graysby, but it's not really that important here. Hmm, I think that one is a Graysby, because the spots are dark. OK.

Coral formations look like they are solid, like hills and rocks on land, but often they have all sorts of holes, tunnels and channels running through them. Not solid at all!

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Mr. Coney swimming around. The blurs are tiny Mysid shrimps, an important food source for fish on the coral reef, and a blurr in many photographs!
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He's keeping a close eye on me.

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Hey, another Coney barges in, chasing the first one on away.

Coneys really change colors. Sometimes they're brown with the blue speckles, and sometimes they're black and white, half and half. Very strange! And at different times of day, they will all be the same color, either brown or the black/white. And sometimes a more pronounced version of the colors of the fish that's running away in this image. Fish run???

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Mr Fish #2 is still keeping a nervous eye on me, and Mr. Arrow Crab has joined in the show, the little sticks-looking thing up in the right corner.

And, yes, the Mr.'s Mysid shrimps making their blurry presence known.

So much excitement, no I won't faint.
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One last look at the coral. Ah, polyps that I adore!

Looks like some sort of worm is living there too. Two holes in the corals, two worms.
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Pretty polyps.

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.Ah, all for today. The camera's housing is off to the repair guy's again!! He so amazed that he's sent me a new housing, and I'm sending the bad-button housing to him. I guess they'll pass each other in the FedEx system today. Phooey, it's a gorgeous day for dive. Should I go anyway, without a camera? Yikes, I don't know...

Thanks for stopping by!
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Argh! Electricity's off!

2009-09-22T10:16:00.000-04:00

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Bummer, right when I was choosing photos and resizing them for you. One just for now, and a nice post later this afternoon!
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I'll have a bt of a story with this picture! No Great Novel, but a nice little story. See you when the power is back on!

Sponges!

2009-09-21T11:22:00.000-04:00

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No, not the kitchen sink kind. But sometimes sea sponges are used for 'artist's' sponges, and for texturing paint on walls.

A Giant Barrel Sponge, or maybe a Basket Sponge, depending on the one who is calling names. Latin is, Xestospongia muta. Everyone agrees on the latin name. (hopefully!) A big fellow, perhaps more than a yard/meter across. Yes, I know, a meter is about three inches more than a yard.

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.Another X. muta. Somehow something made the little part go odd, and it looks like it's making a face. I've posted a photo of this guy before. I see him all the time!

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Some sort of "Rope Sponge" A lovely wine color, but out of the water more reddish than purple.

The fish are little, Brown Chromis.

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A Brown Tube Sponge, also called Pipes of Pan. It takes different shapes sometimes, but usually looks like this. Lots of this kind of sponge where I dive.

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And a fish! A Graysby. More light in this photo than the one a day ago, his markings plainly seen. He's lounging on the reef, see how he's leaning on his pectoral fins, what would translate to human's hands.

Just under him is a round hole, I'm thinking that's a Preditory Boring Sponge! Ha. They attack living coral and burrow all through the interior of a coral's skeleton, eventually killing the coral. Boooo

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OK, I must(you won't believe!) pack up my camera housing and send it off to the repair guy AGAIN!!! He seems to be almost as perturbed as I.

Have fun when you can! See you tomorrow, and thanks for stopping by!
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Check this out

2009-09-18T11:31:00.000-04:00

Hum, some coral out in the sand, let's see what's there...

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Fishies swimming around.

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Barred Butterfly fish, Bicolor Damselfish, a Doctorfish, some juvenile Grunts.

A Maze coral and a finger coral of some sort. Lumps and bumps

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One of the Butterflyfish comes to look at me. He/she turned away right after I snapped the shutter. They are not very bold fish.

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A brave Banded Coral Shrimp. Big fellow, sitting out in the open on the Massive Starlet Coral. Another shrimp in the background.

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A Graysby, a kind of small grouper, hanging around the Massive Starlet coral, maybe he likes the coral's spotted sort of surface tht matches his spots.

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One last look, and time's up for me, I must go shallower, as I have been here at this depth all the way to my "no decompression limit"

Have a great day, and see you Monday!
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.Thanks for stopping by!

Sandy things

2009-09-17T08:38:00.001-04:00

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Well, more blue pictures. I went back to see if I could find yesterday's Super Stars, but alas, no success. I did find one little fellow peeping out of a burrow, but I didn't stay nearby long enough for him to come out.
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My, my, such a big eye!

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Here 'he' is again, down in front, middle. Not the same critter as the two Garden Eels in at the top of the photo. Garden eels always come back out of their burrows as I get farther away, but this fellow didn't.
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Hey, maybe this guy is a nocturnal feeder, meaning that he doesn't come out until after dark. I've not noticed this creature before, and this dive was very late in the afternoon, the sun had just set as I got out of the water. A little mystery fish for me.
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OK, so here are some photos of the 'teasers' from yesterday's post. First is a Shortnosed Batfish.
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The book says their 'nose' gets shorter as they age. So since this fellow's nose is furry, he must be a teenager. After I took this picture, I backed off, and got down close to the sand. Then I ever so slowly approached again, taking photos all along.

The fish started ?? standing up a little bit, so this mug shot, cropped from a much larger image, is as close as I got. I didn't want to make him run away from me.
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Amazing face. Grouchy looking, but just functional. These fish will not eat if put in an aquarium, so you'll only see one diving. Or, you shouldn't see one in an aquarium.

Oh, what a face.

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Something over there moved!
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On the side of the "volcano", which is sand expelled by some sort of worm that digs around under the sand. A Biologist once told me that she was studying these worms, and that to dig the worm out of the sand is really difficult because they move so fast, and burrow away so fast that they're really hard to catch.

So what I saw might be something else, burrowing into the soft sand.

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And, yes. Just who I've been seeking, a Shamefaced Box Crab. A really big one, four or five inches, 12cm.

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I took four images, and actually lucked out, one was sort of in focus. So here's his funny little face. "Oh No!"

I just had to mess with him, there's my wrist at the bottom of the picture as I very slowly dug under the crab.

And, yes, up he jumped, and off he went. They're so funny when they're skittering along. There's the boxy body that's stiff and unmoving, with all the little legs underneath wiggling along.

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I followed slowly, he just wasn't very afraid. They're normally very shy, and burrow out of sight.

Finally I got this shot, but bleahhh!!! The camera was looking on past the crab! Besides forgetting to put the settings on underwater, I hadn't realized that I was close enough to have the camrea set on close-up.

Sigh. Underwater photography is so frustrating.

But you get the idea, right? Oh, my. I haven't applied to National Geographic Magazine yet. Maybe next year.

Thanks for stopping by! See you tomorrow!

Blue pictures!

2009-09-16T08:49:00.001-04:00

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Phooey! I forgot to set the camera on "Underwater" and so lost the colors to blue. Water looks blue for the same reason the sky looks blue, something to do with light being absorbed. I'm not going to do a science class here! OK, the deeper you dive, the less color you see, red disappearing first, then yellow.
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Back when I was teaching scuba, if there was a woman wearing red nail polish, I'd always catch her hand for a moment and show her her fingernails that looked black at sity feet deep. Eeek! And sometimes I'd have a red tank, and folks would always comment about how it looked black at depth.
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So, today I must go try to find these wonderful creatures again, wish me luck! I was in about 25 to fourty feet depth, 8 to 12 meters, or thereabouts.
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Hey! A Batfish! First one I've seen here. Doesn't even look like a fish. They spend alot of time buried in the sand, I might never see him again.

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Oboy! And what's this? Is it looking at me??

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Here comes a ray, looking for lunch.

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I am not his lunch! They make a sort of plunger with their whole body, and whumph whumph up and down, and that's how they excavate craters in the sand. Whatever is trying to hide down in the sand had better be digging for its' life!

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A Trunkfish is attracted by the action. Perhaps the ray will miss a tidbit.

The little things sticking up in the sand in the background are Garden Eels. About a foot 1/3 m, long, they live in their holes, and munch what food specks float by. They're afraid of bubbles, so I cannot show you closeup photos of them. I wonder when they ever come out of their burroughs???

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The show goes on, so to speak.
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The ray decides to check out a new location...

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A Queen Conch? There are about a dozen conchs, the seashell thing, that live in this sandy area. They are all really old, their shells are very thick.
Conchs live five to seven years, and reach sexual maturity at about three years of age. They lay egg clutches that have as many as 250,000 eggs!
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The ray seems to be looking for something, eggs? This conch isn't laying right now, but two others I found this day were.
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Here's one of the ladies doing her best to make baby conchs. Pronounced: Konk, remember.

Both conchs that were laying eggs were up against bits of dead coral. I wonder if there's any significance to that?

Just to show you, I grabbed a wandering conch and turned him up to show you how thick the 'skirt' of the shell has grown, or become with the animal laying down layer after thin layer of the pearly-pink ?? shell material. It has a name, but I can't quite think of it right now. I'll phone you at three am and tell you the word. That's when I wake up at night with the right answers! (I am joking!)

So if the ray finds and eats all the egg bundles, that means no more of these Queen Conchs. And the ray has nothing more to do than go around looking for food. If there was a 'normal' unharvested-by-humans population, there would be plenty of eggs for the ray to have some. There would be at least two hundred conchs here, probably many more.

I saw one place like this off Grand Turk Island where the shallow sand area must have been hundreds of acres, unlike this five acre, 2 hectares, place with the dozen or so animals. The old conchs like these were about three feet, 1m, apart for as far as the eye could see, or the human could swim. Thousands.

So I guess that's how populations collapse. Such a sad subject. I wish there could be a World moratorium on fishing for fifteen years! Or longer! The "Blue Planet" series on TV is making folks believe out oceans and seas are in great shape, when they are not. I stopped, quit, gave up my side of a conversation with a lot of well travelled scubadivers on a discussion group that I participate in. Of course, when they go on their one week vacation, their resort dive operation is going to show them only the very best places, not the usual, or empty reefs. Owell. Ha, and they all want to eat frsh fish for dinner! Oh, my.

I do show you the best 3% of what I see diving. You wouldn't come back otherwise. Oooo, grouchy me!

So, hopefully, I'll have some GREAT photos tomorrow for you, when I go back and find those strange boogies and have the dumb-stupid-duh camera on the righ setting! When will they integrate a depth gauge into a camera's light and color setting????

OK! Thanks for stopping by!

Diving along....

2009-09-15T08:39:00.000-04:00

What's he doing?

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Nearby, I spot two fish, a shrimp, and an anenome. The fish are Gobies, umm, the book says, hmm, maybe Bridled Gobies, as in a horse'd bridle? Because they often have a white line running from the mouth back across the gill cover. OK. Get too close and they zip away. They mostly just sit still on the sand. Here they look like a couple of taxis lined up waiting for a fare.

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A closer look at the shrimp. A Pederson Shrimp. Pretty blue, the arms, claws are to the top, and his round white eyes are under his back-turned white antennae. This photo can't show the little side-to-side swaying dance he's doing to attract a fish. This shrimp is a cleaner, meaning a fish could stop by, hold still, and the shrimp would climb onto the fish and go all over looking for parasites, fishie fleas? to eat. You can hold your hand flat, close by, and sometimes they will come clean it! And if they get in a good pinch, it can hurt! Just microscopically, but you know you've been pinched.
. The roundie-curly thing is a Corkscrew Anenome. These shrimp often live in association with an anenome, finding safety amongst the stinging arms of the Anenome.
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Ah, a sandy area. I enjoy puttering around in open sand just about as much as on a crowded coral.

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.A piece of dead Gorgonian, the bushy looking coral, that's encrusted with fire coral, and there's a sea star, starfish...

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Looking closely, the starfish is a Brittle Star. Very thin 'arms' with lots of spines. They must be very tasty, because they are usually hiding under rocks, or down in the coral formations, or sitting on stinging things like Do Not Touch Me sponges or on Fire Coral like this. They can move really fast if you drag them off onto your hand.
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On the left side of this picture, you can see the stinging hairs, or actually the polyps of the Fire Coral that are extended out of their pin-hole sized pores. It's these "hairs' that sting bare human skin like fire, sometimes an intense burning sting and a short lived rash, if you bump against them. Best to just keep to yourself, they don't have legs, they can't chase you.
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And a hole in the sand! A Sand Belly Button?? Someone's home burough probably, but alas, I am still following my leader, and cannot settle down for five minutes to observe who might come out of the hole. Owell! An unsolved mystery! One of so many in the Sea.

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Ok, have a great day! Thanks for stopping by!
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What's that??

2009-09-14T10:24:00.001-04:00

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Most dives are familiar to me, meaning that I have seen most of everything, and know most of the names of the kinds of corals and critters and fish that I see here in the Caribbean. When I was a scuba instructor, and leading visitors on dives, they would ask, "What was that?" and having the teacher element in my personality, I just had to have a correct answer, and gradually learned the names of most of everything comprising the reef community.

Oh, I learned to dive on Grand Cayman Island in 1983, and lived there for eighteen months. Took my training to Instructor in 1988 in Florida, and taught for about five years.
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I eagerly bought Paul Humann's ID books the minute they were published, in the early 1990's and studied them every day. I can usually find the right page quickly.

Anyway, going through my photos of the dive Saturday off the Carambola resort, I had hastily "shot" an Anenome that I thought was a Branching Anenome.

If I'd been diving slowly as photographers do, I may have SEEN this critter, but I was supposed to keep up with the dive guide from the Sweet Bottom Dive Shop, Tony, and my friend Jan, so had to snap and run. And more than once on this dive I had to rush to catch up. erghhh... But any picture taker will have the same whine. They were NOT going too fast, I was lagging behind.

So now I must go back in the next few days to get better images of this guy. The usual "Branching Anenomes" have pointy tentacles, with a white stripe down each bit. And, phooey, I probably have photos of one, but buried in my thousands of photos.

So, after all this noise, a photo of this odd creature:

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Now, I don't normally get excited about these guys, because I see them occasionally. They do not do anything except jump a tiny bit if you touch them, which is not a bright idea as they sting. Or they withdraw completely into the cranny they're living in. About hand size, under this 'finger' coral.

Aha, but the book says they extend their 'real' tentacles at night. Oboy! Something new for me!

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Here's a close up of the photo that cught my eye. Hummmm, looks different.

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And here's what most folks probably see. I have been trained to see, having taken college classes teaching that ability, seeing. It should be taught regularly in our schools. How many times is someone unable to describe something they saw in detail?

Having read the book "Blink", perhaps the little difference in this critter, even from a passing distance, caught my attention, making me stop to snap a couple of images, although my companions were swimming on away without me. Yoohoo!

So, how to find this little buggar again?? One good thing about how I take scenery photos, instead of that fish or that sponge. Lets see...
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Here's Tony swimming through a bit of a cut through the reef, heading deeper. I posted this photo on Facebook, complaining about no fish, and was quickly caught because there IS one fish. Can't win!!

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And then there's this big, old Fan, I'll draw a sketch of it to really burn it into my poor brain.

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A little further on, this big purple Tube Sponge caught my eye. Must be three feet, a meter, long. I wonder how old? Ten, twenty, fifty years?

I believe we leveled out and turned westward shortly after we passed by this fellow.

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OK, then this photo is #61, and the Anenome is #56, so if I see that clump of "Convoluted Barrel Sponge", Aplysinia lacunosa, greenish inside, I'll know we've gone too far. You can see the sponges down in front here.

Oh, Tony! Jan! Come back!! Slow down! Golly!

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OK, off to run errands, bank, grocery store, and ?? See you tomorrow. Thanks for stopping by!
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Most amazing!

2009-09-11T11:52:00.000-04:00

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So I went back to try to get some images of the little Jackknife fish, and there he was! In the sand, right in the middle of this photo---
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I laid carefully on the sand, and took over 100 photos of him swimming his little pattern, this way, across, back, and this way again.
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Such a cutie!! But then something most amazing happened.
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I was positioned in a bit of sand with coral on either side of me. The sea is very calm right now, so there was little problem with surge and current pushing me around. I'd been still for just a minute or two, and a small Southern Ray swam right up and sat down within two feet, less than a meter, from me, resting his 'chin' on the coral!
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Just an amazing experience! Now I'm wondering if the creature had a fish hook in his mouth, and was asking for help. This DOES happen occasionally. But I couldn't see under him, and this idea didn't occur to me until later. But then, maybe he thought I was a Big Mama Ray, laying there! We'll never know.

I slowly put my camera closer and closer, he turned a bit, but I did get quite a picture of the eye, and gill opening.

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Oh! The wonders in the sea!

Thanks for stopping by! See you Monday!
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diving

2009-09-10T09:01:00.001-04:00

Kicking out from shore, the sea is really calm today. The white reflection on the surface of the water is the from the cloud. The black thing under the water is my fin! Whoosh!

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Oh! Wonderful sunbeams! Almost doesn't look real. They're lost in water much deeper than fifteen feet, five meters.

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Ok, gee, from under the water, the sunbeams just don't show up. The photo above was taken at the surface. I am here, at six feet, two meters.

Hum, not much to see, the hurricanes have pretty much scraped everything away. Some of the storms have sent waves crashing so high that the bottom here was exposed between waves, in the troughs. Hard to image. But the water is pretty and clear today!
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Now what?? Patterns or holes??

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A Spotted Trunkfish. And not running away from me! They're usually very shy. That's a Bluehead Wrass behind him. Or her. The Bluehead is the male, and the yellow fish are female Blueheads. Once again, a kind of fish that is born all females, these yellow, and the oldest biggest strongest turns into a male, once there are too few males to go around.

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The fish was going around in circles, looking at something. I took eight photos. So glad the film days of thirty six images are over!! I missed SO many lovely pictures back then.

The Bluehead is still hanging around. Pretty fishie.

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Aha, see the little squiggldy thing on the sand that the fish is looking at? Turned out that it's one arm off a sea star, or starfish, or whatever you call those things.

That kind of sea star hides, and can move very fast, hum, looks for a reason! The fish eventually ate the thing, but I think he/she was having trouble because the bit was too long and pointy to go into his/her stomach! The pointy end could hurt! haha. As I left, the fish had sucked up the blunt end first, and was wandering around with the pointy bit hanging out of his mouth. Her mouth, whatever. I'm so thankful for knives and forks. And spoons are an engineering marvel, truly.
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End of the dive. Out of the water, one of these two guys walked by and said, "That looks a lot easier than snorkeling!"

Boy, the one is really sinking. Fat floats, so chubby people can just loll on the surface! No struggling like this guy.

And fins. Naked feet are lousy for swimming!

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Ok, pretty calm conditions again today, hooray! More photos for you. I found a little Jackknife fish that I took thirty seven blurry, out of focus images of. The CAMERA took them, my eyes were sharp and clear. I'll put the beast on close-up setting and see if I have better results.

(stupid camera!)

Photography is so impossible, I hate it but can't dive without it. Poor me!
OK, see you tomorrow! Thanks for stopping by!
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today, today

2009-09-09T10:47:00.000-04:00

Ooo, not so bright! The sun just went behind a cloud. What's that lumpy thing?

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Oh, a big sponge, maybe a yard, meter, tall and across. A tube sponge of some sort, where's my book? These guys are filter feeders, animals, you know, not a fungus or odd plant. They take in seawater through their sides, and it's expelled out of the holes, in this case the end of the tube. There are cells that have little whips that bring the water in through the sides of the tubes. There can be quite a current coming out.

Once I was on an "Underwater Poker Hunt" Where a deck of cards is cut into little pieces, and the bits are put into film cans(remember those?) The film cans are left in bags, around the reef, in places marked on a map. You find each bag, get one film can, and go to the next bag of cans, using your compass. Can't cheat! The bits of card must be dry! Best hand wins. Anyway, just for fun, a diver put a film can in a tube sponge, and it popped out! One more time, boom, popped out like a low-pressure gun. "Exo-current" holes, they're called. A goodly current coming through.
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OK, a little more color. A gold colored star coral, coral has patterns on the surface, remember. And some sponges with their holes, and some green algae, "Antler Algae"?? Where's my book! I took it another room, and it hasn't found its' way back. And some purple/red stuff, haha! My ID score is pretty low today, hey? I do sometimes get tired of being an encyclopedia.

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Hey, fish swimming away. Owell, it's tough being a Giant Bubbling Monster and trying to take photos. Lots of fish tails. And what's that orange stuff? Certainly is bright!

Both holes and patterns. Neither sponge nor coral, I'm cheating here, because I already know it's some sort of Tunicate. ?? A Tunicate is a little sea creature that siphons seawater for food. There's an 'in' hole, and an 'out' hole. (Oh no!!) Some are free swimming, and some glob together in a little family like this one. I am coming to believe they live only a year or two. Or maybe something eats them, as I don't find them year after year like corals or sponges. These guys have one 'out' hole, and lots of 'in' holes that look like speckles. Cute little guys! They're fun to find, but they just sit there, you can't play with them.

And one last thingie,

Another plant-looking critter that an animal, or rather hundreds and hundreds of tiny animals, kind of sharing the same body.

A closer view, lousy focus, but you can see the individual polyps. They grow only from the top, one at a time. This thing could be thirty years old, or more. The blue fish is a Blue Chromis, and there's a Brown Chromis, too. Pretty little fishes. They don't do much, as far as fish behavior goes, just swim around.

OK, have fun when you can, and thanks for stopping by!

Fishes

2009-09-08T10:16:00.000-04:00

There they go! Jan and Yvette.

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What's that??

Aha, a Smooth Trunkfish. They take top prize for patterns.

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He's cruising around looking for evidence of a meal.

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Found something! Puffing away, trying to uncover whatever it is. Making a mess, hey, stirring up silt.

Flattest bottom fish there is. haha

Once, back in film days, the girl in the HourPhoto was looking at my pictures as I did. "Oh!" she exclaimed, "That's my favorite fish! They're really good stuffed with rice!"
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I should go catch up with Jan and Yvette. Photographers are notoriously slow divers, always stopping to get images.

So I'll leave this little guy still busily puffing away. The action has attracted the attention of a Yellowhead Wrass. He'll hang around to see if a tidbit will come his way. Fish often hang around each other this way. Sometimes they hunt in mixed packs. Once I watched seven different kinds of fish following an eel. The eel was cruising along, poking his head in crevasses.

Ah! Thanks for stopping by! See you tomorrow!
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2009-09-07T08:01:00.000-04:00

.Oh, hey, a Basket Star! The lump at the top of this Gorgonian is a kind of Sea Star (starfish) that can climb. During the day, they try to hide, sometimes looking like this, all folded up. Then at night, they spread their multi-tendrilled, feathery arms to create a net to catch whatever food drifts through.
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This image was a surprise, I was cropping something down in front, and the little cropbox opened up on this scene. Romantic looking or something. The swishy 'limbs' that we're looking through in front are animals, Gorgonians, or sometimes called soft corals. Then the blue thing is a sponge, and a Sea Fan behind it, and some yellowish brain corals. If I paint this, I guess I'd have to put a fish in it.
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Ha, a really funny sponge. Or funny if you see faces in it. Oooooooo it says! Or anything else. Sorry, my odd sense of humor.

Ah, must run meet some girls for a dive! More photos for you tomorrow!

Thanks for stopping by!
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Fish coral and sponges

2009-09-04T08:00:00.000-04:00

Some scenery. Fire coral down in front, then a Gorgonian, then fire coral again, in a different shape, with a wine colored Rope Sponge that's shaped like a blob instead of a rope.

A little Wrass, darting by in front of that misbehaving sponge. Sponges have holes, yes.

A Bicolor Damselfish trying to stare me down, but I was brave and didn't run away, so the fish ran away. There's another sponge growing in a shape that's not according to the name, but maybe the bumps will grow up into the rope shape.

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.Lots of Wrasses zipping around. That bluish thing is a sponge. It's named (some sort of) Vase Sponge, but in shallow water, it takes a long flowing shape.

And another brownish Gorgonian down in front. This one has white polyps lined up along of the sides of its' branches.

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.Coral, coral and coral. Mustard Hill coral, Brain coral, and Bladed Fire coral. Oh, and a Bicolor Damselfish.

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.Anothet threatening Bicolor Damsel fish that has three colors. They are often arounf fire coral in the shallows for hiding places. A very abundant fishie.

This Fire Coral is shaped like fingers, the white is the growing part. Aptly named stuff, it will give you a burn that stings for several hours if you bump into it. So just don't bump into it.

A Blue Head. A Terminal Phase Blueheaded Wrass. Lucky and smart to have lived long enough to change from a female to a male, once the dominant male is gone. Odd behavior, that. But not so uncommon.

The yellow wrasses in these photos are all smaller females, his "harem"

If there are all females from birth, there are lots more eggs, and a better chance for a decent population.

The males do have to work hard herding around their females and try to keep them from running off in a different herd. As many as 30 to a herd.

And a big fish! A Red Hind. Poor guy, he's all disturbed by my Big Bubbling Monster presence, and I got this image just before he ran away. But good, he's one that they shoot for dinner.

On his cheek is a thing called an Isopod. Hitchhiking, and getting free food left over from what the fish eats. They hang on with sharp claws and must be uncomfortable. The fish might eventually scrape it off, and then it'll grab the next fish.

OK, a mild rainy day here in Paradise. The car has happy feet, the flat tire is fixed, and the storm named Erika didn't grow into a bad beastie, just getting light rain at the moment. A dive planned for tomorrow, and some more photos for you!

Thanks for stopping by!

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Stupid weather

2009-09-03T06:51:00.001-04:00

Stupid weather. This is a plot from the US Navy. The Tropical Storm Erika turned sharply and went right over Guadeloupe Island, and is still there dumping lots of rain, too much rain. And now, the purple line that's the prediction, is headed straight at ME here on St Croix. The storm is over warm water, so it'll probably be really wet here today.

Isn't Paradise great!

OK, back to fish and coral tomorrow.

Thanks for stopping by!

Flat Tire

2009-09-02T08:50:00.000-04:00

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I have a flat tire. Or, rather, my car does. ugh, have to go get it fixed quick because I have an early appointment. So just a coupla images today for you. I am dyslexic, and to get thoughts and grammar correct is very time consuming!
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See the anchor in the last image? And I'm off to take care of the phillips screw that I found in my tire. If I lived on the bus line, I wouldn't own a car!!!

Thanks for stopping by!
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O Boy!

2009-09-01T09:40:00.000-04:00

Hey, Look!

"What??"

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A single polyp type of coral. This fellow isn't very beautiful, but he's special anyway. A little beat up, a hole and a chunk of algae sitting on him. Tough life, being a polyp.

Another one, florescing! Really this bright, when you spot one while diving along.

A close up view.

This little fellow sure is surrounded by plants. Hum, my plants book isn't handy.

Scientists don't know much about florescing. Some corals just go bright. This can really be seen with a different kind of camera, infrared or something. I don't know much about it. I am a dummie lately! That's OK.

Cute little polyp.
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A close up of the Antler Algae. Or is it Antelope? Where's my book! I carry them all over the house, bad me.

Pretty plant, anyway, very tiny.

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Aha, another single polyp coral, a different kind. Pretty stripes. And all kinds of other critters and plants in this photo. Even the tip of my finger, carefully placed to try to help me hold still for the camera.

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Peeking over the edge of the coral head, or Bommie if you're Australian. Some fishes and the sand down there sloping away. This is at about sixty feet deep, 20m, looking down at 100, 30.

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And what? Always look up! Occasionally, anyway. A Barracuda (fish) can just barely be seen going on by, wayyyy over my head.

OK, gotta run! Thanks for stopping by!

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How about photography?

2009-08-31T09:16:00.000-04:00

The top photo is straight up land camera setting. The next photo is an automatic computer enhanced image of the same photo, the "Quick Fix" decided on the colors

You sure get different things out of a camera, and a computer. This one, without the blue background, is after I changed the setting on the camera, there underwater while I was still in front of the sponge, to "Snorkel" something like fifteen feet depth compensated-for-blue.
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This is a fairly recent innovation in cameras because so many people are taking underwater images. The best is to set the color translation before every photo, but I'd never get any pictures taken if I had to do that!
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This is a "Do Not Touch Me" sponge, has irritating spicules in the structure that can give you a nasty rash that burns, but only if you bang into the sponge, or like one ignoramus did, took a roundish one out of the sea and played football on the beach with it. BIG mistake!
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Up close, you can see some little curls and funny things, Brittle Stars, a kind of starfish that's really skinny and spiny, but does not sting. They obviously can live on this sponge happily for a long time, see the indentation in the middle where the starfish is deep into the surface of the sponge! I don't know anything about this symbiosis.

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And a fish picture. These are Hardtailed Jacks that turned away from me just as I turned toward them to take their picture. Silly fish, I wish they could recognize me as being a photographer, and not a predator. They kept swimming back and forth behind me. Some say they're fascinated by a diver's bubbles.
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And the bushy looking thing is a soft coral, a Gorgonian, being blown sideways in the current.

OK! all for this day! Thanks for stopping by!
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Hello! Guess I'll do a post---

2009-08-28T11:25:00.001-04:00

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The camera seemed to behave yesterday. Let's see what I saw.
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Oh, no, a class. I'd better take off fast and go the other way. I used to teach, and was always taking groups of students that I had to closely monitor. And "Resort Courses" Up to six people who didn't know anything about diving. You can take a Resort Course, and after a minimum of instruction, and I mean minimum, go right out to 30 feet, 9m on a real dive. Sometimes people would be jet lagged and hungover, sigh. But, if it wasn't a very safe thing to do, it wouldn't be offered. Hundreds of people I took diving this way all came back with me with zero problems.
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Ah, a barrel Sponge. What's around it, besides the Southern Green Ray swimming on by?

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OK, a gray Gorgonian, hard to tell apart the different kinds. And a yellowish Butterprint coral, and some "Erect Rope" sponges, the wine colored thingies. And the little bunch of sticks? Oh, there are two Arrow Crabs. Oh, the orange stuff is sponge of some sort.

A closer look at one of the crabs. I really did think the first one I ever saw was a bunch of sticks, then it moved! They mostly hold still, but if frightened, they can dart away. And sponges have holes in them.

Cropped and up close, the crab. The face and body(He's facing sideways to us) is on the bottom of the long spike, the striped part. The spike is actually his snout. And blue claws. Yes, they can pinch! Even make small cut in your finger. Hum, how would I know that??
They put extra food on top of their heads sometimes, the spike. The reddish fluff there is cyano bacteria, resembles algae. It grows in hot water, hot is one or two degrees fahrenheit too 'hot', and it's getting hot this summer. Some corals are starting to bleach from the heat, booo.
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Back on the beach, kids playing with a surfboard. One guy would get on, maybe stand up and wobble there for a second or two, before the others jiggled the board and made him fall. They were funny to watch.

Ah, is nice to be posting. Nice to have my camera working, (don't quit again!!) And no, I haven't gotten the new computer yet. OK, have a great day! Thanks for stopping by!

Hello!

2009-08-22T16:30:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the break in posting photos for you. My computer's hard drive is about to crash. Sometimes when I click something, the whole machine starts vibrating frighteningly. So, Monday it is to buy a Mac, I guess!

Have faith, I'll be back!

Melissa

Snorkeling----

2009-08-18T09:14:00.000-04:00

Ah, underwater! Where are we?? Shallow because the top of the sea is so close. I love these photos that have the surface, and reflections of the bottom.
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Peeking above, I snap a picture of the rocky shore.
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Hmm, looks spooky! I wonder what's there...
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Fishies hanging out in the shade, nice and cool in the noonday sunshine. I didn't go any closer because I could see them becoming nervous and beginning to think about swimming away. OK, fellas, I'm not going to bug you!

Like I said in another post, if you turn your face up, you can feel the heat of the sun. I presume it penetrates as deeply as the light, gradually fading as the deeper and deeper water absorbs.
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One look back, and off to open water! All of four feet deep, a little over a meter.
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One Brain Coral has made it through the smashing waves of hurricanes. Have LOTS of babies, old boy! Or are you a girl? Or both? I have more to learn.
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A little fish!
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And a better photo, a juvenile French Angel fish. The bright yellow stripes will fade with age to a black with yellow edges to each scale, a speckled effect. The French Angels have rounded tails, and the very similar Gray Angels have straight edged tails. Not many Grays here in St Croix's waters.

Sad news. My old, old computer, five years old, is not much longer to function. Sometimes when it goes to Desktop, the hard drive vibrates terribly. During the work on this post, it started really fussing, and so loudly that I could hear it. And if you knew me, and how hard of hearing I am, you'd be impressed. So, dear readers, I must take a few days' break, to buy a new computer. Groan, always a trauma, hey?

"Soon Come" Thanks for stopping by!
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Company

2009-08-17T11:22:00.000-04:00

Visitors keeping me busy!
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A bit of a snorkel on the western side of St Croix, more later! I must dig through 268 photos. Oooof!

And a Tropical Depression named Ana just went by, dropped one whole inch of rain at my house. She might be headed to Florida in a few days. The himmacane named Bill is headed toward Bermuda, going to miss the Caribbean.

Thanks for stopping by!
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Friday!!

2009-08-14T07:00:00.001-04:00

Let's just wander around the shallow reef today. That pale yellowish stuff that looks like spilled pudding is a colony of something I haven't discussed, Zoanthids. zo an thid More strange little critters!

Blue sponges, yellow-brown corals, and a soft coral leaning away, a Gorgonian.

A happy Barrel sponge, all crowded with other critters. And a shy Parrotfish running away from me. Silly fish.

There! In the sky! it's. it's ...a squid. But not the sky, just up. Once I was puttering around on a dive, and saw two divers in the distance approaching. I was in a big sandy area, and I ascended to about twenty feet over the sand. The two people were looking at everything around, but not up. They swam right below me, not seeing me at all. Teehee.

I learned to look up when some people asked me if I'd seen the whale. "Whale?" I had just gotten out of the water, and was taking off my gear.

"Yes! He went along right at the edge about twenty minutes ago!"

I'd been right under a whale and didn't know, because I didn't look up. But I probably would have killed myself trying to go say hello. sigh.

Bladed Fire coral, so pretty. One of these days it'll be very calm, no waves coming in, no surge pushing me around, and I'll be able to get some close photos. This coral is so brittle, and breaks easily, stinging at the same time. Little fish like to hide in its' shelter. Not whales.

Sponges swooping and swirling around. Oops, no, this just an impression, they don't move.

More sponges, standing over some Mustard Hill coral. Hum, and see the bits of red? Preditory Boring Sponges. Oh, my. I'll talk about them one of these days.

This is your brain on coral!

(That ad sure did infiltrate American talk, hey?)

Thanks for stopping by!

Fishie Thursday

2009-08-13T12:29:00.000-04:00

Oh, no, not another Squirrelfish! I have to look at these guys on every dive, so you need to see them, too. Dark eyes from staying up all night.
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A Stoplight Parrotfish. They have a most strange habit of changing from female to male if they live long enough. All the eggs hatch as females. The girls sometimes school, with one male 'guarding' them from other males.
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Oh, this is the "Initial Phase" color. When the fish is old enough to do the presto chango, they change color, also. They used to be called "Super Males" but the name was changed a few years ago to "Terminal Phase" haha.
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No, I didn't have anything to do with the name change. The Stoplight really is underappreciated, I think with the dramatic tail, and the rest of the rainbow colors it's one of the prettiest fish on the reef.
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This gorgeous turquoise blue guy is a Striped Parrotfish. The Initial Phase color is brown and white striped. So is a Princess Parrotfish. Hum, didn't do something right, here's the Princess Parrotfish below, jammed against the next photo. Will I ever get the hang of this posting??
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Let's have a yellow here, a French Grunt! They make grunting noises if caught by a human(not me!) and taken out of the water. I do not know why they are French.
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A little Sharpnose Pufferfish, down in front.
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And the face of a Parrot, saying 'oh dear', just before she turns and runs away.

And away I run! Sorry to be so late today, had a hectic morning.

Thanks for stopping by!
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Wednesday---

2009-08-12T10:35:00.000-04:00

Oof. Overloaded today, only one photo for you today, a lovely Eagle Ray gliding by.

More tomorrow, have a great day.

Thanks for stopping by!
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Tuesday Tuesday

2009-08-11T08:47:00.000-04:00

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One of my favorite formations, an overhang. This one is about seven feet, 2m, out there, suspended. There are usually lots of fish hanging out in the shade.
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Once I noticed this habit of their's, staying under things, and I turned my face upward and held still for a moment. You can easily feel the heat of sunshine on your face! I was amazed. Although the deeper you go, the more sunlight, and heat, are absorbed by the water.
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A Black Durgon. They are shy for me, and difficult to photograph closely. They have marvelous patterns of colors that can be seen only close-up. They swim by waving the two fins that run along their back and belly. They steer with their tail and pectoral, side, fins.

A Stoplight Parrotfish. They swim by sculling their pectoral fins, and steer with their tails.
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More pretty scenery. I love the sunlight dancing on the sand. The Sea must be very calm for this to be.
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Someone named this coral Mountainous Star coral.
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And this is called Yellow Pencil Coral, but this is my old camera's photo that is too blue.
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A magnificent Barrel Sponge, towering over the neighborhood. The little fish is a Sargeant Major. First fish name I ever learned. They swim by just swimming like a fish. (??)

Funny, yesterday I googled images for a Shamefaced Box Crab, and it's the first time Google has let me down. Only someone feeding their eel in an aquarium. No box crabs! I'm on a hunt now!

OK, have a great day, and I'm going right now to the Post Office to find out if my stinking camera has come back from Mr. Fixit yet!!

Thanks for stopping by!

Monday Monday

2009-08-10T08:18:00.000-04:00

Watch out for this fish! He'll bite you! A Damsel fish, hmm, where's the book? There are the Longfin, Dusky, Threespot, Cocoa, Beaugregory, Bicolor, Yellowtail, Night Sargeant, and Sargeant Major. Whew, see what books do for you? I'm guessing this guy is a Threespot, because of the yellow 'eyebrow'.
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They are very territorial, growing and tending a garden about a meter/yard square. See the fuzzy stuff behind the fish? It's full of little thingies that the Damselfish eats. Get too close, and the fish goes nuts trying to chase you away, charging right up to you menacingly. Then rushing away to prepare for the next valiant charge. And they will eventually bite, but it's just an tiny pinch to the Giant Bubbling Monster(me).
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All divers agree that if these fish, smaller than the size of your palm, were a foot long, we wouldn't be able to get in the sea.
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Another danger! A "Do Not Touch Me" Sponge. You'll get a burn, stinging itchy rash that lasts a day. OK, just stay away. But, if you're following a diver that gets too close, and their fin hits the sponge, they'll be OK, but the sponge will release tiny-to-invisible bits into the sea, and if you swim through the cloud. you'll be stung. Wowee! Dangerous Sea! (I'm trying to be silly here...).

Coral colors, a pale gold Meandrina or Maze Coral. Purplish blue Rope Sponges, and some burgundy colored ones, and one little feather worm.
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Lovely rich brown Boulder Brain coral, with two attending rope sponges. This coral can have green grooves, or the whole beastie can be green, or gold, or other duller colors.
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Anothe Maze Coral, with white polyp's tentacles extended, feeding during the day. Makes the coral look metallic, silvery gold. A Bicolor Damsel fish lurks in the shade. Sometimes Bicolor Damsels have three colors. ??
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Some deep scenery, sponges and wire coral. And a few bits of plate coral.

I had a terrible dive yesterday, with a dear friend, her Great niece and the niece's instructor. I saw two Shamefaced Box Crabs, one wasn't afraid, was just tottering around on the surface of the sand, while the other one dived in and disappeared under the surface. And then there was a Furry Sea Cucumber, and then, a PURPLE Scorpionfish resting on a YELLOW mound of finger coral!!! And I didn't have my camera!! Terrible dive!

Ha.

Thanks for stopping by! (Silly camera better come in the mail today!!!!!!)
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Let's go deep again--blue pictures

2009-08-08T09:19:00.000-04:00

A Feather Worm, and a tiny fish, on top of a Grooved Brain Coral. If the photo wasn't in natural light, with a flash, the worm would be a deep wine purple, the coral gold and green, and the fish a pale metalic orange.
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Seen from a little distance, the coral is right in the middle. I named this one Featherhat because the coral is about the size of a hat. This place is fairly deep, for scuba anyway, 110feet, 34 meters. There is a long sandy slope, and a sort of curve along a little vertical drop off that's maybe twenty feet high, before the slope continues down to the depths so close to St Croix. At that depth, a diver has sixteen minutes of 'no decompresion' time, a straight ascent to the surface, nice and easy, should result in not getting 'bent', the injury from staying too long, too deep.

Sixteen minutes. Such a brief stay!
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Featherhat. I haven't been to visit for a while, maybe two years. I hope these guys are still there.

A neighbor, a big Purple Tube Sponge about 39 inches tall, one meter. I bet this colony is fifty years old! At least. Remember, it's a slow growing animal, not a landweed.

I would like to know a marine biologist who is a sponge specialist, I have so many questions.

A little plate coral.

Along the edge it's easy to see the polyps budding new little polyps. The parents seem to be dancing along, holding the young ones' hands. And they actually are, in a way. All the polyps are just a thin rug of living tissue spread across the surfac of their skeleton, the white stony part of coral that is seen in stores for sale.

Wouldn't it be fun to see a time-lapse movie of these fellows growing bigger! No, I don't even have a camera that could do such a thing. It'd take at least six months, or a year's time to see much movement!

Ah, to go see if my camera's come back from Mr. Fixit, boohoo I miss it so much. I feel like I've lost half of my eyesight.

Thanks for stopping by, and see you Monday!
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More anchors!

2009-08-07T14:29:00.000-04:00

An anchor hosting some nice sheet corals
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Another anchor just kind of sitting there.
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An anchor lolling in the sand.
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A bit of sheet coral. Lovely how they curl around into spirals sometimes.
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Shallow scenery, A Sea Fan down in front, Fire Coral, Gorgonian.

Hmm, I'm rather tired from all the digging this morning, planting trees along a 'gut', Danish word for a sort of drainage area or dry creek. After I did that, I stopped by the beach and planted a baby coconut tree.

OK, have a great weekend! Not sure if I'll post tomorrow, maybe if I come across some inspiring photos. Camera still at Mr. Fixit's! Arghhh.

Thanks for stopping by!
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Eeek!

2009-08-07T07:50:00.002-04:00

Running late, or rather on Island Time this morning. Am going with a group to plant trees along a new trail. Today's post will be later, early afternoon.

So sorry! See you in a few hours!

Of Rust

2009-08-06T09:08:00.001-04:00

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I read a very funny-sad article about a cannon ball a fellow found in the mud while diving near a battle site from the Civil War in the Chesapeake Bay, on the east coast of the USA. The fellow was SO proud of his find! He put it on a special shelf in his living room, so he could admire his own genuine Civil War Relic. But before long, the ball started rusting. Well, what's a little rust?
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Then he noticed the cannon ball was REALLY rusting, pieces and chunks were chipping off. The man became alarmed, and put the ball in a bucket of water. Maybe this would soak off the salt that must be on the ball from being in the salty water of the bay for so long. After a week, he gently put the ball back on its' shelf.
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The ball still rusted, more and more bits falling off. The ball was actually becoming noticeably smaller. The man made sure the ball was completely dry, and he varnished it. Nope, still rusting and more chips falling off. By this time the ball was only 3/4 the original size.
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As time went by, he tried other things, I forget what, but to no avail. More rusting. Less ball.
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To his great dismay, his cannon ball was just disappearing into a little heap of rust! It had rusted away to the size of a large marble(!) surrounded by a thick bed of rusty chunks, by the time he finally learned that to preserve the cannonball, he would have had to place it in a solution of chemicals, and run an electric current through the bath for months in order to stabilize the changed metal.
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I've seen anchors here taken from the sea and put beside someone's driveway, or on the Boardwalk in town. They rust and rust, until there's simply nothing left. After Hurricane Hugo, there was a pile of seven anchors in one place in Cane Bay. Wow! Selfish individuals took them, one by one, and now there is only one left in that place.
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Christopher Columbus did stop here on his first voyage. He recorded a large island south of the 'Thousand Virgins" that he'd first found. Approaching from the north, he had no way of knowing that the island is long but narrow. He found the entrance of a bay, and thought it could be the mouth of a river. He anchored and went ashore, and was met by fierce Caribe warriors. There was a battle, and one of Columbus' men was killed. The ONE place in the Caribbean where the locals fought back.
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Sailing away, Columbus named the bay Salt River, because he didn't get any fresh water. One anchor in this bay that people know about is embedded in coral in very shallow water, might be his, might not. Another is the one I found in deep water, pictured in yesterday's blog post. might be his, might not. They didn't engrave names in anchors back then. Still don't. as far as I know. Shipwreck people always search for the bell, for that had the name engraved, to positively identify a sunken ship.
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A fellow came a few years ago and was telling everyone that he was going to raise the Columbus Anchor for all the world to see and admire. The Park people said, "Oh, no, you're not!" and that was that.
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So, per your comment yesterday, Barracuda Bill, the anchor stays where it is. Is it worthless there? Could it make someone a millionaire of brought to shore? I don't know, but doubt. Most folk don't really appreciate anchors. the way you and I do.
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Here are some photos of --my anchors-- to complete my post for today.
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So how can I say they're MINE? They are, just like the anchors that have been taken away, and graced somebody's driveway for a short while, were called 'mine' by the people who took them. But the anchors really were mine, and they didn't ask me if they could take them. And the fishermen don't ask me if they can kill my fish.
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Actually, all of St. Croix is mine. And all of the whole Earth is mine. All of it, the whole thing! Hey?
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Thanks for stopping by!
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90 feet deep

2009-08-05T07:28:00.000-04:00

This is some scenery along the Salt River Canyon.

Not quite this dark and spooky, once again, a camera doesn't have eyes. There's my dive buddy looking back at me. It's called "Same Ocean, Same Day" dive buddy. People with cameras always go so slow.

More scenery.

A little pinnacle. My buddy is still within sight, that's good. The string thing is 'Wire Coral'. I found several lobsters and critters that the group didn't see, because they were rushing along trying to see it all. No way to get their attention! You cannot effectively whistle underwater.

Long ago, a sailing ship lost an anchor.

This anchor probably weighs 500 pounds or more, that's well more than 200 kilos. I bet there was much hollering and yeowling on board when an anchor became stuck and irretrievable! Probably took all hands to pull up one of these things.

That's a Trumpet fish, the long skinny critter above the anchor.

Ah, have a great day, and thanks for stopping by!

today's photos

2009-08-04T10:55:00.001-04:00

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Sure wish my camera would get back from Mr. Fixit.
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On shore is Off the Wall, a place where I eat lunch sometimes.
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This is from a snorkel on a verrrrryyy calm day. You can see a yellowish coral in the middle of this picture.
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An Elkhorn Coral, majestic!

Fishies swim by...

A Brain coral and a Sea Fan. The Fan is shaped by having to scrape by the coral in surge.

Close up of the Fan's shape, all the growing tips.

Another Brain coral, with fishie friends

Goat fish babies. They enjoy a home near a crevas.
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And one of the more strange fish, a White Spotted Filefish. They have to be in some sort of mood to have the white polka dots appear all over them. I think they need to be happy and calm, not looked at by a Giant Floating(snorkeling) Monster with one big black eye on the end of it's tentacles(my camera in my hands)

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Thanks for stopping by!
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Some of the reef---

2009-08-03T08:57:00.000-04:00

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Monday already. Well.
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Reef scenery. The camera once again cannot see the bright yellow and turquoise of the Queen Angel fish that's rushing away. They are very shy fish, difficult to photograph.

Where's my book? hmm, oh, here, a 'Spiny Flower Coral'. Each polyp is huge, the size of the palm of your hand.

Another one, this image is from the bleaching in 2005. I tried to get the color right, but owell. They're quite snow white.

But they did recover. I really like this kind of coral, so huge. Lovely subtle colors.

Another fish, a Fairy Basslet. They orient themselves to the surface under them as they go about th reef. If they're up under an overhang, they're upside down, to us human's way of thinking.

A size reference of a Fairy Basslet, tiny! That's a rope sponge. And I've always wanted eyes that see as well as a microscope to look closely at the fuzzy stuff. There must be lots of interesting little critters in all that mix.

I'm going to email the man who's fixing my camera. I don't want to bug him, but I need that camera! Grrr.

OK, enjoy the day, and,

Thanks for stopping by!

A little Mystery

2009-08-01T08:07:00.001-04:00

Ah, my pretty corals. Let's see, Stars, Brains, and some fluffy little plants down in front. There's a hole, must be a sponge. Don't you love how some of the corals look like Elf's hats?

OK, a different format here, writing in the middle. On the left is the original photo, in this case a cropped bit of the picture above. A wee tuft of algae is on top of the brain coral.

I have a terrible option called 'quick fix' Makes sometimes drastic changes in photos, an automatic balancing of colors, I guess. So here is the 'quick fix' on the right, the algae pops out glowing red. This is called fluorescence, or fluorescing. The Scientists don't really understand it, but they caught enough jellyfish in a small bay up north someplace that they refined out the whatever that makes the glowing colors, and now the medical community has colors to use for blood testing and other things.

Here are fixes of corals that are fluorescing. Again, no one understands this. That I've found, anyway. Sometimes it's a reaction to stress, water too hot, or maybe a sponge attack (??) At home, my sponges just sit there under the sink unless I'm abusing them, and even then they don't change color...

But corals sometimes glow, and it really shows up in photos.

. This little flat guy showed up to my eyes while diving as brightly as the fixed photo on the right. A Sinuous Cactus Coral.

And here's my very first photo that showed me this fluorescence. I was casually fixing some images after a dive, and ...

BANG!

I was SO surprised. I'd never seen anything like this. That coral is really out there glowing. Since this is a boat dive location, I have been unable to revisit this fellow since then to take a series of photos over time. Boooo.

Oh, there are boat dives and shore dives. Should be self explanitory. Much diving is done on reefs that are inaccessable except from a boat. Shore dives are precious because you can hang out on the beach and dive at your leisure, just a swim away from the reef. Because I own all my gear, I can do a shore dive for the cost of filling my tank, five US dollars. The cost of a boat dive for locals is around fifty dollars. To buy my own boat for diving would be thousands and thousands of dollars, so a boat dive for fifty is a bargain.

Ok, enough for today. I don't want to bore you!

Thanks for stopping by!
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OK, here we go...

2009-07-31T08:38:00.000-04:00

Mr. Barracuda swims on by. I guess I just didn't look very interesting. Kind of murky right here. Maybe it'll be more clear on out deeper.

Yes, much more clear. The silty water comes around in blobs sometimes. I think this is about eighty to 90 feet of vis-- visability.

The fish with stripes is a young Parrotfish, munching on the coral and algae. You can actually hear them crunching.

Ah, coral polyps up close. Can you see their mouths?

So beautiful! And can you count how many polyps on this coral, Gorgonian? Quite a few, hum.

Wheee, an Eliptical Star Coral.

All the little polyps.

A peek at shore, time to go back to being stuck to the floor, and stuck to chairs and stuck to seats. I do so prefer to be floating around weightlessly. Especially when I want to pick a mango high up in the tree. I can't just go up there and pick it. Gravity has me well stuck to the bottoms of my feet on the ground. When you're diving, you balance buoyancy/floating with gravity, so you're free to just go.

One last look, some Urchins and some Fire Coral. The sunlight flickering over the sea floor.

OK, have a great day!

Thanks for stopping by!

Another one of those miscellaneous kind of days.

2009-07-30T07:40:00.000-04:00

Little fishes swimming around in Bladed Fire Coral. Pretty coral. Quick fish.

A Brain Coral that looks like some kind of thing that should be crawling along. Or maybe blown, see the Gorgonian blowing in the breeze?

Hmm, a mix of pretty creatures

Another mix of creatures

Blue photo, must be a little deeper water, and no flash.

A sunny day. Black Durgons flitting about, eating whatever little things they find in the sea

The next frame, I guess to do a painting of this I'd combine the two images...

Ooo, and a deep scene, late in the afternoon.

Things to do, people to see. I sure hope my camera get back from the Fixit guy soon. I am not compelled to go to the trouble of fiddling with gear and whatnot to go for a dive without my camera.

Thanks for stopping by!

Pieface!

2009-07-29T08:35:00.000-04:00

Let's go visit Pieface!
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In 2005, the sea became warmer,and warmer until the corals stressed, in an event called bleaching. Coral polyps live with microscopic plants called zooxanthellae (Zoox, for ease) within there bodies. Without the plants, polyps are as clear as glass, and their bones, what we call coral, are snow white.
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So the living corals on all reefs are the colors of these plants. They can be green, brown, golden, and in many shades and combinations of these colors. If the sea becomes only one or two degrees too hot, the algae dies, and the polyps spit out the ?? compost, and the coral then is a snowy white color. Bleached.
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Since the corals depend on the plants for food and oxygen, without them, the corals gradually become weak and starved. Sometimes if the sea cools quickly enough in the fall, the corals can adopt(eat) more algae and live. But it's a rough trip. In the year 2005, there was a terrible bleaching event here in the Caribbean, and over 60% of our corals died. Colonies that were here and thriving before Columbus arrived died. Whole areas were devastated. There are some places that I still refuse to go.
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I was diving a lot that summer, and photographing more than 100 individuals, and filing the photos. It was really depressing to watch helplessly as this happened. To do my self-imposed work, to sort the corals, I named them, Andy, Rosie, Petunia, Pieface. Petunia is still living, as is Pieface.
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Pieface is in a very easily recognized place, just at the side of the channel that is straight out from the boat ramp in Cane Bay, where you usually turn left to go along the reef. You turn left, they turn left, not me, I turn right.
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Here's a Bleached photo of the place, and Pieface is the round coral at the right. This is about 90 feet deep, 30m.
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Ah, blue pictures! The living, bleached corals here are light blue, instead of white, because of the sunlight filtering down through the blue sea, and my camera back then that couldn't balance the blue to white. The darker stuff is all dead substrate, but used to be living.
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A truly healthy reef has no dead space, it's all life crowded together pushing against and crawing over itself. I've seen that, amazing. Like the black and white pen and ink drawing at the top of this blog. I doubt the Caribbean has any reef like that anymore. That drawing is from Grand Cayman island, 25 years ago.
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So here is some of my series of Pieface that terrible summer, when the sea all the way to recreational diving depth of 130 feet, 40m, warmed four degrees over the limit for Zooxanthellae life, 86f, 30c
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Pieface survived.

Pieface, first portrait.
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Beginning to bleach, losing Zoox.

October, American dates with the month first. Pieface is mostly bleached. There is some color around the edges. Perhaps this is how Pieface survived. All of the coral shares food eaten and produced by individual polyps.

The sea begins to cool in November, and the Zoox spreads Perhaps the spots in the middle are new algaes that the coral has adopted. I believe that, but don't know for sure.

And the blue color, once again, should be snowy white, but my camera couldn't see like a human.

The end of November, and Pieface is doing well.

And here's Pieface about a month ago, 06/23/09. Gorgeous color, and ouch, a hole in his left side. A little silt to deal with.

Here's Petunia!

Not the greatest photo, but I'll get better, someday, with my photography!

OK, have a great day! Thanks for stopping by!

Diving sights--

2009-07-28T10:19:00.000-04:00

Here they come!

There they go!

Sheesh, I can't get this to work today. I hit 'large' and it goes bigger, then jumps back to 'medium' size. Owell!!!

I named this little coral head "Bad Hair"

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Almaco Jack swims by...

And why couldn't these two guys have settled as the original tiny polyp just a little further apart? Now it's elbow in the face forever.

Open sand, that's seen settled weather for a while. Wonder what does all that digging? And what's living in the sand that the diggers seek to eat? Hmmm.

Some color for you. A Christmas Tree worm, living on a pretty Star Coral.

One last look at some scenery.

OK, have fun when you can.

Thanks for stopping by!

Play play play

2009-07-27T07:48:00.000-04:00

I dearly love Octopus! Long ago, someone taught me how to play with them, it takes patience. Remember the Queen Conch shells out in the sand? And how someone had killed some of them? Well, an empty shell can be shelter for many different creatures. There were, in an older post here, the pretty Banded Coral Shrimp, and the Giant Hermit crab.

As I was looking at this shell, I noticed something--- The sand seemed to be disturbed at the front, to the left in the photo.
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An eye! A little Octopus was inside the shell, peeking out around the corner at the Big Bubbling Monster (me).

Funny little Octopus! How I love Octopus! I'll play with him.

I settle in the sand, nothing to hurt, I checked, and extended my finger, ever so slowly, and started doing little digging wiggles. Octopus watches, fascinated.

I dig and dig, Octopus watches, jiggling around a little, huffing and puffing, trying to figure out what this wiggldy thing is in front of him.

I keep digging and digging, adding a pinching motion, getting a little bit closer. Octopus leans out of his shell.

POP!! Out he comes in an instant!

Yipes! I was expecting an tentacle, not the whole Beastie! I jumped back, even though I have no fear. I absolutely cannot play with an octopus without reacting like this, eeek! Happens every time.

Octopus jumps back into the safety of his protective Conch shell. His tentacle defensively up in front. My hand is GONE, hahaha.

But I extend my hand again, in friendship. He grasps me, his sucker cups pulling on my fingers. I sat with him this way for just a moment, then pulled away and then left.

I could have continued, and he would have come back out of the shell, and quickly run all over me, exploring. I may have done that, stayed to play, but the current was just strong enough to be a real hassle, and I had the rest of my dive to do.

See how darkly the coloring is round his eye? If you look back, you'll see that the color was very pale at first. Then as Octopus became more excited, he turned dark brown.

They have color cells in their skin that can change in an instant. Not a second, but instantly. Amazing to see. The cells are shaped like little umbrellas, and the emotions of the Octopus control the color. When an Octopus goes red, he's angry, and I'll leave him alone! They can be pale blue, sandy white. Brown seems to be their hunting color.

I'd love to take videos of these things, but the lowest price for an underwater video set-up is through the roof, and off to outer space after that. One of those, 'when I win the Lottery' kind of purchases. Boo, and Owell!

OK, off to my day. For you, I wish enough!

Thanks for stopping by!

Polyps and a spade

2009-07-25T08:18:00.000-04:00

Pretty polyps. I haven't seen any others with the white daisy petal-like markings. I don't know why they look like this. Actually the skeleton within the flesh.

More pretty polyps. Ha, looking like the people you see in the photographs of Japanese folks crowding into a subway car during rush hour. One woman commented they look like olives to her. Hmm, there's a baby buddung, sort of bottom right. That's how coral grows.

More coral, more polyps of different form.

Soft coral, Gorgonian polyps.

Oh, look! Over there...

A Spadefish Oh, an Atlantic Spadefish. Common in the Bahamas, and Florida coast. Usually in schools. Hmm, only one.

I'm not going to bug this fellow.

OK, things to do, places to go. You have a successful day.

Thanks for stoppng by!

Miscellaneous, again

2009-07-24T09:22:00.000-04:00

Funny how, if you have a digital camera, and take hundreds of photos at a time, and accumulate thousands of photos, you always want new, fresh photos. Am I the only one?
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Mr. Squirrelfish. If I'd used a flash, there would be no natural shadow under the fish. Or light on the outside of his pectoral fin, or on top of his tail(caudal fin).

He displays his other side, and a better shadow, as he prepres to dart away. An "action shot"?

Note the yellowish dorsal spines. The Longspine Squirrelfish is distinguised by white markings on each spine. Details, details.

Longspine Squirrelfish for your viewing pleasure. Taken with a flash, spot in his eye. Wierd flash shadow behind, but I don't use strobes on arms, which make strobe shadows. These fish aren't always this red, changing with time of day, and environment. Sometimes very pale when over sand.

Scenery with sponge and fish.

Scenery with sponge and sponge.

Scenery with Gorgonians of a different kind.

Scenery with my favorite Gorgonian of all the Gorgonians. Hum, blue picture.

Funny Barrel Sponge, triangle shape, and full of Fire Coral. Perhaps it's grown up amongst this Fire coral, hence the ?? mouthfull of Fire coral. Ooo, that would hurt!

Sponges are tough mean guys, rather poisonous. So, not a wimp who will avoid Fire Coral. Like me, I am a wimp! I avoid Fire Coral because it's well named. You KNOW when you've bumped into it. But the burning sensation usually goes away in a few minutes. And you shouldn't bump into anything, anyway.

Another Barrel Sponge, peeping out from under some -- where's my book?--- Some Siderastrea sidera also named Massive Starlet Coral. This kind of coral turns blue with stress. And it's looking like a stress summer, the water's too warm, and I've already seen a bit of bleaching, ugh.

Have a great day, the moon is new, that nasty eclipse is over with, lots of car wrecks here then, and we can get on with Life.

I just might go someplace for the next Total Eclipse, I want to experience one. "They say" it's really grand, seeing the Moon inside the Corona. and the stars come out, and it's like a 360 degree sunset around the horizon. I think it's in June next year, the path of totality crossing the South Pacific. Hmm, a long trip, and I don't enjoy flying.

Thanks for stopping by!

Water

2009-07-23T08:26:00.000-04:00

Sometimes the sea is clearest blue, "Wyland" blue. There's a man named Bill Wyland who paints blue blue pictures of the whales and things in the ocean.

Sometimes the water is full of sunbeams.

And sometimes there are humans.

A little deeper, the Seargent Majors live.

And the Black Durgons, and little silver fish.

The Little Silver Fish swim too fast, sometimes, for a name to catch up with them.

Sometimes they look up.

And they all rush to the surface. Much too fast for me to follow. How do they all know to turn away from their feeding, and swim off as one, together, never bumping into each other?

The surface, and the air and stark sunshine above must be amazing and frightening to them. Sometimes calm, sometimes horrible with turbulence.

The little turtle goes to the surface for a breath of air. Such a difference, the air and the water.

Thanks for stopping by. See you tomorrow.

Today's Fish

2009-07-22T08:15:00.001-04:00

Occasionally I loose word-steam. Just photos today!

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A huge Dog Snapper.
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Anemone

Princess Parrotfish

Juvenile French Angel, Salt River beach.

Red Hind, similar Rock Hind. They're so easy to shoot, they are curious and friendly.

Juvenile Permits, Cane Bay right by the boat ramp

Barred Butterflies. They often travel in pairs.

Goatfish and Wrasses, Cane Bay

OK, now off with me to await the return of my camera.

Thanks for stopping by!

Sorry about that.

2009-07-21T21:56:00.002-04:00

Maybe the eclipse. Maybe the nasty weather. I feel like I've been powdered with fiberglass dust and dipped in honey. I can't go diving because my camera's off being fixed. Dive without my eyes?

Some coral photos.

Better posts on the way!

Thanks for stopping by!

Some scenery

2009-07-20T08:34:00.003-04:00

I am still struggling to learn how to run this blog machinery!

Anyway, just some dim scenery today.

Whee, which of these scenes shall I paint!? I know, I need to paint all of them! And if I see a lobster, I take multiple photos from as many angles as I can. I haven't seen one in my last fifteen or twenty dives, in over a month now.

The fans are leaning over in the surge. Waves on the surface cause the whole sea to swish back and forth. Bigger waves, more swish. Corals and sponges that aren't tightly attached come loose, and on an incoming tide, wash up on the beach. That's how hurricanes do so much damage. in one storm, I lost my favorite Orange Elephant Ear Sponge that was at 110 feet deep, 30m. Torn right off and gone to the Deep. Hum, now I'll have to go photograph one of these guys for you...

My Big Sponge, a Giant Barrel Sponge, in shallower water, 25 feet, eight meters. I'll have to go find my file on this guy. I have many photos over the years of him. And, wow! A fish! Fancy that!

Oh, dear, just burnt my breakfast all to -- black while writing this. When will I learn?

OK, see you tomorrow.

Thanks for stopping by!

I've been thinking about that Giant Hermit Crab, he just might be feasting on the Conch eggs. I think I'll go move him. There's plenty for him to eat elsewhere. But he might just come right back!

Berried Anenome?

2009-07-18T12:23:00.000-04:00

Maybe! Maybe not! There was one near/under My Pier before Stinkin' Lenny wrecked everything. Grrrr!

Gads, that was an awful storm!! You go, Bill Gates! He's patenting something or other that brings up cool seawater from deep to kill hurricanes. Man, I hope he succeeds! The weather men say it'd take only a four degree temp drop to get rid of a storm.

Once the sea calms down in a couple of days, I hope, I'll get back in the water to look for this boogiewoogie. About seven inches, 18cm, across the base. It's in a place that has few landmarks, the shallows between Off the Wall beach bar, and The Waves hotel. Who would dive there??? Me!
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And I think I remember going in a random zigzag out to deeper water. Ho hum! That'll be really kewlcool if I can find this guy again. They do move around.

BUT the camera is broken again, this is the second housing that's had a shutter release button go limp on a dive, right after I got the photos of the Sea Pen. It works fine now that it's dry. But I'm not going to bother to take the stupid thing diving, and have to carry around a non functioning beast. Next week! I have enough photos to put here, tho'.

OWELL!

Thanks for stopping by!

Another Sandy Visit

2009-07-17T21:57:00.001-04:00

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OK, I'm going to go take a gardening class tomorrow, about growing Dark Leafy Greens. So, I'll need to not turn on this mind trap computer in the morning.
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Here's some of what I found during this evening's dive.
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The Barrel Sponge that didn't make the cut to be on The Muppet Show. Waa.

One of my favorite coral heads. My approach frightened the fish, various Grunts. They had been covering this place like a cloak, but they flowed away.

That Giant Hermit crab again. I disturbed him from digging a pit in the sand.

A Feather Sea Pen! The second one I've ever seen. A colony of polyps that extend at night from hiding in the sand during the day. Filter feeders. So beautiful.
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Didn't get a good focus on this one. I'll go back for sure, and get decent photos. But in the meantime, I must send the camera off for repair again, the shutter release button failed right after this photo. Booo! Second time.

Thanks for stopping by!
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