Critter Post # 9
Posted on Sep 24, 2009 by bruce_moore
...Improved Conditions (As Expected) ... Some Extremely Cool Critters ... Catching Our Breath After Two Very Busy Months ... The Dry Season Gets Dry Indeed ...Finally Some Odd Frogs & Octos ...
As we pass into the later stages of September, we are into my favourite time of the year in this part of the world...
Our weather this year reverted to traditional type: winds starting in early June and building strongly through July and August, with a few days of respite now and then. No rain from mid-July on. The winds slowing in early September, allowing the visibility to improve. And great diving, with critter counts building through August to peak in September / October.
At Black Sand Dive Retreat we enjoyed our busiest High Season ever, finding ourselves full much of the time. It is always grand when the diving takes care of itself, that is, when finding special creatures is easy. Having the eyes of Hengki and Atu helps as they are two of the best, finding stuff above and beyond the wishes of our guests and even spotting critters new to themselves.
In late August and early September I managed to take some snaps as earlier I seemed to only have my camera along on House Reef night dives. I still consider myself new to this digital thing, but even though my trusty old YS-120 flooded, leaving me down to one strobe only, I'm getting decently pleased with my results. The picture here is of - can you guess? It's an elbow crab.
I had a hot streak with wonderpus early in September - 4 O. photogenicus (love the new name) over three consecutive dives and then some guests with Hengky saw one immediately thereafter at Pantai Parigi. They were just popping up!
And we saw bluering octopus at two sites. At one site we kept seeing the wee guy after Atu first found it and it even showed itself when I went to have a look. First I found a nice big red tozeuma shrimp also called sawblade shrimp, though I like to call them bent toothpick shrimp), and after I snapped off a few frames Hengky had zeroed in our quarry only two meters away!
After that dive I immediately went over to where Hengki had seen a larger one a week earlier along with an occelated frogfish. We found no blue ring, but Atu did find a very small ocellated frogfish (none of us saw the orange 'donuts' on the fins until I zoomed in on the pictures I took). And we found some very cool nudis: a pair of Jorunna funebris,
a nice "pokemon" nudi (Thecacera sp.) and a pair of orange-spotted Gymnodoris rubropapulosa.
When I came upon my first of the four wonderpus, it was at Jari-Jari (Jahir 2) and at that time, there was a real hot spot happening. I found a pair of ornate ghost pipefish, then on the same mound Atu found a halimeda crab and a nice nudi. Then a few meters away I found a light robust ghost pipefish and within 2 meters Atu pointed out a darker pair of the same. Then I found a small painted frogfish and within 2 meters Atu pointed out a miniscule orange one, with a velvet fish right beside and then a spectacular Carminodoris estrelyado just down the slope (see above - the shot of the flat nudi covered in fried eggs)... and on it went.A few days earlier we had a boat at that site and the lucky guests saw six flamboyant cuttlefish on that single jump, which is a new record (we've seen five at once before on a few occasions, but never six). So I wanted to work on some flambos, but we found only one, with much circling and searching involved, but I can't complain as if all those critters weren't enough Atu showed us a nice candy crab and then I saw the wonderpus. On a return jump with Hengki and one guest (yes you John!), we spent most of our time at Jahir, as Jari-Jari was crowded (7 divers from Lembeh Resort and 9 from Bastianos at once: not an experience I wished to share). We were doing 90 minute dives, so just waited for the masses to go home and then eased over in that direction, finding most of what we had seen on that earlier jump along with a second rusty-hued velvetfish, a snake blenny out hunting, a new black frogfish, a large robust ghost pipefish, a new white ornate ghost pipefish and.. ta-da! ...TWO wonderpus out and about. A rather excellent dive by all occounts. Other visits failed to yield wonderpus, but a week later two guests (Marcia & Mika) had the great luck to witness mating flamboyant cuttlefish.
Hairball was also heating up recently. There were a number of ambon scorpionfish, a zebra batfish, three flamboyants, ornate and filamented ghost pipefish, a few frogfish including the elusive "hairy" variety and up to five melibe nudibranchs - one sporting commensal imperial shrimp. Joleha (Air Bajo 2) has continued to be hot as well. Numerous ambons and froggies (up to five of each), spectacular devilfish, two flamboyants (and eggs), various ornates (including a wee clear one) and another now-you-see-him-now-you-don't hairy frogfish. We had an excellent night dive there as well, which included a variety / variation of squid that both Hengki and our guest (John) had never seen before.
Night dives in Lembeh are, in my humble opinion, the best anywhere, and recently they have been beyond spectacular. At one spot in the bay, besides filamented and ornate ghost pipefish, three bobbit worms, various white-v and starry night octopus, bobtail squid and tiny frogfish as regulars, I came across a lump which offered a variety of small saron shrimp which were shy under the lights, but I managed to get a few decent snaps with patience. I especially liked the blue-green one.
I was pleased that filamented (roughsnout) ghost pipefish were appearing, as it was the "correct" time of the year - just after the associated algae grows in the shallows, which allows them the proper cover to blend in with. After so few A. striatus (hairy frogfish) over the past two years, it was nice to start seeing them again, though for the most part they were moving around and we were limited to one or two visits only at various sites. We were seeing the related "Lembeh" frogfish (fuzzy rather than hairy and sporting different fishing tackle) more often, a species many confuse with A. striatus. We were also seeing a few odd species - spotfin, scarlet and occelated frogfish, usually on night dives. There are still clown, painted and giant frogfish about, but having a variety of species makes life all that more wonderful.
One particular critter sighting caused much excitement - a new juvenile Rhinopias frondosa. I don't know who found it first, but I doubt that I would ever find it on my own. Hengki found it right away with general directions and it was a tiny fish, around a single inch in length and well-camouflaged on the rubble slope. The snout gave it away as a rhinopias, and the see-through pectoral fins pointed directly to R. frondosa. Hopefully it will hang around long enough to see how it develops.
So that's it for now. I'll next put up a House Reef update as there are just too many pictures to post in one go.
Cheers, Bruce
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