The Second Critter Post
Posted on Jun 01, 2008 by bruce_mooreApril 15th, 2008
In my last post I mentioned that the sites of Hairball and TK3 were "down" for the time, offering little of interest amongst a lot of kicking around in critter-hunting mode. What a difference a few short weeks makes.
Now they are both officially back "up". The mototi octopus that we saw get inhaled then spat out by a hairy frogfish (who is most probably now in frogfish heaven) months ago was spotted again by Hengki, this time in a coconut shell, guarding her brood of eggs. So hopefully at least some of her offspring make it through nature's gauntlet to adulthood for our viewing pleasure. There are three black "hairies" (Antennarius striatus) in the area, though they seem to rotate so that we never find all three on any single dive. The "bald" white "hairy" moved over to Hairball Too and then, along with the stunning orange one over there wandered off. We look forward to their return from walkabout. The squid have been laying eggs on mooring lines at not only Hairball and Hairball Too, but at Magic Crack as well, which has been providing a great way to start and finish dives on those sites.
Nearby at TK3, the seasonal net-dragging done by locals still causes a terrible toll on the benthic creatures in the shallows, but until a realistic solution is reached, it will continue to periodically decimate parts of that section of Kambahu Bay. In spite of the damage we still find some cool stuff - interesting nudis and slugs, wonderpus, various shades of Inimicus devilfish and heaps of the flying gunards that are infesting the muck sites at this time.
Over Easter we had a group of well-travelled Jakarta expats / residents in the house at Black Sand Dive Retreat. The sites don't tend to be overflowing with critters early in the year, but there's always something to see. In three days of diving they managed to spend time with a pair of co-operative harlequin shrimp, a wonderpus, a mimic, quite a few "coconut" (veined) octopus, flamboyant cuttlefish, numerous frogfish (giant, clown, painted, scarlet and hairy), a very photogenic cockatoo flounder, a few common seahorses and 5 thorny seahorses along with the resident pair of rhinopias at Air Prang 3 (a purple R. eschmeyeri & a very lacy red R. frondosa), sitting side by side, which made for a fine photo op. And they rated us as having the best food of any Indonesian resort they'd ever stayed in, which was nice to hear.
When I have the time I've been covering considerable distance underwater in front of the resort, surveying all possible depths between the moorings for Hairball Too and TK2, which is a rather large chunk of real estate. The usual suspects are easily found - countless banggai cardinal fish (some with mouths loaded with eggs), a few cuttlefish, plenty of squid of various sizes, devilfish in various color patterns, though orange seems to be the preferred shade du jour, veined octopus, a few cockatoo flounders, a small stonefish as well as a small sea snake that have "moved in" and more (of course). Highlights have been a clear juvenile ornate ghost pipefish, three resident giant frogfish, a wee clown frogfish that has been wandering in the shallows, a juvenile bamboo shark and the realization that we now have three of the rare pacific monkeyfish (aka: pitted stonefish) in residence. They don't move much, but partially bury themselves at times, effectively disappearing. The largest one, which was covered in long flowing orange algae changed her appearance completely by merely shedding, revealing her orange / red natural coloring (how did she cultivate a shade of algae that matched her predominate natural body color?!). They are truly an odd fish.
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