Swimming in the dark is essentially what night diving is all about. You switch on your scuba torch light, jump into the dark waters and slowly sink deeper into the twilight depths.
The creatures that you see during night dives differ significantly from the usual day dive variety. This rock lobster was just one of many that we encountered.
Scores of hingebeak shrimps were also found in small rocky crevices and amongst the corals.
Yeah, they're edible. But since this is a protected marine, this red reef crab is well, protected from us but not from his natural predators like sharks and large fish, though.
Just peeking out from under the umbrella of hard corals was this cheerful parrotfish who gladly posed for us. Definitely a candidate for Thailand's Next Top Pelagic Model.
This is another species of cleaner shrimp akin to the hingebeak shrimp. It's so interesting to see them at first scramble away from us and then slowly creep back out when they see that we're not there to have them for lunch.
This fella produced a lot of confusion among the divers as to its identity. It looks and moves like the juvenile sweetlips but it's way to too big to be one (about 10 times larger than normal). Yanni says it's a juvenile baramundi cod while another of the divers guessed it could be a 'teenage' sweetlips. Asther, you leh?
See the two dots on the reef crab? I actually thought someone pulled a prank on this poor guy or perhaps a scientist glued a microchip on it to track its movements. No, the marking is 100% natural and it's probably as a 'fake eye' to scare off its predators, very much like the fake eyes on the wings of a moth or butterfly.
Last but not the least, this cute little bugger is a hermit crab. It differs from 'conventional' crabs in that it only has three pairs of legs instead of four. I was mildly surpised to find that there is even a
hermit crab association in America dedicated to education and care for these adorable crustaceans as pets.
Swimming in the dark is essentially what night diving is all about. You switch on your scuba torch light, jump into the dark waters and slowly sink deeper into the twilight depths.
The creatures that you see during night dives differ significantly from the usual day dive variety. This rock lobster was just one of many that we encountered.
Scores of hingebeak shrimps were also found in small rocky crevices and amongst the corals.
Yeah, they're edible. But since this is a protected marine, this red reef crab is well, protected from us but not from his natural predators like sharks and large fish, though.
Just peeking out from under the umbrella of hard corals was this cheerful parrotfish who gladly posed for us. Definitely a candidate for Thailand's Next Top Pelagic Model.
This is another species of cleaner shrimp akin to the hingebeak shrimp. It's so interesting to see them at first scramble away from us and then slowly creep back out when they see that we're not there to have them for lunch.
This fella produced a lot of confusion among the divers as to its identity. It looks and moves like the juvenile sweetlips but it's way to too big to be one (about 10 times larger than normal). Yanni says it's a juvenile baramundi cod while another of the divers guessed it could be a 'teenage' sweetlips. Asther, you leh?
See the two dots on the reef crab? I actually thought someone pulled a prank on this poor guy or perhaps a scientist glued a microchip on it to track its movements. No, the marking is 100% natural and it's probably as a 'fake eye' to scare off its predators, very much like the fake eyes on the wings of a moth or butterfly.
Last but not the least, this cute little bugger is a hermit crab. It differs from 'conventional' crabs in that it only has three pairs of legs instead of four. I was mildly surpised to find that there is even a hermit crab association in America dedicated to education and care for these adorable crustaceans as pets.
1 comment:
The fish is indeed a teenage sweetlip. :) Sorry replied late!
Post a Comment