The other week we were trying out a spot I'd never dove before (pretty cool spot) up north of the airport. This spot is north of the day use moorings so we were anchored in a sand patch next to the reef. I went to check the anchor at the end of the dive and noticed several of these little critters in the sand. I wish I had my closeup lenses on at the time, I'd love to get a good shot of these, this particular shot is really cropped and enlarged. This is a Siphopteron quadrispinosum, a type of nudibranch we see here (if you take notice anyway... they max out at a few millimeters in length) from time to time. To get a rough idea of their size, take a dime out of your pocket and look at Roosevelt's ear and it'll be pretty close to the same size as a good sized one. I've got a picture of three of them in the blog last June, take a look through the June '07 archives to see it. I'll have to keep my eyes open in the sand patches the next little while.Tonight we did a reef night dive with some customers we have dove with already. Cathy dove it while I sat up top, she had great fun with it and came up quite excited... lots of neat stuff to see. Many of the dive operators here are rather invested in the manta dive and you hardly see anyone doing straight night dives on the reef any more here, we're trying to do them when we can get a group of interested divers as the straight night dives are really good and great fun for us (the crew) as well. It's a nice changeup to the manta dive, and so many things come out at night that you don't see during the day that it's quite exciting if you're a critter fan.
3 comments:
I make a point to look for the small stuff. So much so that other divers comment on my having my face in the coral all the time. Never seen these guys, will have to pay more attention to the sand.
Blue Wilderness also does just plain night dives out of Kawaihae.
Look for them in decent sized sand patches, doesnt have to be a completely sandy area, at about 30-40 foot of depth next to the reef. I'm thinking most of my sightings have been right about this time of year over the years. They're actually pretty easy to spot from 3-5 feet up, because they're so bright yellow, you just have to be paying attention, and lucky to come across them when they're there.
Ohhhh...nice shot how I love to be in this particular place to see the wonders of under water world,with fun and full of satisfaction....
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