A quick note.... Been scuba diving some this month...

I'm hanging out at the office again today, but I have charters tomorrow afternoon/eve, Saturday, Monday, Tuesday we've got double charters (am and night) so we're keeping fairly busy for now. My cash register arrived the other day, gotta figure out how to program it now.

The water's amazingly warm for January. We've been seeing 78 degrees - it's much more comfortable than the 72 or thereabouts we had last January. The whales are out in increasing numbers now, we're hearing them sing on a significant portion of the dives. I hope this is the year I finally get to see one underwater... Bob and Cathy have been hogging all the fun the last couple of years... it's a rare and exciting event when it does happen.

I'm on an old laptop I carry to the shop with me, so I don't have new photos to post, I'm trying to link a photo from some time ago on the blog... if it worked you're seeing a school of yellow tangs and whitespotted surgeons grazing on the reef. Surgeons/tangs are herbivores and pick algae off the coral, keeping everything nice and healthy. ....Ah, it seems there's a sizing issue with the photo I don't understand, still works anyway.

Later,

Steve

Some species of fish change colors as they grow...

Here's an adult Orange Shoulder Tang (Acanthurus olivaceus), also called Orangeband Surgeonfish or Olive Tang. We see them on the reef quite often. The juveniles of this fish can often be a bright yellow, developing the orange marking on the side and then darkening up over time. Here's a group of juveniles together. Oftentimes people will mistake them for yellow tangs, just remember yellow tangs are generally more roundish than oblong and you can tell the difference from a distance.

I'm not exactly sure why the color change exists, or if the juveniles are mimicking yellow tangs. In some species of fish, the juveniles will have a different coloration because the adults can be territorial and will beat on others that look the same - the small ones wouldn't stand a chance, so they have completely different appearance until they can handle themselves - - I'm not sure as this applies here, as the adults don't seem to be particularly territorial and are often found in groups.

We're back to the "slow" season again, not that spring break really panned out as crazy busy for anyone here, so no charter today or tomorrow for me. The last half of the week we're pretty busy though. I've got lots of charters set or started for later in the month, hopefully it'll be a reasonably busy April when it's all said and done.

Later,

Steve

Who needs men????

OK, so no news yet, but I was just looking over today's newsbits and saw this... Apparently they've pretty much proven Parthenogenisis in Sharks from a case in a Nebraska aquarium. There was apparently a suspected case in Detroit a couple years back also. Parthenogenisis means "who needs men" in latin... OK that's not true... but it essentially means "virgin birth" in greek apparently. No male is involved and is relatively common in the insect world, and has been seen in many species of creatures outside of mammals, this was the first known proven episode in sharks.

The photo above is of a Goldrim Surgeonfish (acanthurus nigircans). They are a neat fish which strongly resembles a Powder Blue Tang (acanthurus leucosternon) in a sort of night time pattern. They are not one of our more common tangs (a.k.a. surgeonfish), but we do see them from time to time. This is my most recognizeable pic of one.

Aloha,

Steve

It's Kona's slow season again...

Howdy,

People do on occasion ask what our slow seasons are. I've covered it before but it never hurts to repeat it. At least in this biz, it seems the slowest months are May, and September through late November (excluding the week either side of Ironman).

I've been on the call list for jury duty the last couple of weeks and it appears that Tuesday is the day for jury selection. I do have charters tomorrow and Monday, as well as earlier the last couple of weeks, so it seems the timing is right if I do get picked. I'll be going back to my part time job at the airport 'til it gets crazy busy again, they've been real flexible with me during the time I've been busy and I haven't worked with them in about 2 months.

Here's a school of tangs (surgeonfish) I ran across the other day. Tangs are herbivorous and do a good job of cleaning algae off the corals.

We've been reasonably busy with charters lately. We had a week of pretty crummy water - swells from both the north and south, along with winds - but the swells and winds and swells have calmed down and it's been gorgeous the last couple of days... that's how we like it here, and usually that is the case, we've just had some late season north swells lately. The manta action has been slow recently. Last year this time we were having record numbers. I expect with some calm conditions and better plankton levels than we've had lately, it'll pick up again - but you never know, we have no control over Mother Nature.

That's it for now. Later,

Steve