When you want to see the stars, find someplace dark
A sampling of what lives beneath the waves
You see these starfish often enough, they are fairly common on the reef. Often taking a closer look at the commonplace will show something worth a photo. In this case a closeup of the underside of the starfish, a truly odd creature…
A secretive species, the cusk eels are seldom seen by divers on Hawaiian reefs. They shelter in caves and crevices during the day, emerging at night to forage. This eel was holed up in a shallow crevice low in a rock wall. I shot one half decent photo before it retreated further into the crevice, out of sight.
Turtle breathe air. When an air-breathing marine creature needs to sleep there is an interesting choice. It is easy to understand pulling up on a beach to sleep securely, without the waves and currents to worry about. Sea turtles also use another tactic, one harder to fathom, sleeping in the back of a cave 30ft below the waterline…
At the base of a large antler coral, a pair of butterflyfish that really didn’t want to leave, even when a large and noisy diver is sitting just a few feet away. I love these opportunities, any chance to get a closer shot of a fish that usually swims quickly away when approached.
They are everywhere in the tide zone, an extraordinarily common species. So common I usually forget to take a picture. A closer look shows a cool animal. The spines are modified, no sharp needles here, armor plates instead. An excellent arrangement for resisting the fury of the waves and still giving protection from would be predators.
Just another whitemouth moray. But then, I hadn’t seen anything interesting to photograph for a few minutes as I wandered along the reef face. May as well shoot a few frames. Wait? There is a second eel in the cavity! A dwarf moray?
I didn’t spot it this time either. It was Mark who was pointing at the coral. I looked, looked again… Oh! There is something there. The camouflage these fish utilize is impressive, even from quite close they blend amazingly well with the coral and algae. I wonder how many times I have drifted past one of these fish without seeing it.
As Olivier and I got closer to take a few photos, the fish began to walk away. Yes, I said walk. The fish would walk several feet on its pectoral fins then try to sit still and hide again. A truly weird thing, watching a fish walk across the reef.
