UNDERWATER BAHAMAS: REEF GARDENS (3)

November 5, 2013 by Rolling Harbour

UNDERWATER BAHAMAS: REEF GARDENS (3)

We are back in the realm of ‘animal, vegetable or mineral?’. Dive down a few feet – inches, even – to the reef, and… is this thing waving about here a plant or a creature? And is that colourful lump over there a bit of inanimate rock or a living thing?

1. FEATHER DUSTERS

Not in fact pretty frilly-fringed plants, but worms among the coral. The tiny electric blue fish are Blue Chromis, ubiquitous around the reefs.

Here the feather dusters have attached themselves to a sea fan, a ‘gorgonian’ coral

Moored on part of an old wreck

A different form of duster with remarkable feathered tentacles

2. BASKET STARS Creatures in the same family group as brittle stars. Take a close look at the remarkable transformation in the two photographs. The top image is taken in daylight. The star is off duty and enjoying some downtime. However the second image is the same view at night, with the star fully open and waiting to harvest whatever micro-morsels come its way. The star has truly ‘come out at night’.

3. CORKY SEA FINGER Another form of gorgonian coral, sometimes known as dead man’s fingers… **

4. GOLDEN ZOANTHIDS Coral forms living on a Green Rope Sponge. Some zoanthids contain a deadly poisin called palytoxin, which may do unspeakable things to your heart. Like stop it. Luckily, none so unpleasant live in the Bahamas (or so the Bahamian Tourist Board would no doubt wish me to make clear).

I realise that calling this occasional series ‘Reef Gardens’ is a bit of a misnomer. They are in fact Reef Zoos. The previous posts are as follows:

REEF GARDENS 1 Anemones, Basket Stars & Christmas Trees

REEF GARDENS 2 (Corals)

Image credits, with thanks: Melinda Riger @ Grand Bahama Scuba

** I knew this image reminded me of something… or someone. And (superannuated British rockers out there), is it not exactly like the hairdo of one of the guys in Mott the Hoople, a band lifted from relative obscurity to fame by being gifted a song by David Bowie? Guitarist. Ian Hunter. Take a look at him now… and just imagine then

SHORE THINGS: BEACHCOMBING ON A PRISTINE ABACO BEACH

June 15, 2013 by Rolling Harbour

SHORE THINGS: BEACHCOMBING ON A PRISTINE ABACO BEACH

The Abaco bay known as Rolling Harbour is a 3/4 mile curve of white sand beach, protected by an off-shore reef. The beach is pristine. Or it would be but for two factors. One is the seaweed that arrives when the wind is from the east – natural and biodegradable detritus. It provides food and camouflage for many species of shorebird – plover and sandpipers of all varieties from large to least. The second – far less easily dealt with – is the inevitable plastic junk washed up on every tide. This has to be collected up and ‘binned’, a never-ending cycle of plastic trash disposal. Except for the ATLAS V SPACE-ROCKET FAIRING found on the beach, that came from the Mars ‘Curiosity’ launch.

We kept is as a… curiosity, until it was eventually removed by the men in black…

I’d intended to have a ‘plastic beach trash’, Atlantic-gyre-rage rant, with angry / sad photos to match. Instead, I decided to illustrate a more positive side to beach life – things you may discover when you take a closer look at the sand under your feet. Like the coconut above. Many of these photos were taken by our friend Clare Latimer (to whom thanks for use permission); some by me.

A LONE FLOWERSEA STAR (DEFUNCT), WITH CRAB TRACKSSEA FAN (GORGONIAN)WASHED-UP BOTTLE (PROBABLY NOT RUM)

SEA BISCUITS

Thanks to Capt Rick Guest, who has contributed an interesting comment regarding the sea biscuit with a hole in it. He writes “the (Meoma) Sea Biscuit w/ the hole in it was dined upon by a Helmet Conch. The Cassis madagascariensis, or C.tuberosa drills the hole w/ its conveyer-belt-like radula teeth w/ some help from its acidic, saliva. Probably 98% of all symetrical holes in marine invertebrates are of this nature. Murex, Naticas, Helmets, and many Cephalapods (via a Stylet), are the usual B&E suspects. The Cone shells utilize a modified radula in the form of a harpoon which is attached to a venom tube.” For more on the vicious cone shell, and other creatures to avoid, click HERE

DRIFTWOOD. IT’S LIKE… OH, USE YOUR IMAGINATIONA WILSON’S PLOVER NESTHORSESHOE CRAB (LIMULUS)A SCULPTURE? AN EMBRYONIC SHELTER? LARGE BIRD FOOTPRINTSMORE BIRD PRINTS AND CRAB TRACKS CRABUS CUTICUSCONCH SHELLS & OTHER BEACH TREASURESCRAB HOLE & TRACKSSOME IDIOT’S LEFT HIS… OH! IT’S MINE

THE CORALS OF FOWL CAY MARINE PRESERVE, ABACO [VIDEO]

November 30, 2012 by Rolling Harbour

THE CORALS OF FOWL CAY MARINE PRESERVE, ABACO

coral6

I usually have 3 or 4 planned posts on the go. Some are quick to compose, some are not. Especially those requiring technical input from the technically unsound – downloading a video, changing the file format, editing and polishing, uploading to a compatible ‘carrier’ etc. I’ve been meaning to get round to making some fish and reef videos from footage of a trip with Kay Politano of Abaco Above & Below. Now I have… coral8

If you are tolerant enough to at least start this one, which focusses on coral, can I restate the excuses? I swim like a panicking cat. I hadn’t snorkelled for a great many ~~decades~~ years until 2011. I was a stranger to underwater scenery, let alone photography. I wave my tiny camera around too excitedly, though not deliberately to inflict seasickness on hapless viewers… It is a bit less bad this time round, however. Luckily I can tell from my stats if anyone has bothered to click on the video below, and you can rely on me to trash the thing if I find a paltry (or non-existent) response. Best just to watch on the small screen, though. coral14

With those dire warnings, here is the video. I would be very interested to ID all the corals that can be seen. There are the easy ones like sea fan, elkhorn, mustard hill, brain… but what’s that one over there? No, behind the waving one…? Comments / suggestions welcome. And if you don’t much care for coral, there are some pretty fish to look at…

Music Credit: Adrian Legg’s ‘Old Friends’, from ‘Guitar Bones’

ADDENDUM JAN 13 I am really grateful to Capt Rick Guest for taking the time to view the video, and the trouble to analyse the contents. He has very helpfully highlighted many points of interest in the film, both as to coral and as to fish, so I’ll post his commentary in full, with my thanks. Of both interest and concern are Rick’s remarks about the Elkhorn Coral. I had wondered about its bleached look. It’s dying…

CORALS ETC

At 0:36 a lavender Sea Fan…(Gorgonia ventalina).
At 0:52 Yellow “Leaf”,or “Letuce Coral”. Agaricia species growing around a living soft coral called a “Sea Rod”. Soft Corals have living polyps which feed on plankton just like the hard corals.
At 1:02 More Agaricia, and a small Brain Coral at bottom. Either a Diploria, or Colpophylia species.
At 1:10 A Sergent Major fish, (Abedefduf saxatilus). One of my favorite Taxanomic names! Behind is mostly dead, Elkhorn Coral. The white areas being indicative of “White Plague”. A disease responsible for Coral Whiting…..Death!
At 1:37 A Blue Tang swims over some “Mustard Coral”… Porites porites.
At 1:55 A chubby “Chub” swims by. Likes caves and caverns and edible, but not palatable.
At 2:33-38 Much coral bleaching damage here on these Elkhorn Corals.
At 2:40-48 A Thalassoma bifaciatum,or “Blue Headed Wrasse” is swimmin’ about. This guy used to be a lady,but he’s a product of Protandric Hermaphrodism! When there’s a paucity of males in the area, a yellow female will step up and become a male for the school.
At 3:29 Lower right: a fine example of Millepora complanata,”Fire Coral”. Fire Coral is more related to Man-O-War, and jellyfish than Corals.
At 3:50 More Elkhorn Coral with White Plague
At 4:23 Brain Coral, probably Diploria clivosa