Marine Life Encounters Blog

Jawfish and a classic last dive in Lembeh

March 28 – 29   From Ned: The old adage about the blind squirrel aptly fits my dubious underwater hunting prowess. My found acorn in this instance was the serendipitous discovery of a symbiotic relationship between a three-inch jawfish and an ornately patterned shrimp. The chance encounter actually began a few weeks back in Gainesville, Florida where Anna and I had a lovely visit with renowned ichthyologist and long-time friend Dr. William Smith-Vaniz and his wife Esther. Bill, recently retired from the US Geological Survey, has taken on the Herculean task of reorganizing the worldwide complex of jawfishes. During our stay, Anna and I agreed to take photos of jawfishes for his project during our travels in Indonesia. 

 

Jawfish Face

  When threatened, jawfishes characteristically hunker down in their rock-lined burrows with little more than the tops of their heads exposed until danger passes. Disturbing the top layer of rocks ringing their burrow entrances is an old jawfish ID trick. Being anally retentive about their masterfully crafted burrows, jawfishes, even under duress, will eventually give in to the compulsion to reorganize their entranceway, which in turn provides a better view of their markings.   

 

Jawfish with shrimp

On yesterday’s dive, while waiting for a particularly stubborn little jawfish to give in to its obsession for perfection, two long dark claws appeared from the burrow beside the jawfish’s head then rapidly vanished. Immediately on high alert, I watched the entrance with renewed concentration hardly daring to breathe. Less than a minute later the claws reappeared, but this time attached to a splendid polka dotted shrimp that teetered briefly on the hole’s edge before once again disappearing back into the shared quarters.   

 Our last dive of the trip was a classic Lembeh Strait dive. In 70 minutes, we found a stonefish, squid laying eggs on the mooring, a Mimic octopus, three Ornate ghost pipefish, jawfish, a T-bar nudibranch laying eggs, a group of small jacks, nuclear hunting with Striped catfish and 16 intermediate batfish, who drifted down to meet us as we made our safety stop. 

 

Frogfish and Abalone in Lembeh Strait

March 26 - 27 –We’ve seen a number of frogfish this week and they seem to be unusually mobile. Frogfish are ambush predators, blending into their environment by barely moving until prey comes within reach. In a flash, so fast in fact it is barely discernable on video played back in slow motion, they expand their cavernous mouths and hoover in their victims. My favorite was a beautiful green Giant Frogfish, Antennarius commersoni, bouncing along the bottom like a beach ball. We followed it from 20 up to 12 meters where it finally stopped, presumably in a favorite feeding spot. 

 Our dear friend and managing director of Eco Divers, Cary Yanny, is diving with us tonight. Cary is spending the month on property acting as dive manager and overseeing the completion of the new resort spa. This gives us the rare opportunity to spend some valued time in her company, even if it is only fleeting moments between her many duties. I’ve been teasing the busy lady about writing a story entitled “A Day in the Life of Cary – Resort Manager Extraordinaire,” so here goes.  Yesterday morning before breakfast, she dealt with a disconcerting crisis in the spa when a cat wandered into the open building, knocked over an open paint can, traipsed through the spill and performed an Irish jig, which left little white paw prints all over the recently installed hardwood floors. During breakfast she leapt up from the table to shoo a bird that had flown into the restaurant window. Just before lunch, she jumped fully clothed into the resort’s swimming pool to rescue a four-foot monitor lizard that, whether there on purpose or accidentally, was proving a formidable obstacle to guests waiting to bathe. Cary, ever the trooper, deals with one unforeseen happenstance after the other with grace, forbearance and good humor, pausing every now and again to regain a bit of sanity by repeating to herself the timeworn mantra, “ At least I do not have a boring life.” 

 

Our Cary

 Ned will take over here to describe a few details about last night’s dive:

 

 

Asses ear Abalone

 The second abalone, which is going to take a bit of research to pinpoint its species name, is only an inch across. It is much easier to recognize as an abalone by noting the spiral of the shell and the series of respiratory holes near the shell’s outer edge. 

 

Abalone

 

Shield Shell

 

 

 

Inspecting Anemone Hermits, beautiful Thorny Seahorses and a night dive grump fest

March 24-25 – This morning we made the twenty-minute boat ride to one of the distant dive sites, California Dreaming, named by Scuba Diver Australasia’s editor, David Espinosa, years ago when he was diving the Strait with his mentor, legendary critter hunter, Larry Smith.The towering underwater precipice festooned with a multihued gallery of both hard and soft corals, provides a stunning visual contrast to the local muck sites. We went in search of Convict Fish and did find a large swarm of the 3/4-inch juveniles, but failed to locate their den, the permanent home to one or two brawny ten-inch adults. Ned, long ago bored with my latest fish mania, joined Liberty turning over rocks in a rubble field at the base of a cliff. Their patient search paid off big when Liberty uncovered a pair of tiny Harlequin Shrimp, Hymenocera elegans, busily consuming a tiny sea star that they had previously dragged to their lair. To inhibit the five-legged echinoderm’s escape Harlequin Shrimp will flip their prey on its back, and over a matter of days consume their stash, one leg at a time.

Harlequin turning sea star

 Four years ago while videotaping a fist-sized Anemone Hermit Crab, Dardanus pedunculatus on a night dive at Jahir, I happened to spot a porcelain crab nestled next to base of one of the anemones attached to the crab’s protective shell. This particular species of hermit received its common name from its clever habit of severing anemones from rocks and attaching the wispy animals to their mobile homes. In theory this symbiotic relationship offers a semblance of protection for the crab while providing the anemones with mobility, which allows enhanced access to food. This example of symbiosis upon symbiosis instantly struck my fancy so I set about learning what I could about the relationship.  Now bear in mind that “close inspection” of a large, highly mobile hermit crab armed with nutcracker-sized claws isn’t exactly an easy task. However my curiosity as to whether this was a one-time occurrence or a regular behavior set me to task inspecting every Anemone Hermit I have encountered over the past four years. I have discovered in Lembeh that about half of the Anemone Hermits have one or more porcelain crabs riding hiding among their anemones. I decided to make it my mission to capture video that clearly shows the porcelain crabs. I first had to convince Ned and Liberty to help me with the project. Liberty attempted to hold a hermit in place by grasping the end of its shell and immediately received a rather nasty pinch for his efforts, so that wouldn’t work. Besides, when disturbed the anemones expel pink stinging threads and close up completely and the porcelain crabs scurry for cover inside the hermit’s shell. In the end, after Ned and Liberty became thoroughly disillusioned with the entire idea, I decided patience and a lot of chasing was the only solution. Here is video of one particularly large, half inch orange porcelain crab (large is relative, of course) riding on the hermit’s back. 

There is also a porcelain crab that lives with anemones on hermit crabs in the Caribbean, but I have not seen this association anywhere else in the Pacific, so this might just be another Lembeh Strait curiosity. Incidentally, last night I watched a huge mud crab feeding on an Anemone Hermit Crab. The anemone’s stinging threads, which fluttered in the mild current, offered no protection against the marauder’s tough exoskeleton.

 

Bus Sign

A large group of business people stopped in for a luncheon at the resort. I ran out to take a photo of their buses, which were painted to advertise the upcoming World Oceans Conference. This provided an opening to talk to some of the group and I had a nice conversation with several gentlemen from the Development Bank. I am sending NOAA some underwater video that I hope they will be able to use in their Coral Triangle Initiative participation at the conference.

Thorny seahorse

Our Wednesday morning dive was at Magic Crack, where Ned shot two beautiful Thorny Seahorses. I spent my dive with a shoal of baby squid floating around the mooring buoy line, which just happened to be the same buoy where, last year, I taped a group of adults laying finger-sized translucent egg cases.

 

Devilface

Crab