Whidbey Island Critters

[Jan K]

Flatfish on the run.

[Jan K]

Found a moon jelly with six moons... Not unheard of, but first for me

[Tom Nic]

Wow!

[Desert Diver]

Thanks Jan,
I didn't even know why they were "Moon" jellyfish. I appreciate very much what you have taught me. Some of it even sinks in.

Brian

[Jan K]

Thanks Tom. Brian, I also learn as I research the subject.
Today, I had to reach out to Whidbey Audubon Society to help ID a Whidbey critter for me

[Tom Nic]

Marvelous pictures! What a treat!

[dwashbur]

Now I wanna know what anaerobic respiration is, and how I can do it so I can stay under longer, too!

[Jan K]

I observed an interesting hunting strategies by Kelp Greenling.
It was using me as the tool to scare the buried Pacific Sand Lance out of the sand, swimming
along side and then dashing after them, sometimes succeeding in catching the fleeing fish and
always returning back to me. It did it for at least twenty minutes. When I settled and did not move,
it would swim away and by swimming on its side, stirring up the sand with its tail, getting out the
Sand Lance this way. Too bad the visibility wasn't that good, I had a wide angle fish eye lens and
lots of silt in the water column.

[LCF]

Jan, if there were a Nobel Prize for the person who has amazed, delighted and educated me most in my diving career in the PNW, you would get it . . .

I am simply awed at the last sets of photographs. I have tried and tried to get pictures of the baitfish; I can never get close enough to them to get anything that can actually be recognized. And the couple of times I've been lucky enough to see a fishing bird (cormorants, in my case) I haven't had a camera.

I hope you continue to contribute to this thread forever. It's the most fun diving-related thing on the internet.

[Tom Nic]

Awesome!

[Jan K]

Thank you Lynne, Tom. I am glad that you still enjoy my posts, I keep wondering when
the time will come and I have to say to myself: " Give it up, it all has been done before".
And then I go diving and find myself looking at something I never did before and let
the camera shutter loose again
All those dives at Keystone and only one time enveloped in genuine bait ball.
Of course, I went back next two days, the fish were there, but no bait ball formed.
It is indeed the last resort the bait fish defense ... Of course it was at the end of my dive
when the strobe batteries took forever to reboot.

[Nwbrewer]

That is an awesome shot!

[dwashbur]

Who cares if you post something that's been done before? Keep them coming!

[Paladin4Christ]

This is my favorite thread to look at in all the interwebs!!!

The only complaint I have is...I don't see all cool things you see but we are diving in the same places. :angry:

[Jan K]

Slow day on the shores of Whidbey. A piece of dead isopod

[Jan K]

Another hunting encounter. This time the Lingcod did not get its fish.
The flounder kept its cool and stayed buried in the sand and the Ling
was unable to grab it.

[Jan K]

I had old macro wet lens laying around, so I jerry-rigged it so it sort of fits on my present
camera housing, so now I venture into the world of tiny critters

[LCF]

LOVE the phoronid picture!

Doesn't it seem a profligate use of energy, to grow such an involved shell for one year of life?

[Jan K]

Thank you Lynne.
I sure enjoy my new toy - the wet macro lens. Now the camera sees even more
of my eyes cannot. The joy of point and shoot

[Jan K]

And added another critter to my list.
A very tiny jellyfish which doesn't like to swim very much.

[renoun]

Wow, that is really making the most of your macro lens. How well could you see it without the camera?

[LCF]

Fascinating! It's hard to imagine what a jelly that tiny is doing with information gained from focusing light on a retina, without a brain to build images. The world is indeed an amazing place.

[Jan K]

Wow, that is really making the most of your macro lens. How well could you see it without the camera?

Once you know what you are looking for, it gets much easier, although the Cladonema are very small,
especially for my aging eyes. Sea stars on other hand, much easier to see

[Paladin4Christ]

All I can say is "WOW".

That new lens of yours is amazing.

[Jan K]

This one is probably not on anybody's "Want to find" list. Not too exciting as far
as critters go. But it is part of our underwater world nevertheless...