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Showing posts with the label wire coral goby

Diving for Frogfish and Nudibranchs in Maui

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Tiny baby frogfish   Frogfish and nudibranchs were both high on the list of animals to find while on our scuba dive vacation to Maui. We checked some of our favorite dive sights like mala pier, five graves, and white rock, as well as doing a bit of muck diving and it paid off with 4 frogfish and countless nudibranchs. I love diving in Maui. Wire coral goby    Maui can be an underwater macro photographers dream. Tiny gobies like the one above live on wire coral on the fringes of the reef. Moray eels of many shapes and patterns can be found hidden among the cracks and even within the branches of live coral. White Bump Nudibranch Big Fin Squid   Nighttime brings out the unusual critters like flatworms, rarely seen nudibranchs, and squid. This big fin squid pictured on the right is the biggest one Heidi and I have ever seen in Hawaii.   And of course no trip to Maui would be complete without a few nudibranch hunts. We found some old favori...

Turtle Town=Nudibranch Town

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Turtle Town isn't just for turtles anymore. Today Heidi and I went to a well known turtle hotspot for a scuba dive. Knowing us we weren't there for turtle watching, we were looking for the small things like this iridescent blue striped Ewa Fang Blenny mimmicking the coloration of a juvenile cleaner wrasse in order to get in close to bite bigger fish. This frog fish on the other hand would not fit into the 'small' category. It was massive and very green. It was stationed just off the reef not moving, just waving its lure out to draw in unsuspecting prey. These frogfish are related to deep sea angler fish and have a very similar lure on their foreheads. As we were taking in the full size of this frogfish Heidi notice a small, brownish nudibranch crawling along the reef. It turned out to be a rare red spotted nudibranch. The color red is the first to go when you get deep in water but when I took a flash photo the red color really popped. Also showing off a bea...