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Archive for the ‘Coral Reefs’Mar 12, 10 Comments (0)
 New Coral Growth Good morning all, such a busy day yesterday I had no energy left last night for anything! We got home from our night dive to the Superior around 10:00 and the dive was great. We did have a little difficulty getting in and out as usual but the Superior reef is really worth exploring. Well the next morning (yesterday) I had to get up real early to meet a couple I met that is here from Virginia, Mike and Susan and they are here just to explore the island on bikes. They have no rental car, just the bikes so I told them I would give them a sort of grand tour. We started out by riding many of my single-track trails and then rode over to the salt ponds, from there we took off to the North coast. At the North coast we started at Saint Joris bay then rode over the mountain to the ocean along the coast to the windmills and then back, we were gone for three hours! It was a great ride and after I left them at the Aquarium. There they parked their bikes and walked to Mambo beach and found a nice chair under the palms and spent the rest of the day relaxing on the beach and snorkeling. I on the other hand, cleaned my very dirty bike, went shopping, returned tanks from the night-dive, worked on my honey-do-list and played on the computer. I had wanted to take a nap and rest but never found the time. At 5:00 I rode back down to the aquarium and picked up our two new friends and had them follow me to our house where Aimee served up a wonderful homemade pizza dinner. After dinner I loaded their bikes on the car and took them back to their hotel which is down near Hooks Hut and upon getting back home fell into bed!
Here’s a real cool photo from a dive site in Bonaire called Invisibles. This is a new Grooved Brain Coral colony just starting to grow on this old rock. Hopefully if all goes well, this coral will keep spreading out more and more and will eventually cover that whole rock, and that will take years but could someday be quite a big specimen.
Running late, I need to get moving, talk to you tonight, Barry
Mar 2, 10 Comments (0)
 Sal Good evening readers I am back!!! What a GREAT trip to say the least, the folks in Bonaire ROCK!! Our friends Sal and Patty who spend 3 months a year in Bonaire met me at the airport and delivered me to the folks at Wannadive where I then stayed for the next 6 days. Sal and Patty picked me up from the Wannadive Hotel every morning and off we went to some new fun dive spot in search of new creatures and coral reef scenes. I was also lucky enough to have friends from Rapid City diving here at this time as well. Their names are Scott and Tammi and they are the owners of Black Hills Scuba, please stop in and say hi to them for me they are such great people! Everyone I met or ran into was so nice and everyone went out of their way to make me feel at home, so to all of you, thanks for everything!!! So the first morning Sal, Patty and I met Scott and Tammi at the Wannadive shop at Eden Beach and off we went up the coast for our first dive together. The dive spot was called O’l Blue and within minutes of arriving we spotted a giant pod of Offshore Bottlenose Dolphins swimming right out over the dive spot headed towards Bonaire at a very slow pace. Upon seeing this we all quickly got our gear on and raced to the water but by the time we all got out and under they had already passed. Even though we didn’t see dolphins it was a really beautiful dive. This is Sal floating over a beautiful cluster of tube sponges which this spot had plenty of, I kind of just raced from one to the next like a man on a mission. Bonaire has such beautiful diving! Almost every spot we went to we saw big fish and lots of them, something Curacao has very little of as our reef’s are fished hard! I think it’s safe to say we all had a wonderful dive here, Scott shot video and Tammi did a little posing for me over a few gorgonians, what else could a man ask for?
Well more tomorrow, it’s late and I am beat! Again thank you all, Barry
Feb 6, 10 Comments (0)
 Strong Current Good morning readers, after work yesterday I took off on the bike for a ride and near the end I crashed and burned! It’s a section of trail that has a steep step-up and for the first time I just didn’t do it right and couldn’t get out of my cleats fast enough causing me to land right on my knee. Our landscape here is very rough, it’s all razor sharp limestone meaning when you fall it’s usually not good. I cut open my knee pretty good and had a very tough time getting back home thankfully Aimee came to the rescue and was able to ride the bike back home and I drove the car. So this morning the knee is very sore, I can’t even walk on it very well meaning I will be staying home today, good times!
Throughout the year I talked about our strong currents we have and many readers have asked for a photo explaining this. Well I found this one although it still doesn’t do justice, it’s like trying to shoot the wind, you can feel it but you can’t see it, current is the same way. When our currents are running full blast it is impossible to swim into it, the only thing you can do is let it carry you and hope you can make your exit point. I always explain current to folks as a fast moving underwater river, you can’t swim up a river and you can’t swim into current unless you pull yourself along the bottom holding onto rocks. You can see by this photo that the gorgonion is being pushed in one direction, I shot this as I passed by as there was no way to stop. Some of you may remember that this year strong currents kept me from shooting coral spawning, remember, that was the worst current I had ever been in.
That’s about it, going back to lay down and take some pain killers! Bye now, Barry
Jan 12, 10 Comments (0)
 Slit-Pore Sea Rods Hi all, here’s something really cool, these are either Giant Slit-Pore Sea Rods or Slit-Pore Sea Rods both are so similar and it’s hard to tell without a close-up of the retracted polyp itself. These are live corals or what we call soft corals. Most divers refer to these as Octocorals or the more common name that everyone knows and goes by Gorgonians. What’s cool about this shot is that the Sea Rods on the left are open meaning the live polyps are open and feeding while the other half (on the right) of this colony is closed and the polyps are retracted, cool huh?? These beautiful corals sway back and forth with the passing of every wave and are again home to countless little creatures! The little Slender Filefish loves these gorgonians and I find a lot of baby or juvenile trumpetfish hiding in there as well, so divers the next time you pass these slow down and really look you might just find a hidden surprise.
We all worked today including Emily. The strong winds finally slowed a bit and the ocean wasn’t as crazy as it has been. We did have rain off and on today but we really could use it, we didn’t get the normal amounts for this time of year yet? Our little Indi hurt her leg somehow and can’t put much weight on it, needless to say she won’t be going with us tomorrow, she needs to rest.
That’s it for today, all is well. Have a great evening and a wonderful day tomorrow, Barry
Jan 1, 10 Comments (0)
 Reef Scene Good evening one and all, how was your New Years Eve?? I’m guessing most of you went to some kind of party or at least got to ring in the new year with countless explosions of fireworks!! Believe it or not Aimee and I stayed home!! Yep, we stayed home! It’s such a terrible night for the animals here in Curacao that we figured we would just take care of them and watch the show from the balcony. Words can’t even describe the noise that shook this island at midnight and continued for the next two hours, it was just pure insanity!! Aimee and I were wondering just how many people got hospitalized last night?? This morning as we rode our bikes to work we got to see first hand all the litter left from the exploding fireworks, all I could think of was, “who’s going to clean all this up”?? Oh yeah the wind will do it and blow it all into the ocean! Cool!
Here’s another common reef scene from the Sea Aquarium House Reef. The things that look like trees in the background are Gorgonians swaying back and forth from the passing waves. The orange ball is a massive Orange Elephant Ear Sponge and the light colored sponges to the right are called Branching Vase Sponges. I honestly just never get tired of searching for and shooting such beautiful scenes, the colors are just so beautiful!!
Well the fireworks have begun again for the night, it will continue for at least a week still!! Hope everyone is well, till tomorrow, Barry
Dec 29, 09 Comments (0)
 Damselfish Garden Good morning friends, someone was kind enough to give me a cold for Christmas so I am a bit under the weather this morning and went to bed early last night.
Remember a month ago or so I sent a photo of a pillar coral with green alga on top?? I had told you I thought it was a dying colony of coral or some kind of coral disease? Well here’s the exact same thing except this time it’s on a big colony of grooved brain coral. See the little damselfish at the top of the coral head? He did this damage to this beautiful coral, it’s called a “Damselfish Garden. My friend Nick who is a coral expert explains below just what your looking at, it’s very interesting so read on. Nick writes, the story with the damsel fish is that they find a bit of coral they like and peck off the living coral tissue. The exposed skeleton becomes overgrown with algae that the damsel fish like to eat. The fish defend these little farm territories so aggressively that they will even chase off larger herbivores like parrotfish that would quickly clear away the algae (I have definitely had them bite my fingers while working with the corals & once had one hit me right between the eyes…good thing I had a facemask on). Apparently with the decline of larger predatory fish on reefs worldwide, these little guys have become much more abundant and can be a real threat to reef health. The photo you took is a great example, where you have what appears to be a perfectly healthy coral missing tissue only on that patch at the top of the pillar where there is a thick mat of algae growing on the white skeleton. The angry looking three spot damsel fish staring you down in the center of the photo tops it all off! If you want to hear more about these guys check out this piece NPR did on Bonaire last month.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1117 I found this scene again on my first dive to San Juan a few weeks back. I have been telling everyone that my dive there wasn’t the greatest but in fact I captured some really cool pictures from there that morning, I guess I didn’t realize just how many. When I was shooting this I watched this little fish chase off many other bigger fish who thought they could stop and graze on what seemed like an unprotected buffet of algae, boy did he ever teach them a lesson and me as well! The closer I got to his little farm the crazier he got! As I passed he came up and bit my wetsuit twice, I am not kidding when I say these fish have no fear!! Another Lionfish was found by our Sea Aquarium staff and is now on display at the aquarium, if you haven’t seen one yet come on it! Have a wonderful day, Barry
Dec 24, 09 Comments (0)
 Fallen Pillar Corals Hi all, we just got home from watching a great movie called Avatar in 3-D!! It was non-stop excitement from start to finish! I swear every movie is getting better and better, the special effects in this are out of this world, no pun intended, you guys have to see it!!
I was just sitting here thinking that tomorrow is Christmas, it just doesn’t seem like it. We are going to a fun employee party tonight at 7:30 and then unfortunately I have to work tomorrow while Aimee gets to stay home. I went over to a friends this morning and installed a driftwood towel hanger that I made for her, it looked pretty good once it was up. Also the driftwood box that I have been working on so much will finally be going to it’s new home as well some time next week, will take some photos before it goes.
Here’s a very interesting photo, this is a large colony of Pillar Coral that I assume was knocked over by the monster waves from hurricane Omar last year as it passed thru. Those waves were so big that pretty much anything in 20 feet of water was destroyed or re-located. This beautiful colony of Pillar Coral is supposed to be standing straight up but has fallen over but is still very much alive!! Many corals can be placed back in their upright positions but this one was just too big and heavy!! So what’s going to happen to it now?? Well if you look closely you can see lumps starting to form. Each lump will eventually grow into a pillar of it’s own and the base should once again fuse itself to the ocean floor creating an even stronger foot or hold for the next storm. I found this specimen at San Juan and like a few of the other shots I took I want to return in a years time to see the progress.
I guess that’s it, have a great Christmas eve and super fun day tomorrow!! Merry Christmas all thanks for another great year!! I’ll be back tomorrow, best wishes, Barry, Aimee, Inca, Indi and yes the cat!
Dec 21, 09 Comments (0)
 Grooved Brain Coral with Elephant Ear Sponge Good evening once again. Yes it’s time for your daily dose of the underwater World from a little island called Curacao! This is really something unique that I have never seen before. This is a large piece of Grooved Brain Coral with a bright orange Elephant Ear Sponge growing right in the middle of it! How cool is that?? This is something I want to go back to each year to see just how much it has grown, I would love this same shot with the orange sponge just a little bigger filling the hole a bit more, or is that asking to much?? I found this a few weeks back when Aimee and I went to San Juan on my first ever dive there.
Well Christmas is now just days away! Living here makes it so hard to get into the Holiday spirit, the sun is shining and everyone is running around in swimwear and wearing flip-flops!! We do have our little fake tree up and it’s all decorated and we have our stockings hanging but it’s just not the same without a little snow!!
Well, I just don’t have much for you all tonight, it was just another day in Curacao! Dinner is smelling good, I am going to go check it out, see you tomorrow, Barry
Dec 19, 09 Comments (0)
 Mountainous Star Coral Good evening friends, I don’t have much for you tonight just a super nice specimen of Mountainous Star Coral. This was a fairly small colony but it was just beautiful and very colorful! I found this out on our reef a few days back and just couldn’t believe that I had never seen it before?? Most of these I find are more of a greenish color but this one was really orange and stood around 4 feet tall. The ocean currents are raging here right now, the worst I have seen all year and bringing up cold water from the deep!!
Tomorrow I am doing a first ever Christmas Dive with the good folks from the Dive Bus hut, it should be a great time.
All is good, I did a fast 45 minute loop after work on the bike and if I have time will try to ride more again tomorrow. Have a wonderful weekend, Barry
Dec 17, 09 Comments (0)
 Star Coral Mound Good evening friends, first off I wanted to say I am having a few problems with my www.coralreefphotos.com site as many of you have so faithfully pointed out but should have those little glitches fixed soon. Also since I am on the subject if you do not get your daily e-mail from me just go to the site, you can read the same thing there and maybe see a few you missed as well.
This is a beautiful mound of Mountainous Star Coral that we found again on our dive to the famous Mushroom Forest. That’s Aimee at the top of the mountain with Eva in the background exploring. This area is really know for these formations as well as Whatamulla, those are the two best spots to see these in person.
Aimee and I just got home from doing a mountain bike ride together!! This is a big deal guys we never ride together anymore!! Tonight we did one big loop on the trails I made and then over to the salt flats, we had such a great ride! Aimee said before we left that I would probably have to wait for her a lot because she was so out of shape!? Well after seeing her ride if that’s what you call out of shape I’m in big trouble, she rode great! This morning we both took the dogs to the salt ponds and did some much needed trail maintenance over there. Some areas were just thick with pica thorns all over the trail so she trimmed while I swept them away! At 10:00 Aimee went with Sheila from CARF and helped her with some homeless dogs on the island. This lady should get a bronzed statue of herself in the middle of the city for all she has done for the local wildlife here. Please if anyone out there needs a fabulous island dog contact me and I will hook you up, we went over to her house a few weeks back and got to see some of them. So while Aimee was out doing that I did a little Christmas shopping and then spent the rest of the day around the house.
That’s about it and yes we still have the whale for those of you asking he is doing very well. See you tomorrow, Barry
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