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Aug 18, 10 Comments Off
Good morning all, look what I found yesterday! Cool huh? Months ago Mark, from the World famous Dive Bus Hut and I were diving the Superior and he found one of these but at the time I was holding a 10.5mm wide angle lens and the most we could do was take pictures in our heads! So yesterday as I was out waiting for the sub to come out of the channel I looked down and spotted another! I again had the wrong camera but at least this time I had another diver with me. What I did was hand my camera off to my friend and gently scooped him up with a little piece of plastic and slowly carried him back up to the surface. Once at the sub platform I yelled for someone to grab me a plastic container with holes, I then set him in there and left him under our platform in the sand while I got out and prepared another camera with a macro lens in another housing. I think I was only out for around five minutes. I again jumped in the water, swam down to the bottom with my new camera and gently picked up my colorful nudibranch (who was crawling all around the inside of the plastic container). I then swam back out the channel and down to 50 feet to the exact spot I had found him and let him out for his little photo shoot. Once released he went right back to his feeding and I shot away. This little Caribbean beauty is only a 1/2 an inch long by 1/4th of an inch wide, he’s tiny!! There are more than 3,000 known species of nudibranch, and new ones are being identified almost daily. They are found throughout the word’s oceans, but are most abundant in shallow, tropical waters. Their scientific name, Nudibranchia, means naked gills, and describes the feathery gills and horns that most wear on their backs. I wish I could give you a name but so far I haven’t found it, if anyone knows please drop me a line, it’s another first for the Browns.
My other exciting thing that happened yesterday was that we almost flooded a camera! We started using an older Nikon D-200 yesterday that will be used mainly for the sub. Well, we had already had the camera in the water when I found the nudibranch and it was fine but the second dive it started to leak and it started to leak bad! Thank goodness my friend Kevin was with me, he pointed to the front of the camera and the dome was quickly filling up with water but had not hit the lens let! I shot to the surface and held the camera up out of the water and at the same time un-clipped one of the main body clips and released the water! I then re-clipped it and swam to the rocks were people on shore raced over and grabbed it and took it back to the sub-station. The good news is the camera never got wet, we saved it but we don’t have a clue where it is leaking, that’s on the to-do list today. I have flooded 3 cameras since I have been doing this and finally have learned how to save them. Get that camera to the surface, keep it up-right at all times and release the trapped water as fast as you can, it works!
After work I met 3 other friends for a fast one hour bike ride, other than breaking my chain in half it was a great ride!
I need to get moving, have a wonderful day, enjoy the nudibranch he’s just for you! Barry
Aug 17, 10 Comments Off
Good morning all. Last night after work we immediately went with some friends out to the airport for dinner to celebrate a new restaurant that just opened, WENDY’S!!! It’s the first time I have had a fast food meal in years and it was great! The only bad part of the whole mission was once we got there we found out they didn’t have their World famous Frostys yet! But they said it’s on the way! Yesterday I stayed pretty busy at work. I first started to train a new person then went snorkeling for three hours and finally we did a sub dive which I took photos of. We have a channel of sorts that the sub comes in and out from and yesterday we spent some time removing some big underwater rocks with the crane. Those of us in the water helped our diver by bringing him big ropes to tie the stones with and then once tied we would give the signal to lift, the stones were then set in a better area. Curacao was hot yesterday, it’s starting to look like the rains are gone now for quite awhile! I am back to my routine again of hauling water out to the desert for my birds each day filling up the bird baths we made, they seem to love them!
Here is another shot from our trip to Vaersenbaai. This is a colony of Warty Corallimorphs that I found at around 35 feet out on the reef. This is actually something we don’t see to often especially in big number like we saw there. For those of you thinking you have seen thousands of these at the Superior site in the shallows, those are different, they are called Sun Anemones. Corallimorphs are very easily confused with Anemones! The best visual clue to the orders identity is the arrangement of the tentacles, which form two geometric patterns concurrently. The tentacles radiate out from the center of the oral disk, like spokes, and form concentric circles which progressively increase in diameter from the center.
I got up at 5:00am just for you guys today so never let it be said I don’t love you! I apologize for not posting the frogfish on my website yesterday, not sure how I forgot that but it’s there now.
Time to get ready for another big day, be back tonight, Barry
Aug 16, 10 Comments Off
Good evening friends, I am sitting here wondering just where did my weekend go?? It’s like “poof” and it’s gone! I am not sure I told many of you but I have been teaching/training a young friend of mine in the fine art of mountain biking for the past few months. His name is Stiyn and he is one of those kids who has a natural gift for biking, especially rough technical single-track. Well today he had his first race and he WON!! He rode like a champion and made us all proud, it was a great race! I ended up riding my bike home from the race at around 10:45 and it was scorching HOT!! I rode as fast as I could to get home but still ended up getting burned a bit, guess it was a bad day to wear a sleeveless jersey. At 1:00 in the blazing heat I did something I rarely do, I loaded the dogs and drove top speed to the beach! We have a beach called the Dog Beach over by Jan Thiel and that’s where we spent the afternoon! When we got there I made a bee-line into the water and the dogs followed at top speed, we all had a wonderful time! That’s pretty much my day, I made a fun dinner on the BBQ for Aimee and now everyone is relaxing.
Here’s another first for yours truly, this is a Longlure Frogfish swimming in mid water! Yeah can you believe it? Check out his Lure floating out in front of him. I was photographing this yellow beauty when all of a sudden without any warning he jumped off the coral head he was perched on and swam to another! Those of us watching were screaming underwater, it was just so cool to watch! As you can see Frogfish do not swim like a normal fish, he had to use his four flippers/legs to swim with and this took quite awhile for him to get to the other coral head.
Thanks for all the compliments on yesterdays shot, that really is something you probably won’t see anywhere else! Hope you had a great weekend, see you tomorrow, Barry
Aug 14, 10 Comments Off
Hi friends, check out this cool shot, talk about one in a million! Today at around noon I picked up my friend Stiyn and we drove to Vaersenbaai where we met two other friends, Rob and Ke-chi, both who work with me at the Sub- Station. Our main purpose for coming here was to find a new frogfish that another friend (who was here from Holland) just found and told me out. Most of the time when something new is found those that know these reefs can usually find the said item just from a brief description of the reef and the depth. Well the frogfish was really easy to find, it was exactly where I was told it would be. It stood out like a sore thumb with it’s glowing yellow body sitting high atop the reef motionless waiting to catch lunch! We stayed there for quite awhile, I ended up with some great photos and even got to see and photograph him or probably a her leaping from one coral head to another swimming in mid-water, it was so cool! The reef is starting to look a little better at Vaersenbaai. I found a cluster of Purple Stove Pipes that is amazing and will be going back next weekend with a model to shoot that. Well on the way back in just 15 feet of water there is a big rectangular chunk of rock just sitting all by itself surrounded by nothing but sand. Since I can remember this little micro-reef has been home to thousands of reef creatures like fish of every kind, shrimps, crabs, anemones, and corals of all kinds but mainly baby fish. In fact it’s a nursery of sorts. Well today while I was laying in the sand shooting a new shrimp that we don’t have photos of Rob signals me and points to a just born juvenile Smooth Trunkfish the size of pea! I couldn’t believe how small it was and how brave he was?? As we both watched this little trunkfish (who normally stay in one area) swam all over the side of this reef area, he was so brave. In fact at times he was moving around so much and so far from his original home that we both lost him but re-found him on and off. Well, while trying my best to keep a pea-sized creature in focus he suddenly left the confines of the rock reef and swam out towards me, maybe thinking I was another big chunk of rock with possible caves to hide in? On his way out to me, he was immediately met by a school of new-born French Grunts, they were only about 2-3 inches long but to him they were monsters! They immediately thought this was a floating piece of food and tried over and over to eat him or at least taste him which when the trunkfish baby felt this he went swimming full blast back to the safety of the reef! I only got one shot as it happened so fast, one of those, if you blink you would miss it kind of things, it was really cool to see! So again, you never know what your going to see on the reef, I will check on him again next weekend and let you know if he is still there.
That’s pretty much my day other than doing two hours of trail sweeping this morning with the dogs. I hope everyone is having a great weekend, see you tomorrow, Barry
Aug 14, 10 Comments Off
Good morning all, I had a busy but fun day of diving yesterday and once home we went to a friends birthday party, so I got home late again. Today after walking the dogs I am meeting some friends for a dive at Varsenbaai in search of a new frogfish that was recently found. I really don’t have much for you this morning, it’s hard to think when your still half asleep.
This was a small school of Goatfish I found the other day all hanging out together. I often notice fish swim in a certain order or rank like largest on top and the smaller ones below. I have always considered Goatfish as the “calm” leave us alone fish. They really keep to themselves and are always seen swimming in small schools. Much of their day is spent digging in the sand, they use two fleshy whiskers called “barbels,” located under the tip of their chin, to search for prey hiding in the sand. These fish are Carnivores, they feed on shrimp, crabs, bottom-dwelling invertebrates, clams, and clam worms.
Dogs are waiting to go, talk to you tonight again, Barry
Aug 13, 10 Comments Off
Good morning everyone, Aimee here. This is a great photo of our Michelle (at the front) doing a program called the DSE (dolphin scuba encounter) with some of our Dolphin Academy team, MC and Papito (yes, we have an employee and a dolphin named Papito). The dolphin is Romeo. In 2007 when I was put in charge of training the 5 new dolphins I was told to train a new program; one that was not a swim, encounter, snorkel or therapy. Tough one. So, we decided to do an underwater encounter on scuba with the dolphins. This would give anyone the opportunity to see the dolphins up close, face to face, get to hear them and their many sounds and learn about the animals in their own world. It took many months to get them used to all the equipment and to be relaxed with all the divers and hands and fins. One of the funniest and toughest things was to teach them to not float up, but to relax and stay close to us, right off of the bottom. Romeo seems to be doing an awesome job! Before we put divers in the water we give them a 20 minute briefing talking about dolphin anatomy; most people don’t think about a dolphin belly button or ears or follicles where they used to have hair! We teach them about sounds and echolocation. Once they are underwater they get to see and feel all these wonderful things right at their fingertips. They also get to participate in an echolocation demonstration. The trainers swims off a bit, sends the dolphin back to one of the guests with a triangle and then the dolphin returns to the trainer. We then put eyecups on the dolphin and ask them to retrieve the triangle from the guest. Everyone gets to not only see the dolphin locate the triangle but gets to hear the echolocation clicks as they are finding it. For me, it is always the highlight of the dive, so cool! Well, we have been doing this program for about 2 years now, but it is a new program for us over at Dolphin Academy. It is just great letting our new colleagues experience such a fun new thing. Barry called so excited yesterday after this dive telling me how great it was and how wonderful Michelle and Romeo were! He just could not stop buzzing about it! That is just awesome. Michelle had never even touched a dolphin before she started working here. You would never know it now! She seems like an old pro who is just a natural with the animals. I am very lucky to have found her. Well, now all you locals who know about this have to come and join us, and you divers from other places, this is just one more “carrot” to get you down here. Come visit!
Busy but fun day ahead, Aimee
Aug 12, 10 Comments Off
Good morning all, we are both waking up after a fairly restless night, it’s so hot here that we have to keep turning the air-co on and off throughout the night, it’s either too hot or too cold! Both of us are felling better and I did do a dive at work yesterday while Aimee had the day off. My day started with going to get my island ID card again and this time it was successful, I only had to stand in line for 2 hours! The rain seems to have stopped, we haven’t had moisture in a week now and I can already see the wild flowers are dying.
Here’s another dolphin photo for my dolphin fans out there and again this is Tela and Pasku! When Pasku is inside the dolphin lagoons with the others he is everywhere and doing everything on his own but out in the open ocean he usually sticks close to momma for security. I have found over the years that photographing dolphins in their natural environment can be very difficult because they move so fast and turn on a dime. Now I am starting to listen for them, when I hear them coming I at least know from what direction and have a better chance of catching them as they speed by.
It’s off to work, see you again tonight, Barry
Aug 11, 10 Comments Off
Hi friends, just checking in like a good boy! Our two South Dakota friends left this morning and I am still waiting to hear how the day went, we sure did enjoy them!! Here’s a fun photo from today’s 10:30 dolphin show. I thought for once I would try something new and walked out on the big boulders along side the ocean and shot in towards the crowd. This is Tela and little Pasku flying high for the crowds and let me tell you they love it! Pasku is just so cute as he tries to duplicate everything his mom is doing and for the most part he is succeeding, he just can’t jump as high yet! I figured if I didn’t get a dolphin photo out soon I would start getting hate mail.
Aimee and I both felt a little better today but not well enough to go for my Tuesday evening bike ride.
I did do a fun dive with the dolphins out in the open ocean this morning in fact it was also with Tela and Pasku, geez, talk about two dolphins that are worth their weight in gold! The dive was great although the visibility wasn’t so hot, I did get a few nice shots and will send them your way sometime in the next few days.
Sorry so short again, there just isn’t enough time to do everything! Bye, Barry
Aug 10, 10 Comments Off
Good evening friends, this will be a real short one tonight as I feel terrible again. I had a real hard day at work and came home and went to bed at 4:00. There are so many people sick right now including Aimee so at least I am not alone. Our guests entertained themselves today and we briefly saw them at 5:30 but had no energy to go out and do anything. We will take them to the airport in the morning at 6:00, I don’t need them paying crazy money for a taxi at that hour.
Here’s the beautiful old church at Porto Mari and it’s finally getting a complete restoration job. They have been working on this for a long time now, the front is finished as you see and now they are working on the back. When we were there I noticed they removed all the paint from the old doors as well and are going to leave it rustic looking and it looks great! From the looks of it the doors must be at least 200 years old.
Sorry so short all, I am worn out, see you tomorrow, Barry
Aug 8, 10 Comments Off
Hello readers, how was your weekend?? I had a pretty fun day as usual starting out with photographing my two visitors during a dolphin swim. And to make the whole dolphin swim even better, besides the sun and the crystal clear water, Aimee was their trainer! I am going to just guess and go out on a limb and say they had a wonderful time, at least from where I was standing that’s what it looked like! After the swim they did a little shopping then went over and got kissed by a sea lion and then back to watch the 10:30 dolphin show, it was a full morning. The next stop was the sea glass beach. It was raining when we got there but quit almost immediately and then with a short walk we found the sea of sea glass! This is a place I found years ago and it is one of the best spots in Curacao for sea glass. The glass here is very old, and has beautiful natural rounded edges and can be found in every shape, size and color under the sun! We stayed there for about an hour and a half, my how time flies when your having fun! Our next stop or their next stop was me dropping them off at Mambo beach for two hours to eat and do some more shopping and at 3:30 I picked them back up and took them back to the Avila Hotel. We have a little problem in Curacao at the moment, there looks to be a gas shortage or gas strike ahead! Yesterday and today cars have been lined up for blocks trying to fill up, we have no idea at this point what is going on or how long it will last so we will keep the driving to a minimum. Because of this gas traffic jam I had a hard time getting the girls home, I had to take a long out of the way loop instead. So we decided to just call it a day, the ladies have a spectacular hotel to relax in and we had some stuff to do at home.
I am still getting lots of requests for more sub photos so here is a new one from my fun photo shoot on Friday! This is pretty much “picture perfect”, even I like this one and I am really picky! The two smiling face are friends I work with at work, there is never a shortage of models or volunteers at the Sea Aquarium! Our two sub pilots have been now practicing for two weeks and are becoming masters at driving these things!
That’s it. more tomorrow, thanks for all the kind comments! Barry
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