some stuff you don't see every day

I think the other boat is called the Kararu or something like that.

Cheers

James

Craig

thanks for the wonderful pictures !

the "white moray eel" looks familiar, it either an eel goby or a pipe fish, do you have a close-up of the head ?

also, the porcelain crab is not trying to catch the fish for a meal !! maybe it tries to chase it away ? any way, porcelain crabs are strictly filter feeders, they filter out small organic particles and plancton with their specialized bristle-covered maxillipeds

cheerio

Art

Well as we all know, crabs will take a swipe at anything. I have seen mithrax sculputs do the same thing - even though they are herbivores. Hey - everybody's gotta have fun.

Cheers

James

The crab was also feeding on some debris while I observed it. It picked it up in a clump from the bottom.

Here is a crop of the head. It's my understanding that this is an eel.

hey !

crabs - yes, most of them are carnivorous or omnivorous, but porcelain crabs (Porcellanidae) are not true crabs, but crab-loking squat-lobsters

of course it could complete its diet with some debris, but I don't think it can catch and kill a fish

cheers

PS will try to figure out what's you white moray is

HI EVERYBODY !

Craig,

thanks for the "close-up" of the head - it helped with the id

your white moray eel is actually a pipe fish, a very unusual one, symbiotic with mushrom corals, scientific name: Siokunichthys nigrolineatus described by Dawson only 20 years ago

I would appreciate a high resolution scan of your photo, I have a series of talks/lectures on symbiosis in marine environment

by the way, do you need the id of your shrimps ?

cheers

Art

I seemed to recall seeing it listed as a an eel but I can certainly see it being a pipefish. Now I'll have to check next time I look at a book. I'll go back and edit the post.

I'm not accustomed to listing specific ID's with pictures, but others want it for the future wetpixel gallery so ID's are helpful and shrimps are tedious. I sent you a private message with a link to the orignal TIFF. If any other pictures are useful to you please let me know. If you haven't seen already, here is my gallery. Also, I have two other pipefish shots that are OK. They show more than one pipefish if you are interested.