More Freaky Underwater Stuff

More Freaky Underwater Stuff

Image by Boogies with Fish
www.messersmith.name/wordpress/2010/02/02/more-freaky-und...
I have a few more shots from our recent dive at Magic Passage to show to you this morning. I'm not feeling very chatty today, so you'll be spared the usual verbal assault that comes along with the pictures. The more images that I process from the Canon G11 the more impressed I am. Now, if I can just find a student, I can get started on something that I've wanted to do for years - teaching underwater photography!

This is a cute litte baby Giant Clam (Tridacna maxima) only about as wide as your hand: Awwww, cootchie, cootchie, coo. If you click to enlarge, you will see its "eyes", which are the turquoise spots around the edges. I had a hard time taking this shot, since I had to get the camera close, but every time I did, the clam would sense the shadow - they can't really "see", but simply sense light and dark - and withdraw into its shell.

Here is a nice shot of some Feather Stars (Comantheria briareus): These things are all over the place. There are many different colours. They have little "feet" to hold onto the rocks and the move very slowly about, looking for the best supply of food drifting past. The arms are very sticky and break off easily, so you have to be careful when moving around them not to cause them harm.

This is a beautiful Blue Encrusting Sponge (Haliclona sp): I have noticed that these are spreading like weeds in the area of Magic Passage. I don't know what that means, but I'm a little worried about it. It is ridiculous that there are no facilities for marine research in Madang, something which I am hoping to do something about soon. More about that later - stay tuned. Anybody out there wanting to do marine research in the area should contact me.

I have a couple of new Sea Squirts for you today. This is a Sea Squirt of the Botryllus genus: The species name was not given in my resource book. It may not even have a name yet. There is so much here that is unidentified.

This is a Sea Squirt of the Didemnum genus and a real beauty it is: The colour is amazing. You can also see that one Feather Star has chosen this spot to perch for a while. It is interesting that the colours are similar. I can't imagine that this is anything less than chance, since there are absolutely no brains involved here. It's blind luck that a Feather Star matching the hue of a Sea Squirt colony end up being the same.

Finally, here is another shot of the Papuan Scorpionfish (Scorpaenopsis papuensis) which I showed to you recently. It is a bit easier to see the fish in this shot: Most of the scorpionfish are well camouflaged. The Papuan is a master. I'm the serious photographer in our little mob of divers, but there are several who are better at spotting things. I let them swim around looking for stuff and I wait to hear someone banging on a SCUBA tank. Then I go over an shoot the critter.

It's good to have friends.

Lost Parrot (Take 2)

Image by MOZ278
I make no excuses to post a couple more pictures of our "lost parrot". Different day, different tree, but still in the garden. Yeh I know, just like a shot in a zoo, but this guy has no cage!
He's* cute, and "shouts" at me when I'm around. I'll miss him when (if?) he goes or dies because of bad weather or predators. It won't be through lack of food, he's eating apples & nuts from our bird table (next shots planned).
This is still a long shot from about 12m. Not been able to get closer yet. But I think he's semi tame, because he's not spooked, when I'm in the garden.

*Apparently, Amazon Orange Tips, can only be sexed by DNA testing.

This has got to be the cutest picture of a dog ever seen on a dog food can.

Image by Chris1051

Day 279

Image by Xelcise
Day two hundred and seventy nine of my project 365. This is a picture of a cute little leaf in a puddle in London today when I went to the big smoke with my coursemates to visit the site for my design module in architecture. It was such a hectic day getting to the capital (2 hours in the train and then about a 30 minute walk to the meeting place). But it was nice to get the park and see where our building is going to be placed - theoretically. I took over 300 photos of the site today and many of them are VERY boring, but I had a whale of a time just chilling and taking as many as possible :D We had lunch in the same pub that I'd visited with my family several years ago as child, somehow I found it which was pretty amazing and the food was really good. I was so glad to get home though and have a natter with Kirsty in the evening and sort of my many photos :)

Meet Mia.

Image by sarah_jordan
1. Loves Food
2. Is a Papillon (Butterfly in French)
3. Currently addicted to Toads
4. Is soo darn gosh cute (not so much in this picture though)