With all the nutrition suspended in the water in Lembeh, providing such a rich source of food for so many critters, whether directly (you eat the stuff), or indirectly (you get eaten by other stuff), survival often depends on remaining unseen, and there is not that much cover to hide in here…

So you have to adapt, and for many creatures, especially for some crustaceans, that means adapting to one type of coral.

This was very noticeable in some of Barb’s photos from this week. As I was looking through them I was struck by the photos she had taken of one piece of Xenia Soft Coral.

Xenia Soft Coral is a fleshy soft coral, usually fairly small in size, with broccoli-like clumps about 15 to 20cm (6 to 8”) high. The are fascinating in their own right, as the polyps they extend at their extremities rapidly open and close, like little time-lapse flowers opening and closing.

Occasionally we find shrimp or crabs on them, surprisingly named Xenia Shrimp or Xenia Swimming Crabs. What I hadn’t seen before was both crustaceans on one piece of coral. You can see in these photos the smaller shrimp in a group of three (above two photos), with the larger crabs to the right. On the photo below you can see a close up of the shrimp, with  it’s lovely camouflaged patterns.

Evolution is an amazing master. the patterns on the shrimp and crab are so intricate and so perfectly suited to living on it’s host.

The next camouflage crustacean I saw this week was the Mushroom Coral Shrimp. A month or so ago I posted some video of another inhabitant of Mushroom Coral, the Mushroom Coral Pipefish. The Mushroom Coral Shrimp is a little more common than the pipefish, but often overlooked, or only quickly glanced at. But is has found a very effective camouflage, mimicking, with it’s white head, the whites tips of the coral polyps.

Click here to see the video in a new window

This white head, buried amongst all the swaying polyps, is often all you can see of them. A quick look, then you are off to see the next thing the guides have found. But when you look closer you can see these are a beautiful crustacean.. as well as their white ‘popcorn’ heads, they have wonderful transparent sense organs, red bodies, clear pincers and legs with small purple dots on the joints.

As with so many of the critters in Lembeh, you have to just stop and have a close look. You don’t need a camera or video, you can see all of this with a cheap plastic magnifying glass too…so if you are coming here, don’t forget to bring one with you, so you can fully experience the amazing macro life here.

The rest of the week has been smashing too. Highlights included Barb seeing her first Brook’s Urchin Shrimp and we have an orange Giant Frogfish on the House Reef. We also saw Harlequin Shrimp, Harlequin Crabs, Boxing Crabs, Tiger Shrimp, Crinoid Shrimp, Snapping Shrimp, Orang Utan Carbs, Halimeda Carbs, Sponge crabs, Decorator Crabs, Elegant Squat Lobster, Hairy Squat Lobster, Hairy Shrimp, Painted Porcelain Crabs, Porcelain Crabs, Whip Coral Shrimp, Xeno Crabs, Skeleton Shrimp, Candy Crabs, Tozeuma Shrimp, Commensal Shrimp, Mantis Shrimp, Coleman Shrimp, Brook’s Urchin Shrimp and Sea Spiders. As well as our Giant Frogfish on the House Reef we also saw Hairy Frogfish, Painted Frogfish, juvenile Warty (Clown) Frogfish, Occellated (Coin-Bearing) Frogfish and Crimson Frogfish. There were more Blue Rings, Mimics, Wonderpus, Long Arm, Coconut, Shaggy, Hairy and Reef Octopus, as well as Flamboyant Cuttlefish, Broadclub Cuttlefish, Pygmy Cuttlefish and Bob Tailed Squid. And we saw Denise, Pontohi and Bargabanti Pygmy Seahorses, Thorny and Estuary Seahorses, Lembeh Pygmy Seadragons, Pygmy Pipehorses, Winged Pipefish and many more. There are still Ghost Pipefish, with Ornate, Robust, Halimeda and Rough Snout all being seen this week. And some of the weirder fish include Bigeye Conger, Bamboo Shark, juvenile Fingered Dragonets, juvenile Sole, Spiny Devilfish, Randal’s Goby, Ambon Scorpionfish, Pegasus Sea Moths, Ribbon Eels, Cockatoo Waspfish, Napoleon and Blacksaddle Snake Eels, Stargazers and great Mandarinfish.

Thanks to all our great guests. Last week we had a group form the States and some guests from the UK.

Enjoy Barb’s great photos this week, just click the photo strip at the top or bottom of this blog.

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That was the question I found myself asking, not once, but twice this week.

It has been a great week, lovely to be back properly, over my jetlag and enjoying such good diving.

I was diving with Ade (one of my Dive Supervisors) at Aer Prang 2, a site close to KBR. It’s been a good site for frogfish recently and we were there with our guests, rummaging around as usual.

Towards the end of the dive we were swimming over the sand when Ade suddenly called us over. He had found a very strange worm. At first I though it was some sort of gigantic Bristle Worm, as it was nearly a meter (3ft) long.

Then, when looking a bit closer, it seemed to look a little like a Bobbit Worm. I watched it for quite a while, as it moved around over the sand, it’s head with Bobbit-like tentacles swaying around. A very strange creature.

When we got back to KBR, Ade went to look in the ‘book’ to see if he could find it. I asked him if he had ever seen one before in his 15 plus years of diving in the Strait…and he said ‘no’ he had never seen one….and surprise surprise, we couldn’t find it in any reference book. The closest thing we could find was an undetermined Eunice worm, known only from Papua New Guinea. These worms are closely related to Bobbit Worms, so I was nearly right with my original ID. This was my first ‘And what are you..?’ of the week.

The second ‘And what are you then?’ was a critter that Barb found. We were at California Dreaming, a truly beautiful coral and wall dive (yes, I know, no muck!!) in Lembeh.

Barb had found a hole in a sandy/rubbly area and at the bottom were 4 or 5 weird white things crawling around. They were small and seemed to be some sort of shelled mollusc, with it’s white spikey mantle and a featureless head and foot.

And that is the featured video this week. If anyone has any idea what it is, please let us know.

Click here to see video in a new window

Last week I posted some photos of me at the NEC Birmingham. A week or so after that we also had our booth at DEMA, which was in Florida this year, and here’s a picture of our booth there, with Mark, KBR’s owner. Many thanks for everyone who showed up and we hope to see you next year….

And so the critter list for last week…as well as the two ‘unknowns’ we saw several different Harlequin Shrimp, the wonderful blue Banded Tozeuma Shrimp, Skeleton Shrimp, Tiger Shrimp, Boxer Crabs, Hairy Squat Lobster, Elegant Squat Lobster, Squat Shrimp, Hairy Shrimp, Orang Utan Crabs, Zebra Crabs, Brook’s Urchin Shrimp, Donald Duck Shrimp, Harlequin Crabs, Porcelain Crabs, Crinoid Shrimp, Snapping Shrimp, Candy Crabs, Mantis Shrimp (one with eggs), Halimeda Crabs, Decorator Crabs, Carry Crabs and Sea Spiders. There were more Mimics, Wonderpus, Long Arm, Coconut and Reef Octopus..and Blue Ring season looks like it starting, as we’ve been seeing several on several different sites. And the Flamboyant Cuttlefish are still around, as well as Broadclub and giant Cuttlefish.There have been Yellow and Pink Bargibanti Pygmies, Denise and Pontohi Pygmies, as well as Thorny Seahorse, Double Ended Pipefish, Lembeh Pygmy Seadragons, and Ornate, Robust, Rough Snout and Halimeda Ghost Pipefish. Frogfish have been good, with Clown (juvenile Warty), Painted, Giant, Hairy, Occellated (Coin-Bearing) and Crimson Frogfish. And there have been great Mandarinfish, Ambon Scorpionfish, Helmut Gurnards, Cockatoo Flounder, Cockatoo Waspfish, Spiny Devilfish, Scorpionfish, Ribbon Eels, Melibe Nudis, Egg Cowries, Crocodile Flatheads, Electric Clams and, unexpectedly, I saw a huge Bumphead Parrotfish being cleaned on the reef.

We had a great group from northern California this week and sadly said goodbye to Richard who once again finished his yearly month-long trip to KBR.

Barb’s back on top form and had plenty of wonderful photographs to see this week. Just click on the photo strip at the top or bottom of this blog to see them all.

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Barb and I have been away for a while, but now are happily back home at KBR.

We went to the Birmingham NEC Dive Show at the end of October and had a lovely time in our booth, meeting both old friends and some hopefully soon to be new ones.

We thoroughly enjoyed being at the NEC. It was great to have our own booth and be able to show our videos and photo slideshows.

After that we had a short break in Spain to see family, and then another short break in Singapore to see more family…

..so now we are recharged and very much looking forward to dive dive diving again.

So a short blog this week, as we haven’t done much diving since we got back, though Barb did find time to take some wonderful photos of a really amazing Tozeuma Shrimp we found.

And, late but not forgotten, is our October 2011 Critter graph. You can have a look to see all the amazing critters we saw in a great month.

No video this week, but they will be back next week for sure.

Click on the film strip at the top or bottom of this blog to see the rest of Barb’s photos from this week.

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