The end of the season

I hope that you have enjoyed our season in Bonaire.  This is the last underwater post of the year.

Here's to all the great creatures that live on the reef!

Thanks for sharing the journey.  Hopefully, we will do this again next year.

Here's looking at you!

Yellowtail parrotfish

We frequently see initial-phase, yellowtail parrotfish on the reef.  Sometimes they are swimming by.  But often they can be found lying on the bottom.  These fish were about 12 inches in length.

When fish are on the bottom, in proximity of a reef structure, often they are being cleaned. As you can see, these parrotfish were being cleaned by cleaning gobies.  The bottom photo illustrates how the fish can move its eye.  It was watching the goby.

Looking inside corkscrew anemones

Corkscrew anemones are translucent.  Their name comes from their  corkscrew-like, whitish markings.  They don't get more than 6 or 7 inches across.  And they provide habitat for several shrimp species.  Often, we see a pair of red-and-white-banded antennae protruding beyond the tentacles.  The antennae belong to red snapping shrimp, which we rarely get more than a glimpse of.

However, today we were able to attract the attention of a curious red snapping shrimp, that seemed to be interested in cleaning our fingers.  The larger claw is the snapping claw, and when the claw snapped, we heard it (and felt it, when the claw was aimed at our fingers).  The snapping may deter intruders, and may also help the shrimp procure food.

Grunts

The reefs of Bonaire are inhabited by quite a few species of grunt.  Most of the ones that we encounter are in schools, but some are solitary.

The name "grunt" comes from a sound produced by these fish, a grinding of their teeth that is amplified by their air bladder.  I haven't heard them grunting.  They apparently do it in associating with mating behavior.

Most often, the species that we encounter are either the French grunt (top photo) or the smallmouth grunt (bottom 2 photos).  They often school together (next to top photo).  All of these fish were 6 to 8 inches, and neither species gets longer than 12 inches.  The photos were taken at 30 to 45 feet deep.

Queen angelfish

Queen angelfish grace the reefs of Bonaire.  Their electric blue tones appear to be illuminated, almost like a neon sign.  Although they can reach 18 inches, the three adults seen here were all about 12 inches long.  This species is rather shy, except when they are actively feeding on a sponge(top photo), in which case, they don't seem to care who is watching them.

The bottom photo is a juvenile queen angelfish that was about two inches long.  They dart in and out of reef structures, and are always fun to find.

All the photos were taken between depths of 30 feet and 45 feet.

Sea snails

Sea snails are fairly numerous down here, but not very well represented in the guide to Reef Creature Identification that we brought with us.  So, I can't even guess which species these photos represent.

Although we occasionally encounter various species of snails underwater, we often don't see much more of them than their shells (like the top photo). 

The bottom 2 photos were taken this morning, of a snail that was moving along the sand almost like a nudibranch or sea slug would move, except it was carrying a shell on top of it.  Attached to the foot of this snail, you can see a hard, brown, oval-shaped disc.  This is the operculum.  When the snail withdraws into its shell, the operculum covers the opening to the shell (something like closing a door).

Pardon the over-exposed nature of these photos, I tried everything that I could think of to reduce the light level, but forgot to shut off my flash.

Surgeonfish

We encounter three species of surgeonfish on Bonaire's reefs.  Often, several species swarm together in a sort of blue feeding frenzy, as they graze algae off the reef.

The name surgeonfish comes from the sharp (knife-like) projection at the base of their tails.  The bottom photo is a blue tang (no white band on tail, and no bars across body).  The middle photo features a doctorfish (with body bars and a white band at the base of tail).  The top photo is a swarm of mostly blue tang.

The ocean surgeonfish also occurs here.  It looks like the doctorfish, but has no body bars.

Cherubfish

Today, for the first time this season, we dove down to a big colony of cherubfish, at about 85 feet.  This species is one of the smallest angelfish.  Instead of reaching 18 inches in length like other angelfish, cherubfish don't grow longer than about 3 inches.  They are fascinating little blue beauties, with a yellow-orange face and blue spectacles.

In this rubble colony, the cherubfish dart in and out of coral rubble.  And they don't hang around long enough to pose for photographers.  And as you can see, a number of other fish live in the rubble with them.

Glasseye snapper

Despite its name, this species is not a snapper.  Rather it is a member of the bigeye family.  Their big eyes are reflective of their noctural feeding habit, which requires good vision.  They are fairly solitary fish, that are found under ledges, during the day.

In the center photo, a Pederson cleaner shrimp is cleaning inside the fish's mouth.  All the fish were about 10 inches long, and found at about 30 to 40 feet deep.