The Weird and Wonderful

I wouldn’t have anticipated that a day at the aquarium would have yielded much by way of interesting photography. Indoor photographs are sketchy at best, what with low, artificial light as a starting point. Add to that the limited options you get for creativity in a museum-like environment where everything is on display, add hordes of inconveniently moving people who always seem to be pooling around what you’re interested in, and of course the glare of any other ambient light that comes off the glass of the displays themselves, and you have yourself a recipe for leave-your-camera-at-home.

The aquarium in Melbourne, however, turned out to be an enjoyable little jaunt from a photographic perspective. Their displays are thoughtfully mounted, with lots of creativity and a certain amount of flair. In fact, I’d highly rate it as a place to check out, especially with a family.

More to the point, some of the exhibits they have are just downright weird. I mean, underwater stuff is always a little odd (nudibranchs, anyone?), but some of these fishy things are right off the charts.

These guys, for example, are somewhere between alien and angelic, beautiful silver flanks gleaming against that deep blue backdrop, and those wacky streamers trailing out behind them. I mean, really- is that practical guys? I would’ve thought they’d have gotten tangled in seaweed or something. And don’t tell me you’re going to be better at getting away from predators. But man they look cool.

Also, who knew Melbourne aquarium had acquired Son of Cthulhu? Actually it’s a cuttlefish, probosci-facing, but the UV toplights give it an extra-terrestrial hue, and those coiled appendages… man…

I’ve no idea what this guy is either, but he was pretty big, and pretty slow, so it was kinda fun getting up nice and close and getting some detailed shots of his face. After all, they say a portrait is all in the eyes.

This one I do know- it’s a Lionfish, and one of my favourite fish in the ocean. I’ve shot them plenty of times in the past while diving- and I have to say, give me a choice between an aquarium, or out in the open sea, I’ll take the latter every day, first for the thrill of the dive, and second for the challenge of trying to manage a complex piece of photographic equipment under seventy feet of water without drowning. I love the Lionfish in part for their gorgeous plumage and bright colours, and in part because they are lethargic, floating around with the drifting currents, and therefore very easy to photograph. This one was no exception, and I was able to get a nice shot despite the thick glass.

There are some stunning images out there of the jellyfish enclosure at the Baltimore aquarium, and unfortunately Melbourne’s display by no means matches what is available out there. The tanks here had quite a bit of stuff in them too- various jellyfish sheddings, as far as I could ascertain- but I did enjoy capturing this one against the deep blue backdrop. It’s not the sharpest shot around, but the lighting in some of these areas was seriously low.

The nautilus, pictured here, traditionally lives at considerable depths below sea level. About the size of a basketball, they’re some of the ocean’s weirder inhabitants. That giant, lifeless eye and the moustachioed appendages scrabbling up front do it for me. They are, however, pretty awesome in their oddity. I’m not sure if this tank really felt like home for them, but it’s the only time I’ve seen them up close. Definitely giving off a Cthulhu vibe here too.

[Incidentally, given that this is probably the only time I'm ever going to reference Cthulhu in my blog (and I've now managed three times in one post)- can you believe that the automated spellchecker on my MacBook actually recognises 'Cthulhu' (four)- even while refusing to recognize the American-English spelling of recognise.]

This stingray makes me happy. Every time I see it, it just looks like it’s giving one big happy smile to the camera. Seriously, I can’t look at it without smiling myself. I hope it was genuinely having a lovely day.

The high point (possibly low point) of the aquarium, as with many, was the reef environment, complete with sharks galore. There were a bunch of reef sharks- variously tipped- as well as lemon sharks, grey nurse sharks, leopard sharks and a few others. I like sharks. I didn’t use to. They used to terrify me. The mere thought of them. Then I actually dived with them a bunch of times. I have a deep, deep respect for them. But I admire their beauty in a way I never thought I would. And as long as they’re the more harmless types, such as reef sharks and lemon sharks, they don’t freak me out.

Put me in the water with a bull shark, and that’s another story.

Photographing the curved glass wall of the final display gave some fun optics when combined with the wide end of my Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8, and I got some interesting images coming back to me.

Incidentally, I shot using available light throughout (no flash), on my Canon EOS 5D- now starting to become a bit of a dinosaur in the DSLR lexicon, but despite being 7 years old, still holds its own as both a classic, and a top-end performance camera. The high-ISO end of things isn’t necessarily the best, so it does struggle in the sorts of low-light conditions I was shooting on this particular day- I’d say I was pushing it towards its limits- but all in all I was pretty pleased with how it worked out.

I shot using my EF 16-35mm f/2.8 wide-angle lens- still the best piece of glass I’ve ever purchased- and the super-cheap EF 50mm f/1.8, an ultra-lightweight plastic-fantastic of a lens, but with a faint macro function and a nice intermediate focal length still a very usable lens in low-light conditions, when racked all the way open at the 1.8 end of the spectrum.

Fin.

Fish Soup (It’s Been a While)

I’ve not really been underwater since leaving PNG, which was where I really developed a love for diving.  I also learned to be comfortable (mostly) in the water.  I’ve always been a good swimmer, but what lurks beneath the water, out of sight, has always scared me a little.  Not until I saw my first shark (a cute little black-tip) did I realise that the wildlife under the waves is overwhelmingly beautiful, and something to be cherished, not feared.

In Fiji I managed a couple of dives, and a good deal of snorkelling on one of the most spectacular beachside reefs I’ve ever had the joy of splashing across.  I re-acquainted myself with some old fishy friends (you’ve already seen my latest Anemonefish post- bless their stripey orange socks), as well as meet some new ones.

A little sampler below.

First off the mark is an old favourite.  This colour-strewn fellow is known, for painfully apparent reasons, as the Picasso Triggerfish.  He looks rather as if a box of crayons has vomited on him (similar things could be said about the work of his namesake, if you ask me).  As my old diving buddy Jan continuously points out, Triggerfish are notoriously territorial, and it’s well worth keep an eye on what they’re up to when you’re in their territory.  However the Picasso is not generally among the most aggressive species (at least in my experience).  They are, however, incredibly flighty, and I was very chuffed to be able to get this shot before he shimmied off among the coral branches.  I am always delighted to find one of these flitting around the reef, as they are visually stunning to look at.  One I’ve seen for years, but never fails to delight.

A bit of trivia, for those not in the know: The Picasso Triggerfish, and its similarly patterned cousin the Reef Triggerfish, together share the honour of being the State Fish of Hawaii.  In the native Hawaiian tongue, they share the polysyllabic but oh-so-delightful-to-recite name of Humuhumunukunukuapua’a (“triggerfish with the snout of a pig”).

This ethereal beauty is a species of Reef Squid (I have no idea which one).  I’ve seen squidlets around on dives before, but I’ve never seen this species, nor anything quite like its enchanting behaviour.  Nearly translucent in the water, they drift with an almost tangible silence, the fins that surround their body undulating to propel them forwards.  Or backwards.  I’m not actually sure which end is which.

We came across them as they approached us in a curious line, almost like a flight of aircraft on a recce.  Again quick to flit off, eventually they came back for another curious gaze, and hovered in the water just below us.  On the third or forth occasion that they delighted us with a swim-past I managed to get a series of shots which I was very pleased with.  You can clearly see the delicate markings on the larger shot, while processing the other image for white balance and colour temperature revealed a pink-red hue that was quite unexpected but utterly wonderful.  One of the stranger wayfarers we stumbled upon on the reef, but certainly one of the more wonderful.

Next up, another tried and true favourite.  Known to Nemo fans as Scar, and regretfully voiced by Willem Dafoe, the Moorish Idol is commonplace to many tropical reefs- but is by no means common in appearance.  (For clarification, I have nothing against Dafoe- in fact, very much enjoy his on-screen presence; but his gravelly voice is far too sinister to represent such a gorgeous fish).  While the fish itself is seen often, many people don’t know its name, and assume it is a type of Bannerfish, or an Angelfish (justifiable because of its spectacular appearance, not because it bears any resemblance to the various species of Angelfish, which are markedly different).  The yellow-black-and-white patterns also resemble some species of Batfish, though on the latter- which is larger- the colours are far more muted.

This photo isn’t about to win any awards, but like many other fish on the reef, the Idol doesn’t stay idle for long.

This is a Three-Stripe Damselfish (Dascyllus Aruanus).  I don’t have much to say about it, except that they’re very pretty.

The Three-Stripe has a little cousin, the Reticulated Dascyllus.  These much tinier fish are often seen congregating around coral plates and outcrops, and have a terribly delicate appearance- very lovely to watch.

And this one is a Royal Angelfish.  REALLY pretty.  I like these ones. 

These next two shots are of another favourite, the Blue-Green Chromis.  Here they’re flitting among the branches of a coral thicket.  They’re beautiful fish- they swim in shimmering shoals near the surface of the water, darting down as one unit with a gleam of shining flanks that looks positively metallic (hence the name).  Out of direct sunlight, the strong colour of their scales really shows up.  They’re a delight to snorkel amongst, always hovering just beyond the tips of your fingers as you drift past.

Another commoner- so common I don’t even know its name- is this stripey fellow.  I leave you with this one, and a cheeky little face-off from our regular guest here, the spunky Anemonefish.

Close Enclownter

After an eighteen-month hiatus, I finally got back into the water in Fiji.  Or not so much into it, but under it.  And I got to take my camera (the Powershot G9, not, sadly, the 5D) swimming too.

The snorkelling along the beach was fantastic- probably the most beautiful beachside reef I’ve ever had the opportunity to explore (more on that presently).  However I did also get the chance to do a little diving as well.  A refresher dip, just so I could recall how to submerge myself without panicking/drowning/getting decompression illness.  Then a shark dive (way to ease yourself back into the hobby), replete with Grey, White-Tip and Black-Tip Reefers, Grey Nurses, and a couple of pretty bulky Lemon Sharks as well.  Awesome fun- but sadly, in my haste (and a tickle of nervousness as well) I accidentally left the camera on the boat.

I also did a dive with my fiancee.  It was her first, an explorer dive, which she very bravely accomplished with the instructor with just 15 minutes’ worth of briefing- something I never would have done.  But I managed to remember my camera this time, and took it along to document the fun, and explore the reef at the same time.

As I’ve mentioned before, anemonefish are great subjects, because unlike most fish, which scurry away the moment you home in on them like a cycloptic predator, anemonefish tend to stay put.  You know where to find them (check out your nearest anemone), and not only do they not swim away, they often charge at you, all teeth and tiny bouts of indignance.

This little reel is a set of six colourful shots I managed to snatch of one pair of such little critters.  The combination of bright colours, the exotic location, and the semi-translucent tentacles of the anemone itself, all make for fun viewing.  I hope you enjoy.

For the record, I suspect that the little fishies showcased here are all Cinnamon or Fire Anemonefish (Amphiprion Melanopus)- a little different from the Anemone Clownfish of Nemo fame which most people are familiar with.  I have no idea what the anemones are (there are at least two species shown here).

More Fiji shots- above and below water- to come.

Note: Photo at top taken snorkelling in Blue Lagoon; photos at bottom taken diving at depth ~10m on Blue Lagoon Reef.

Moments in Time and Space #7: Wongat

It’s no secret that I didn’t really love my time living in Papua New Guinea, for a variety of reasons. However the one thing that did make the place special were the weekends. Saturday mornings we would jump onto Jan’s dive-boat and head out into Madang Harbour, easily one of the prettiest pieces of tropical real-estate in the Pacific. A large natural harbour surrounded by an outer reef wall many miles long, the harbour’s shallow waters are home to a diversity of marine life, not to mention interesting dive sites and historic wrecks. A smattering of islands can be reached within ten minutes of the jetty, among the prettiest, Wongat Island, a tiny little blob of rock, sand and palm-trees that would fit well inside a football stadium.

I liked Wongat because it had perhaps the nicest sand beach in the harbour, and a lovely shallow run-out into the warm sea. The water stayed a balmy 29 degrees centigrade through most of the year, while shoals of colourful fish played among rock outcrops, which snorkellers could explore leisurely beneath a hot sun.

I found this little outrigger (yeah, I know, it’s kind of familiar) bobbing around the corner from the main beach, tucked behind a few rocks. The shot itself was taken with my little Canon Powershot G9 (the same camera used for my underwater photography- Jan used the G9, and now has the G10, for his underwater shots as well), and to take the photo I held a pair of polarized sunglasses over the lens (as I couldn’t fit a polarizing filter over the front) to capture the clarity of water and contrast in the sky. The result was one of my favourite photographs from the year, and made my list of favourite photos. Coupled with the beauty of the environment it was taken in, this one’s a keeper for me.

Rocking Planet Rock

I can safely say I have never seen quite such a plethora of fish than that which I saw at Planet Rock on Saturday.  I couldn’t begin to number them.  In this small sliver of a shot you can see- what- three hundred?  Five hundred?  I haven’t even tried counting.  And there was a solid three-dimensional wall of them, like a gigantic underwater swimming-pool jammed full.  An immense living morass of sleek flitting fish.  My only regret for the morning’s exploits was that a smudge in the middle of my underwater case on the inside of the glass ruined most of my shots.  You’ll have to bear with me on the few that I’ll share here.

Here you can see Jan doing his thang.  A graceful and experienced diver, Jan’s pretty much lost track of how many dives he’s done, but it’s over 2,000.  Most of them here in Madang Harbour.  He’s also a darn good underwater photographer and a true artist with Photoshop.  When he puts his stuff up on RedBubble I’m sure buying some.  Here’s an older shot of him cruising along the bottom of Madang Harbour, sans smudge and with a bit more light.

A pair of barracuda were gliding in a lazy circle like a pair of cruise missiles looking for something to bomb.  They’re cool fish.  Very benign to be close to, but with those maws they look like mean buggers.  Like sharks they’re so streamlined and graceful.  We had a shark out there on Planet Rock, too, but I didn’t get a photo.  We only caught distant glimpses of him up near the surface, a big Grey Reefer, perhaps eight feet long, just that unmistakable silhouette up against the light.  It’s a wonderfully eerie and humbling experience being close those ancient predators.

Overall, Planet Rock has to be one of my favourite dive sites, and I’m just sorry I wasn’t able to get a better range of photos out of my time there.  I’d say next time, but sadly as my time in PNG draws to a close, that next time may be a very long way off…

Any Given Sunday

Sunday.  I hooked up with Eunice, who’s the head chef down at the Madang Resort.  We’d been talking for a few weeks of doing a dive outside the Harbour, where folks do most of their diving.  I poached a car from the office, we loaded up with four tanks of air, an esky with ice and sandwiches, and set off down North Coast road.  Destination?  We weren’t really sure…

But we had a few places in mind, and figured we’d play it by ear.  Just over an hour out of town is the village of Kubugum.  This is where boats leave for Karkar Island six days a week.  On Sundays, however, the market is shut and the banana-boats, usually drawn up on shore, are conspicuously absent.  There’s an island out in the harbour, maybe five hundred yards off-shore.  So we found a friendly man and his wife with a little aluminium row-boat who was willing to paddle us out there.  We didn’t know what we’d find around the island, but we thought we’d give it a go anyway.

We loaded up.  It was a 10-foot boat, teeny-tiny.  Into the boat climbed Eunice, myself, the man, his wife, two tanks of air and associated breathing and diving aparatus.  And six children.  There was a hole in the hull about the diameter of a kitchen tap.  Water came through it at a similar rate.  There were two little plastic tubs with the lids cut off.  One little girl stamped her heel over the hole in the bottom of the boat and two more bailed out the boat for all they were worth while the man and his wife paddled us across the channel with leisurely strokes.  I comforted myself with the knowledge that if the boat did in fact sink, I had an hour’s air supply with me under the water.

Pulled up on the island, we pulled on gear and got straight in.  The water was warm and once away from the sandy shoreline, quite clear.  There was a reef shelf about ten metres deep, then a nice drop-off that sloped gently away into the ocean.  Fish life was copious, and the coral landscapes were exotic and enticing.  It was a wonderful dive, all the more fun for the freshness of it.  Eunice and I circumnavigated the island and ended up where we started an hour later, myself with all of 30 bar left in my tank.

We paddled back across the bay.  This time our leaky skiff was accompanied by three little boys in an outrigger.  If they were wise they’d keep their distance so that when we sank to the bottom, they wouldn’t get pulled down by helpless floundering escapees.  Back on the road, we backtracked a short distance to a little village whose name I don’t even know, looking for a spot called WaraWall.

WaraWall we know as Hole in the Wall.  It’s a sheltered little lagoon bounded by a reef wall, into which time and the relentless surf has worn a great natural archway about five metres across in the lagoon floor.  It’s entirely underwater, and is a bit of an attraction among locals.  Keen snorkellers can swim the little passage out into the open ocean.  The lagoon itself is very picturesque, with a white coral-sand beach and children playing in the surf, while brown thatched huts peek out from the bush at the water’s edge.

After a surface interval we got back in the water, this time fighting the waves on the way out before dropping over the reef wall.  The visibility was perhaps a little lower, but the small network of gullies formed by the reef were a treat to explore.  Sea cucumbers and small reef fish abounded close in, while at the rollover into the Bismarck Sea, we found shoals of Fusiliers, Angelfish, Moorish Idols, Butterflyfish, and plenty more besides.  A highlight was a pair of large Hump-Headed Parrotfish towards the turning point of the dive.  We entered the water via the Hole, finding a beautiful Lionfish drifting with the surge before resurfacing.

What was great about this Sunday was that it really was like any given Sunday out here.  Dive gear notwithstanding, the day cost us twenty-five Kina in access fees and a bit of fuel money.  Sites like this abound up and down the North Coast, and for those of us who enjoy taking advantage of the diving opportunities here, every weekend we spend it out on the water (as those of you who’ve been watching my photos and stories over the last couple of months have realised, with me sounding increasingly like a record stuck on ‘dive’).  When I get back to my other life in Australia, I have no idea what I’m actually going to do with my weekends…

Something Lionfishy

This beautiful Lionfish (Scorpionfish; Firefish; Turkeyfish) was floating in the surge beneath Hole in the Wall on Sunday.  I really adore these guys- such a wonderful display of feathery creativity.  I will sorely miss being able to get close to such wonderful creatures.

Biodiversity

One of the great attractions of diving is the abundance of life you get to witness. It’s true what they tell you in the handbooks- a half-hour dive on the reef will let you see more diverse flora and fauna than ten times as long walking through a forest or a field. Pick the right spots, and life is teeming around you, always moving, always interesting, always colourful. It’s a never-ending procession of the creativity of the Creator, and I get high off it.

Since getting into diving, I’ve discovered that one of the coolest things about being underwater is that a lot of the stuff that lives down there is downright weird. I’ve posted a few nudibranch shots, for example. When I say the word ‘slug’, you’re going to think of some ugly grey slimey thing that oozes on your lettuce head. But these marine versions are so phenomenally diverse, with bizarre and seemingly extraneous appendages and blatantly unnecessary colours, they could have stepped right out of a Gaultier costume extravaganza.

Take Christmas Tree Worms. These guys are awesome. I had no idea what they were at first. They look like little plastic toys, sticking out of holes in rocks or coral heads. Their bizarre spirals cluster like superfluous decorations, a teeny tiny forest, so for a while I wasn’t sure if they were plant, animal or mineral. They look just like a soft coral growth, but when you get too close, they suck back into their holes, curling up and vanishing in the blink of an eye- distinctly un-plant-like behaviour. Again what strikes me each time I see them is the wonderful colours. I’ve only got this one shot of a blue one, but I’m determined to see if I can’t collect a full set of colours.

These next shot I don’t have a lot of intelligent things to say about. I don’t know what you’re looking at. It’s just a random piece of reef scenery. Most likely coral. I just love that it looks like nothing else you’d find on the earth’s surface- it could almost be some alien flora. And this is a tiny six-inch fraction of a reef. Imagine if you could catalogue everything living and growing on Madang’s ten miles of living barrier.

This giant spiny Sea Slug was one of the highlights of Sunday’s dive. I’ve no idea what species it is, but it was huge- about a foot long, and as fat around as a clenched fist. You could headline it in a Ridley Scott feature and nobody would have any problem believing it was some extra-terrestrial parasite. The outrageous colours and bizzare protrusions make it like a giant step-brother to the fragile little nudibranchs, a behemoth among molluscs. Enjoy it in all its grotesque, spiny glory.

This little Hawkfish I shot in murky light near Tab Island last weekend. I really loved how his patterns and body-makeup make him blend perfectly into the spiny coral.

And on the subject of patterns, neither of these shots are as crisp as I would have liked, but both were taken in suboptimal optical conditions (say that three times very quickly with a marshmallow in your mouth). I hope to get a better chance at catching them again in the future. The first is, I think, some species of Angelfish. I’m not entirely sure. I found it flitting around coral off Barracuda Point on Saturday, during a dive that was full of exciting wildlife, but low on photographic opportunities. This one moved just a little too much for me to get a sharp shot, but even so I think you can appreciate the wonderful colouring and patterns.

The second photograph is of a juvenile Emporer Angelfish. The Emporer Angelfish is a relatively common sight along the reefs here, but apparently the juvenile version is a little less prolific. The two look nothing alike- in fact if you didn’t know it, you’d think it was a completely different species of fish. I will try and get a photo of an adult for comparison. But this juvie’s rings and swirls and splotches of white and blue are just delightful- truly one of the prettiest fish I’ve seen. This one was lurking around the wreck of a Cessna just off Tab Island.

From a little juvenile a few centimetres long, to a great walloping lump of fish more than thirty metres down, this guy is some species of Rock Cod, I think. He was the second of these I found lurking under a coral growth in just a couple of minutes. I spotted his cousin a little earlier while loitering at forty metres, but as I was about to line up a shot I noticed Jan had moved on and was around the next spur, and I didn’t fancy being left alone. Ascending, and this one made his presence known. At over half a metre long, I bet you could get quite a few steaks out of him.

And from the plain and almost ugly to the extravagantly beautiful. This one is a reefside classic, alternately known as a Firefish, Lionfish, Scorpionfish, or even Turkeyfish. I think that the common name for this species is the Red Firefish, and it belongs to the order Scorpionidae, so Scorpionfish works as well, but with a big mane like this you can see why it gets the Lionfish moniker. This is with out a doubt one of my favourite fish in the sea. It is posessed of a delicate beauty, with that fan of long fragile trendrils that float like so much extraneous crepe-paper. The stripes are full of drama, a veritable siren screaming ‘do not touch’: the Firefish gets its name from the row of poison-tipped spines protruding from its dorsal fin. And like the sub-adult Sweetlips, its locomotive habits make it a joy to photograph. The Lionfish hangs motionless in the water, looking deceptively like a piece of discarded seaweed, drifting with the surges, before pouncing on smaller unsuspecting fish. I got my lens to within six inches of this young one- always cognisant of the dorsal spines- and it never really gave me a second look.

Just a teeny tiny sampling of the vast and rich diversity life has to offer beneath the waves. When you think about the size of the oceans, it’s enough to blow your mind…

This Wreck is the Bomb-er

I won’t say that it’s one of my favourite dive sites, because I pretty much love them all. It is however a fascinating blend of history and nature that teases the imagination, above and below the water.

The American B-25 sits in shallow waters just off Wongat Island. She was shot down during the Second World War by the Japanese, when they held northern Papua New Guinea and had one of their major bases just a few miles down the road. The story of her six crew is not a happy one. Although just one crewman died in the crash itself, the other five were captured and, in retaliation for recent bombing raids carried out by the Americans, executed. The aircraft sits in almost perfect condition as a lasting, living memorial beneath the waters.

It’s only even been murky when I’ve dived the B-25, so I have yet to get a good shot of the wreck as it lies. It’s at a considerable angle, with one wingtip at about twelve metres’ depth, the other down around twenty-eight. The wings and tail-plane are still intact, and even remnants of the undercarriage can be spotted. The deeper right wing has the propellor fixed to the engine, bent back by the crash-landing but still recognizable where it sticks vertically out of the sand.

One of the favourite features of the aircraft are undoubtedly its machine-guns, still mounted in the wreck. There are four guns protruding from the nose housing, two inset in each wing, a tail gun, and the B-25’s distinctive gun-turret mounted atop the fuselage towards the rear of the aircraft.

Divers can drop into the roofless cockpit and sit in the pilot’s seat, the steering-wheel still mounted in the control board. This is my boss. I’m pretty sure he’s supposed to have that second stage between his teeth…

Over time, as with everything discarded in the sea, nature has claimed the craft, which has now become a naturalised reef. A giant barrel-sponge sits on the up-slope wingtip, a distinctive marker during the descent and now growing so big that there are concerns it could snap the wing off altogether. Coral and sponges and algaes and all sorts of other undersea flora have colonized the surfaces. Fish spawn in the hundreds inside the relative safety provided by the abandoned fuselage. Others graze the vegetation under the wings and around the tail mount.

There are regulars here. A White Leaf Scorpionfish lives among thorny corals at the back of the left-hand wing, elusive and hard to spot even on a clear day. The bottom shot shows him in natural light rather than flash-lit, and you can see why he’s not that easy to find. He’s about four inches long. Check out that beautiful eye.

I’ve seen these guys a couple of times when I’ve been down there. I can never tell whether they’re False Moorish Idols, Three-Stripe Angelfish, or some other form of Bannerfish, all of which look pretty similar. They are beautiful- though a tad skittish and hard to get close to, hence the murky shot.

Ribbon eels live in the sand beneath the downslope wing and are predictably easy to find, worming their way half out of their holes like Cobras swaying to a snake-charmer’s pipe.

Yesterday, there was some giant lobster living under the wing. I haven’t seen him before, I just noticed his antennae and the front knuckles of his long spindly legs dancing out from underneath the wing. I didn’t get too close. He must have been nearly a metre in size, when all the protrusions and probiscuses were taken into account. He was a little shy and slipped back into the silt before I could get a photo.

The other resident we came across yesterday was the polar opposite, both in terms of size and body complexity. This little nudibranch was spotted by Bec, who managed to prove to me (as has been proved to me time and again) that I suck at finding nudibranchs. I do, however, love a bit of nudi action when I can get it.

My favourite family of Anemonefish lives on the right wing of the bomber. They’re just back a little ways from the cockpit in a big writhing blob of anemone, predictable and easy to find. Unlike Lionfish or Sweetlips, the Anemonefish tend to be a little camera-shy, and as soon as you point the thing at them, they’re dancing like they’ve got ants in their pectorals. In fact they’re some of the most highly territorial little fish in the sea, and even though relative to them I am the size of an Enterprise-class aircraft carrier, they still try and see me off from their patch. As a result, getting an in-focus photo of one is no mean feat. I resort to the age-old practice of firing off as many pictures as I can take and hoping that by sheer dumb luck, at least one will turn out right.

It works occasionally.

The shot below shows the difference between shooting flash and shooting natural light (this one using natural light).

After spending half an hour on the wreck, we come back up for a safety-stop on the chain holding the marker bouy.

It’s hard to avoid celebrating the diversity of life, even on something as incongruous as a war wreck. I find the triumph of creation as one of the great beautiful mysteries of this world. Left to itself, we find the force of life manifesting in almost every circumstance, even one where death previously triumphed. As if the natural world is telling us with one loud voice, everything can be redeemed.

Sweet Lips, Dude

My knowledge of Sweetlips is pretty limited. I first heard of the fish as a species hand-feeding chunks of bread to them from the end of a reefside jetty in Vanuatu about six months ago. Big squat things without fancy colour or graceful shape, they’re still somehow appealing in their brute ugliness, like many fish I paddle across. Apparently they taste great, though I’ve never (to my knowledge) eaten one.

These here are sub-adult Silver Sweetlips- given away by the array of yellow spots over their body. They’re not pretty. They’re not streamlined. As far as I know they’re not possessing of any uncommon intelligence. What makes them special for the photographer, however, is that they’re about as dynamic as cows. They sit there on sandy bottoms- in this case in rock crevices about twenty metres down the reef wall- and hang there an inch off the ground. They don’t really move much, and they don’t appear to be particularly bothered by the presence of divers. If you’re careful, you can get to within a few inches of them, and they might give a lazy flick of the tail and drift just out of reach, but so long as you don’t charge in amongst them, that’s about as much movement as you’re likely to see.

So I had some fun lining up a few shots with them. Here, one Sweetlips shows off the distinctive pattern of yellow spots that sadly fade with time.  You can see the distinctive fat pout that presumable gives the fish its common name.

Firing flash catches some of the silvery hues off the fish’s flank. While I like using natural light where possible to photograph underwater, conditions often make this challenging. If the dive is deep or the sun is behind cloud, not only does this adversely affect shutter-speeds, but you lose the natural colours of the subject, and everything cools down to shades of blue. Firing a flash is like putting a burst of sunshine on a fish, and if you’re subtle about it, you can make it as bright and colourful as it would be at the surface.

Listen to me. I make it sound like I actually know what I’m doing here.

This Sweetlips below clearly had enough of my photographic intrusions and tried to make a run for it. Happily it still moved slowly enough that I could keep it lined up in the frame. Its more colourful piscine cohabitants like the Moorish Idol and the Anemone Clownfish (forthcoming) are rarely so accomodating.

As well as making moves on loitering Sweetlips, we came across a whole bunch of other life down in Sek Passage yesterday. In fact, there were shoals and shoals of the stuff above us near the reef crown.

I only had a split second to fire off a shot at this torpedo-like Barracuda as it streaked past me, so it’s not as sharp as I would have liked. Mind you, his teeth certainly are.

This little fella I have no clue about. All I can say is he was slow enough for me to get a bead on him before he scuttled off. If anyone knows his name, drop me a line. I’m always curious.

My final offering from Sek Passage is somewhat less natural than the rest of my portfolio. This is a diver’s weight, the sort we hang from our belts to help us stay underwater rather than cork to the surface. I spotted it almost directly beneath where we’d anchored the boat at the mouth of the passage. To give you an idea of scale, it’s about three inches long. I don’t know how long it’s been down there, presumably dropped by some slip of wet fingers and lost to the deep. It was about seven metres down. It’s an anthropic intrusion into an otherwise natural environment, but I really like how it’s been colonized by the reef anyway. With luck, in another few years, you won’t even be able to see it at all.