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 "Click for a larger view Image by Mary Lou Reid")
Longfin waspfish Apistus carinatus
Have YOU seen this before?
All images were taken by photographers guided with Diving 4 Images!
 "Click for a larger view
Pictured dragonet from Bali by Graham Abbott")
Dwi and I recently went over to check out a new area here in Bali. This was to try and find a rare little critter that is much sought after by photographers. As soon I dropped in they were there, the gorgeous and very colourful pictured dragonets. I have seen the before in a Raja Ampat and unlike the Mandarin fish these fish don't only come out durign dusk and dawn. From what I have seen up to now these can be seen throughout the day. Even with my little pocket camera I managed to get a shot good enough to see the wonderful colours of these very rare fish!
Alex Mustard with a Divequest Photographic Group
We took Alex for one day of diving at PJ, he managed to all other area's on his own though brought in our services to get the most of this unique dive site. We all met at Zen Resort, we had timed the dives to coincide with the best tides to make sure we had optimum conditions and give us the best chances of finding target critters. The main target animal was the mimic octopus, due to this being such a large group we had brought in a few other dive guides to ensure the very best service for Alex and his group. We made three dives and everyone managed to see the target critters on this site plus some more.
Click here to see what Alex photographed on his 3 dives.
9th January - 13th January Perry Kuo
Perry and I had been mailing, he had seen the rare critters no my site, after coming to Bali many times he wanted to see if I could indeed show him things he had never seen here before. Another great photographer coming armed with a wish list, only his has animals had I never heard of, we worked out over the course what they were though.
Perry has a great rhinopias symposium on his own site and wanted to see these, sad fact though, it seems they have not been seen for a logn time in Padang Bai. Andy and I went there prior to Perry's arrival with twin tanks to really see if this was true, sure enough no rhinopias and nothing we wouldn't see near Seraya. On arrival at Seraya Perry and his assistant readied the camera gear, our first dive was a dusk dive. On entry we instantly came to an ornate ghost pipefish, then a long tail ghost pipefish. I came across a tiny red frogfish though it was very alarmed and swam straight at me and I never saw it again, then another frogfish this time a more unusual though not so photogenic brown spot-fin frogfish. On Perry's list were the decorated hydroid crabs, these are regulars so went to these, then found a cool sponge shrimp and plenty of sea slugs. Whilst starting the search for the boxer crabs, I heard a sudden boom, instantly I knew what it was and turned to see Perry's spotter lamp in bits, it had exploded for some reason, this brought a sudden end to our dive and the out boxer crab hunt.
 "Click for a larger view Thecacera sp. by Perry Kuo")
top
 "Click for a larger view Boxer Crab by Perry Kuo")
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Acentronura gracilissima
by Perry Kuo
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by Perry Kuo
Our night was a real hit too, first coming across a cool pair of Ambon scorpionfish, them the very bizarre articulated sea slug Euselenops breviceps, plenty of weird decorator crabs and bizarre shrimps, really unusual juvenile fish too, still waiting for to see Perry's photo's to try and ID these. Our last dive was trying Secret Bay, visibility was really bad and critters virtually none existent, after spending 74 searching and only finding a few fingered dragonets we didn't bother making a second dive.
Conclusion
Seeing and showing others new critters is always the best ever trip and this
was no exception with plenty of new critters for Perry and a few fish I'm
looking forward to trying to ID.
2-6-04 Bali Diving Tour with Norbert Wu
Norbert's quote "I saw more in 1.5 days of diving with you than I saw in 30 days of diving at KBR!", Kungkungan Bay Resort in the Lembeh Straits.
With only one and half days it was a little bit of hurry to try and get in all the critters on Norb's list though hey a wicked challenge once more. He was after Mimic octopus, boxer crab and a hairy frogfish....
We met up the evening before to talk about the critter list and how best to go about getting them.... It couldn't have started better we hit Seraya and on our first dive and bang.... a hairy looking ghost pipefish, then the bright red Rhinopias eschmeyeri, then to my astonishment another rhinopias though this time it was a colour variation I hadn't yet seen here, a bright yellow Rhinopias frondosa with gorgeous red and blue spots of colour when looking closely. The funny thing is that these two fish were sort of hanging out together, now you tell me, two different species hanging out in the same area.... what's going on here. I've now seen these two species in the very same area and often very close together? There was more with the coolest leafy file fish, what I think is an adult Cheatoderma penicilligera, then a Pegasus sea moth, though this a resident in his usual place, this was only our first dive. We made two more dives though our initial plan was another three.... the last one wasn't needed as we hit the target critters and more. Our target critter was the Boxer crab which Norb has been trying to get shots of for a long time, not only did we find it, we found about 5 different individual Boxer crabs though only a couple were photographable without disturbing them too much.
What I love about this spot is there is no need for turning over rocks and changing the dive site going in search on them. Often they will sit out proud as can be waiting to be photographed, though on occasions they will just hide as well so be careful and please don't turn all the rocks trying grab them out this only disturbs their habitat! We also had a few different Halimeda crabs, Saron shrimps, a small frogfish looking only slightly hairy, I think it was the juvenile of the Hairy frogfish (A. striatus) we'll have to wait till his photo gets a better ID from a someone more in the know on these little beauties!
Next day we hit PJ in Lovina and low and behold a 100% record is still standing with finding the Mimic octopus here, each time they fail to disappoint. In all we had 3 of these out displaying, just how we like to see them. Not only the mimics in our 2 dives here we came across the gorgeous juvenile fingered dragonets, they were more colourful, maybe D. kuiteri?, a few cool shells moving around in the day along with finding some of the most incredible opistobranchs known.... the Melibe (probably M. fimbriata), even more exciting was to see those cool little shrimps taking a ride to make the shot even more dramatic, there were hairy sea hares (Burstella leachi?) and another unknown stripy species of sea hare in groups of over 20 or more and another bunched up group of small bubble shells. Crustaceans were out in force as well with plenty of wild and wacky decorators and carrier crabs, the most bizarre was a triangular crab we had never seen before, it had a perfect triangular shaped body and long gangly legs, we came across a few different Box crabs and the funniest carrier crab with old clothes it had shredded up and put on it's back, a truly hilarious creature.
Click here - to read Norbert's full testimonial
17-3-04 Bali Diving Tours and top New Dive Site....
This new site will be taking over from the old Secret Bay - I had been hearing about a new area being dived in Bali from a few people, it has been named PJ. This site is less attractive at first glance underwater than Secret Bay. With only black sand and very small algae outcrops this really is a baron place. This of course never put me off in the slightest in fact I loved it all the more.My First Dive here
Heading over the flat sand top it was very unusual with only sand ripples and
juvenile razor wrasse, then comes vast amounts of sand dollars and their tracks
all over the sea bed, then comes dense patches of tiny mushroom corals. One tube
anemone I noticed was home to a few rare yellow legged cleaner shrimps....
a first for me (Lysmata prima?) The sand crest came at about 10m
/30, as I wanted to fully explore I slowly headed down to 28m / 94'.
 "Click for a larger image")
Photograph by Graham Abbott©
On recent dives the list now goes like this:
- Numerous sea horses on every dive, including a weedy looking species I have never seen before and tiny dwarf pipehorses.
- My first ever Ambon scorpion fish.
- Blue ring, The Mimic and an unusual blue ringed octopus species I could not identify with blue rings around the legs and tiny blue spots when it moved, and many different small cuttlefish species.
- Blue fin, yellow dwarf and many other different juvenile lionfish species.
- Numerous flying gurnards, most in their colourful juvenile phase.
- Many different species of crustaceans including a Lysmata prima I had never seen before.
- The very rare long fin wasp fish Apistus carinatus and the usual cockatoo wasp fish.
- Fingered dragonets in all different stages of maturity including the very small and most sought after juveniles.
- Many different juvenile frogfish including the weedy A. hispidus.
Of the last two trips on other various dive sites I took very recently we had:
- 2 different juvenile rhinopias though they I could not find them on my latest trips!
- Numerous Boxer crabs.
- Harlequin shrimps, two different pairs on occasions.
- 3 different rhinopias in 2 different species.
- Devil scorpion fish Inimicus didactylus.
- Lots of different leaf scorpion fish.
- Frogfish in sizes varying from as big as your head to as small as a few millimeters.
- Stone fish galore, over 7 on 1 dive in Amed.
- Bubble shells.
- Cockatoo waspfish.
- Pegasus sea moths.
- Bumblebee shrimps.
- Bobtail squids.
- A whole variety of different ghost pipefish.
- Nudibranchs in too many species to start to mention but a few!
- A very unusual angler flounder.
- Pigmy sea horses - 2 different species.
9 Day Bali Dive Tour - 22-2-04 WOW Bali just gets better....
Strange I know.... I just had to make the
conclusion first as I cannot believe it was so good, I need to make sure you at
least read this brief rundown!
Conclusion - this has been one of, maybe even the best trip for critters I
have ever taken anywhere, and all in my new back yard of Bali so to speak!
Highlights - 5 different rhinopias in 2 different species including 2
juveniles, a harlequin shrimp, a large boxer crab, an angler
flounder.... I had never seen prior to this trip, 4 different species of
sea horse, 13 different ghost pipefish, 9 different frogfish ranging from
pinhead size to huge, 2 Pegasus sea moths, 2 even more unusual long tail sea
moths, bobbit worm, fingered and long tail dragonets, sea slugs, crab and
shrimps just too many to mention, keep on reading for a more complete rundown!
Pemuteran - Guests arrived 2 days earlier to rest a little and take in some
spa treatments before they started to dive.
Secret Bay - looking forward to see what we would find this time. In
total we made 4 day and 1 night dive here in a few different areas of this small
bay and it was really better than I had seen it the last few times. We saw, lots
of very long, unusual stick pipefish on most dives, 2 large common seahorses,
juvenile ghost pipefish and a large adult pair, 3 different frogfish, 1 being
the very cool hairy looking frogfish. A very unusual looking fish, virtually the
same as the Pegasus sea moth, though with a very long tail and being very dark
in colour, we saw this twice or maybe there were 2, as it was in different
areas? A huge floppy Melibe sp. sea slug about 18cm long, we watched as it fed
upon the bottom with it's huge mouth extending out to catch whatever it could in
the sand, there were plenty of fingered dragonets in all different sizes, male
and females and a more unusual kind of dragonet, what I call a long tail
dragonet otherwise named Calliurchthys japonicus, a few of these were seen here.
Lots of colourful and a few unusual gobies & blennies, at night of course the
bobbit worm showed it's ugly face, crabs, shrimps and huge prawns galore, we
could see a meal in each one as we went by!!!!
It became a little awkward with the change in tide bringing a mild current. so
we finsihed earlier than usual.
Menjangan Island - the current was
fairly strong in one area so we moved over to a different part of the island to
avoid any struggling. Visibility was lower than usual at about 15-20m, though
Bali was just recovering a heavy weather that lasted nearly a week prior to this
trip. We made a slow drift, the reef scenery in areas of Menjangan is comparable
to some of the best of sites throughout some of the more remote regions of
Indonesia. I love to go a little deep here to 35m to see The Bommie, here a
gorgeous coral filled rock lays, filled with different reef fish that have made
this their home 2 leaf scorpion fish and Bargibants pigmy sea horse here too
made the depth all worth while. I had noticed a large white tip reef ahead of us
though the others never saw it.... doh! As we ascended we saw a few turtles, one
lay in between the corals feeding with no care of us looking on. Some really
interesting sea slugs and on the reef top a cooperative cuttlefish and a very
large octopus.
Our boat driver has problems with the outboard motor though he still managed to
follow our bubbles and anchor in a safe place as to avoid damaging the reef till
we got on the boat. He temporarily repaired the problem and we limped to the
jetty. Lots of boats had arrived from other parts of Bali, it was quite funny
see all the other divers and their guides coming back talking about fighting the
strong current where we had checked earlier. After our snacks the current was
still fairly strong, so I tried to find the middle where the current breaks. Not
quite finding the right place though still good enough to see some good fish
life without too much struggle we slowly drifted around the opposite way to all
the other operators to enjoy the beautiful reef on our own. On this site a
pristine wall drops down filled with gardens of huge sea fans, sponges, soft
corals in a variety of colours, small ledges, grotto's, and later canyons with
black coral bushes and all round excellent reef scenery make this a really
enjoyable dive!
Tulamben - we arrived, settled in and off diving we went. After the storm that swept through a week or so ago I was very keen to see how it had changed.... Happy to see no changes, in fact it may have even been better, the first dive alone we had 2 different species of ghost pipefish together, tiger shrimp, a beautiful yellow thorny sea horse, 2 Pegasus sea moths, sea slugs galore and a juvenile RHINOPIAS. That was just the first dive here as well....
We stayed for our planned 4 days, diving the house reef every day at least once everyday. On the house reef the list goes a little like.... We eventually came across 2 juvenile rhinopias (probably frondosa), a feeding harlequin shrimp, boxer crab, 2 thorny horses, about 6 different ghost pipefish, about 5 juvenile frogfish, a first for me was what I could only call an ANGLER FLOUNDER with a small fin that was sticking up above the mouth like a lure, lots of different sawblade shrimps, and weird and wonderful decorator and sponge crabs, bobtail squids, we came a long tail dragonet here too, leaf scorpionfish and then too many different species of sea slugs to even start to name but a few of them.
This was just on one site as well, we dived a few very pristine reefs nearby too. One of these such dives we saw 2 different of pigmy sea horse, including the rare yellow Bargibants and the plucked chicken (H. denise) schools of big trevally great reef fish action gorgeous coral gardens and of course the famous wreck which we dived a few times in the morning to avoid the crowds.
Padang Bai - I was just hoping the adult rhinopias were still going to still be here. On our first dive we did indeed find the 2 rhinopias (probably R. xenops). I had been talking about this area a lot and was excited to see if we could find more, our search to this same site was worth the while as we came across another rhinopias this time the very much sought after R. Frondosa. Marcel couldn't stop the film from rolling on this dive, what with 3 different rhinopias to shoot in 2 different species and all within 20m / 65' of each other. We had found a huge black giant frogfish many different leaf scorpion fish including a few fast growing juveniles I have been watching grow recently both Marcel and Andrea loved all the different sized marbled dragonets. We came across 2 separate robust ghost pipefish.... looking so much like pieces of weed flowing back and forth in the shallow surge. Another winner of a dive site, though it does seem to be a seasonal thing with all the rhinopias and leaf scorpionfish that seem to move on as the small baitfish leave.
Conclusion above!
Padang Bai - 15-02-04
The Rhinopias saga continues - Out of sheer curiosity I needed to see whether the rhinopias were back in Padang Bai. Armed with a twin tank set up and an underwater video off I went. My usual Jukung (Balinese style boat) driver Kadek looked on as if to say "oh no here he goes again with another 2 hour dive". I was very surprised to see the water so clear after long hard winds and heavy winter rains though Padang Bai is one of the less affected areas for visibility. I was on a mission and headed straight to where the rhinopias used to be, conditions looked very good for rhinopias as the bommies were surrounded by hundreds of small bait fish. Last time here there were not so many, less food for the rhinopias of course! Here there are always leaf scorpion fish and it was great to see they were still around and plenty of them too. I noticed mommy and daddy leaf fish had been at work as their were now a few small juveniles here. Moving down a little I noticed it.... yes it was a rhinopias but not the species I had seen before, unless of course they had now morphed into something totally different. This species does not have the fronds all over it's body like the ones pictured below from June 2003. This fish had one mottled colour throughout its body, a kind of greyish blue colour which seemed to change slightly when I moved around the fish, as it lay there with no care of me taking video. This species had very smooth skin, kind of like the skin a frogfish has, with a really high dorsal fin. Any idea's.... many books have different names for rhinopias, some give this fish the name R. frondosa though I cannot see how it can be the same fish, after all, frondosa surely means the fish has fronds all over it's body!
Searching for more - Other times when I had been here there had been more than one, and like leaf fish, you find one there is usually another some where nearby. I went in search of more. There were lots of very shy horned cowfish, different species of pipefish, dragonets galore, they were all over the place, beautiful with bright red colourful markings all over their bodies and quite a few blue spotted sting rays here. I was searching hard where I had seen them in the past when all of a sudden I noticed, out of the corner of my eye an odd shape, quickly looking closely, it surely was another rhinopias. This time totally blending in with it's surroundings, looking more like a scorpion fish does when it blends in with the coralline algae. Though this was no scorpion fish, the huge dorsal and massive eyebrows give this fella away as being a rhinopias for sure. I approached and started to video, suddenly in a flash it had disappeared leaving only a small cloud of sand, obviously this was the shy one in the bunch. It took me nearly another 5 minutes before I found it again, it really does blend in that well. I eventually managed to get it on video though I have only used this video set up twice and have no way of downloading the footage. As soon as I do you will some either a few jpegs or even a short mpeg movie of them if I can manage this.
The rhinopias story to be continued.....
Latest news - IT IS HOT HOT HOT IN TULAMBEN! Read on.....
January 2004
 "Click for a larger image")
Photograph by Michael Aw©
Bali road trip - Four of us headed off, Silvi who had only just completed her first dive course especially for this trip. My friends, hadn't seen the best of Bali so we took the scenic route through Mengwi, Tabanan and the crater lakes of Bratan, Buyan and Tamblingan. I love to take this route as the scenery always changes with different weather and times of the year. Rice fields are at different stages of cultivation, low lying clouds can form on the rim of the volcanic craters making such dramatic backdrops to this already beautiful scenery.
We arrived at Gilimanuk to dive Secret Bay and made two dives, finding lots of elyisa opistobranchs, a pair of harlequin ghost pipefish, a pair of robust ghost pipefish, 2 huge stick pipefish, the usual resident weird sea snake and of course fingered dragonets, no night dive! We stayed at the Nusantara Family Homestay which seems to be the best available for those wanting to stay near Secret Bay.
Next day we went to Menjangan Island for 2 dives, this was
excellent, I hadn't been here in a while. First we dived the Bat Cave, a really
excellent wall to steep sloping reef filled with sea fans, sponges with great
invertebrate life and plenty of fish. Of course I couldn't resist to go in
search of the smaller critters, this was very rewarding with a yellow leaf
scorpionfish, a tiny plucked chicken pigmy seas horse, nudibranchs, shrimps and
crabs on the many sea cucumbers in the shallows, the reef top here is also very
good with congregations of snapper, sweetlips and lots of other colourful reef
fishes.
The next site was chosen due to the mild current that would take us along
the reef on the far north west, here an
excellent reef top to start with lots of small coral rocks with feather stars
waving in the mild breeze, as we descended the reef becomes slightly patchy
though at 15m / 50' the reef blooms with soft coral colourful sea fans. The
deeper reef below was very inviting, I thought about looking for the Bargibants
pigmy sea horse though was disturbed when a white tip reef shark slowly arose
from it's resting place and swam casually by us. Another loon into the reef and
disturbed again as a large ray went cruising by, all the while at around 25m /
85' the reef scenery is fantastic with large colourful coral covered bommies and
good fish life in places. Ascending and starting to look once for critters we
managed to find another leaf scorpion fish, plenty of blue spotted sting rays and
good fish life, the shallows where we finished was a little further than I had
expected, here the reef top is fairly baron though plenty of critters on the sea
cucumbers and sea stars here.
My friends were happy to rest and snorkel near the ship wreck.
Dwi & I stayed at the new Scubaseraya Resort, I had been hearing about this stretch of reef in front of here for a while now, first it was from Japanese divers who raved about gobies in the black sand. I couldn't resist and with Christianne we went on a night dive. OH OH OH - this was excellent with very unusual critters starting of with over 6 different opistobranchs before I had even past beyond 5m / 15'. Lots of crustaceans including pebble & spider crabs everywhere you looked, plenty of small cowry and other shells here in the rich black sand.
 "Click for a larger image")
Photograph by Michael Aw©
Next day Tulamben - The Liberty ship wreck, conditions were great and with not too many divers around in the morning we had a great dive, especially Sylvia & Gabi who couldn't stay away from the huge school of jacks. Gabi never believed I could really call the jacks and have them schooling around me within seconds, he was soon convinced and even managed to do it himself. As they enjoyed it so much we dived the wreck one more time before heading back south.
I had heard about the Queen of Sea while it was in it's building stages as Kararu were making a deal to charter this for there forthcoming season. Kararu ended up back with Sea Safari and the Queen of the Sea is available for charter. I had to see what it had to offer and joined a cruise, it happened to be one that Michael Aw and Cassandra Dragon wee also joining as a check out cruise. There was a basic plan of an itinerary that had been laid out, our first dive was in Nusa Lembongan, due to strong currents the boats dive master Scott chose the safest site, the Bali Hai Pontoon. I had never been here before and was pleasantly surprised at the health of the reef, it was great with a good hard coral garden and bommies ideal for beginner divers, no wonder Bali Hai base themselves here. After a short chat with Michael about what he was actually interested in photographing, I made a quick phone call and we changed plans and started cruising towards Tulamben to Scubaseraya Resort. Patrick the owner was over the moon as I was his first phone call using the newly installed Telkom network in Tulamben, this made him a very happy chappy indeed, though what made him happier still was that I would bringing Michael Aw, and old friend of Patrick's to dive on his house reef, he instantly started to celebrate!
On arrival Patrick came out to greet us and guided us to the best place to anchor near his resort. He was already a few beers under the weather and full of the joys of spring too, truly great to see such a happy man. Our first mission was to dive the house reef I had been telling Michael all about. I knew what to expect and now with Christianne (an excellent, mad keen critter spotter) at Scubaseraya and myself guiding, Michael and Cassandra would be spoilt. We found lots of very unusual opistobranchs more that we could not identify, the frogfish were there once more along with even more, more saw blade shrimps, the tiger shrimp in the same place and many more unusual critters. We made a few dives over the couple days we stayed in this area and found even more. Fingered dragonets, more boxer crabs regularly in the same place, a juvenile delicate ghost pipefish (S. Leptosomus) showed up one evening though did not settle as we could not find it the next day. This surely is going to be a new top SITE here in Bali.
More discoveries and resorts in Tulamben - Tony & Dot Medcraft, the legends behind Exmouth Dive Center and the whale sharks have now opened up a new resort in Tulamben. Tony & Dot cater for divers who want to see a few different reefs not dived by the masses that come from the south to dive the wreck. The accommodation is also excellent value for money and all to western standards.
Tony wanted to show us one his best finds. Visibility was fairly poor today, though on descent down a terraced reef spur that juts out from the shoreline to over 40m / 130'. Excellent coral cover and great fish life, with a quick look I instantly found a bunch of pigmy sea horses on a sea fan and later a leaf scorpionfish, instantly I knew this place had great potential. The rest of the reef just got better, with a colourful coral covered cavern and more excellent reef on another terraced reef spur, from 15m / 50' on this second coral spur lies a gorgeous soft coral meadow, unfortunately the very mild current was going the wrong way so the soft corals were all limp. It was so great to dive a different reef and one with so much life and potential, sure this will soon become another well visited site though only for those who stay in Tulamben as most new divers tend to only dive the wreck and rightly so, it's great!
Other sites we dived (dove for those of you from USA, though isn't this a bird like a pigeon - hehehehe!) on this trip were Gili Selang and Lipah Bay. I will be diving these much more now that Scubaseraya has a good tender boat available. These two sites are excellent for reef scenery though many operators and divers come here for very different reasons. I just love the underwater scenery in these places, with excellent soft coral filled bommies, a soft coral meadow, hard coral gardens alive with thousands of anthias and damsels flitting around above them, there lots of sea fans and even a small wreck with excellent soft coral cover.
It just gets better each time!
August 2003
Padang Bai - 2 trips for videographers wanting to film the
incredible rhinopias frondosa (weedy scorpion fish).
Pressure was on as I had these 2 different guys at 2 different times in
August ready with video in hand to film this awesome fish, would it
still be there.... Well it was and what is even more special is that
there were another two of them on the first trip there, 3 altogether!
At times two would get very close as if they are a mated pair.... I am
sure they are? During the 2 trips here we also found 2 different robust
ghost pipefish, 2 inimicus (devil scorpion fish), the resident
giant black frogfish, a very cool ceratosoma trilobatum and a
few other more common nudibranchs, lots of other bizarre scorpion fish,
the usual load of leaf scorpion fish and the colourful dragonets too!
 "Click for a larger image")
Padang Bai - one day of diving, a few check dives for guests who were joining the Black Sand Critter Cruise. Jon had asked about the chance of seeing the rhinopias I had told him about seeing here, "no promises though I'll try". On our two dives we came across a whole range of great critters, about 4 different leaf scorpion fish, cockatoo wasp fish, juvenile ribbon eels, colourful dragonets, gobies and blennies, cuttlefish, though what had us really wild with joy was coming across not just the white one I had seen here before.
 "Click for a larger image")
This time there was two of them, RHINOPIAS FRONDOSA? and most impressive of all was a bright red coloured one, almost purple and wow!!!! such a beautiful and ornate looking fish. It was not at all bothered with Jon and his huge camera set up going in for macro shots of the fishes face. Another great day of diving in Bali!
25th May 2003
Tulamben - the wreck was still OK, visibility was much lower than usual. It was as low as 10m/30', this was first thing in the morning too when it should be much better. I only had a quick look around the wreck, still has one lone pigmy sea horse H. denise there, some colourful soft coral cowries and interesting goby and blennies as usual. The best area for critters, the River has been covered over with lots of silt, not too many critters above about 15m 50'.
14th April 2003
Padang Bai - here is the list of top critters seen on only 2 dives in 1 day, on this one particular dive site:
Leaf scorpion fish galore - a total of 7 different individuals including a beautiful magenta coloured one seen here regularly now.... ahhh such a beautiful sight to see! 2 giant commersons frogfish, one hiding amongst the reef looking like a not so interesting sponge and the other one just sitting out in the open waiting for an easy meal to pass by, a very well camouflaged adult warty or maculatus frogfish, this I have seen here before it's a real task to see it. I have missed it on other occasions though I found in exactly the same place I first saw it. It is so hard to find as it looks just like the coralline algae rubble bottom it hides on, in fact it has coral growth on it too, very small tunicates, hydroids etc. There was a large and very colourful flying gurnard with it's fins splayed out for all to see, a crocodile snake eel hiding in the sand looking just like a rock, a stargazer.... the first time I've seen them here in Bali, now I know they are definitely here, I will just have to look harder to find one every time, a juvenile cockatoo waspfish looking just like a leaf as it went back and forth in the surge, 6 different Spanish dancer nudibranchs and the beautiful and not so commonly seen gymnodoris aurita (deep red with bright yellow spotted nudibranch), lots of great decorator crabs, small dragonets, gobies, blennies, pipefish and lots of other stuff these were just the highlights!
And yes divers, the Holy grail of top critters is also being found here in Bali, it's been seen in Bali over the last few months. First hearing of sightings from Sue Jarvis, Aquamarine's dive guides have been seeing them for a while hear also. I had been there once to have a look for this elusive and most beautiful of reef fishes and spent the whole dive looking in the wrong area, on this trip I just done my own thing and there it was.... RHINOPIAS FRONDOSA!
30th December 2002
Secret Bay - during the two dives I had last time the critters I came
across were:
2 different species of sea horse and 3 different
individuals, a pair of huge ornate ghost pipefish, a huge pair of long
tail ghost pipefish, 2 different frogfish, fingered dragonet, nudibranchs
and emperor shrimps on the back of sea cucumbers and lots of great
juvenile reef fishes.
Interested? Click here to inquire for more information about Bali diving!