Dive photos from Aug 4-14 Comments and Criticism are welcome...

[deborahdelamar]

Very, very nice eye & photos! I love the B&W moray and many of your macro non-fishy photos.

Fish ID corrections:
Image 5412: The coney is being cleaned by a goby, not a wrasse. The two gobies here that look like that are broadstripe & barsnout and your little one looks more like broadstripe to me.

Image 5660: There is no critter in the Caribbean called a Chainlink Moray. There's a Chain Moray but it doesn't look anything like this, which is a very golden Goldentail.

Gracias!

 

[charlesml3]

Yay Deborah! I was hoping you'd jump in and help me with IDs. I didn't think that "chainlink" was right. Another DM told me that was what it was but I'd never heard it called that. I've updated the descriptions on Flickr.

Something new I learned: 5667 sometimes goes by "Jack Knife" or "Jack Knife Fish." Apparently when a Juvenile Spotted Drum is tiny it's called be either name. Miguel from CozumelDigitalCreations pointed that out to me.

If you have any other feedback, please post it! I can take the criticism. In fact, I welcome it. There's no better way to improve...

 

[driftin' by]

What aquarium did you take those at? Just kidding... Spectacular especially the B&W Moray.

 

[deborahdelamar]

Something new I learned: 5667 sometimes goes by "Jack Knife" or "Jack Knife Fish." Apparently when a Juvenile Spotted Drum is tiny it's called be either name. Miguel from CozumelDigitalCreations pointed that out to me.

Spotted Drum and Jackknife are separate species in the Drum family -- different fish. The Spotted Drum always has a black spot on its "nose" while the Jackknife has a dark vertical line or "dash." The Jackknife may have yellow coloring -- the Spotted Drum won't show any yellow -- and its dorsal and anal fins are always held in a stiff "L". Young Spotted Drums continuously wave their dorsal & anal fins and are much harder to photograph because of that!

5667 is a Spotted Drum.

 

[ivakdiver]

Great photos, Charles! Makes me want to get back down south soon with my camera.

 

[charlesml3]

5667 is a Spotted Drum.

Got it. Then would 5677 be a Jack Knife? It was certainly more yellow than white.

Thanks!

-Charles

 

[deborahdelamar]

The problem IDing these babies is that everyone loves to shoot them from the side and the ID marking is on the front!

I'm pretty sure that 5677 is a jackknife because it doesn't have enough "schmutz" on its nose. Here's a photo of an even younger spotted drum -- notice the amount of black mottling on its nose -- the black will consolidate into a very obvious spot as it matures:

Spotted Drum - Juvenile - Equetus punctatus - Bonaire - Photo 14 - Tropical Reefs

Versus this older juvie jackknife, whose nose will be cleaner -- more white or translucent white/clear -- when it's younger. This is a mislabeled photo BTW:

Juvenile Spotted Drum | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

 

[SeaSoulSelf]

We just kept saying..WoW! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Dive Choice Mexico]

Just wow! Makes me want to go to work tomorrow!