Monterey Jellies

[Larry C]

My Photobucket is back up and running with room for storage (although I'm not yet happy with the organization) so I thought I'd start posting some images from the last few months. Last month we had a huge invasion of tiny jellies. Since they like the algae layer where the good eatin' is, and they're tiny and etherial, they were a bitch to get good shots of. Here are the few I was satisfied with.

Scrippsia pacifica

Aegina citrea

No Clue whatsoever

A.aequorea

Mitrocomella polydiademata (about 25mm) with a tiny shrimp hitchhiking on top

 

[mikerault]

Love the rider! Excellent shots! I am going last week in June hope I get some shots! What lens where you using? I have the 100mm macro, would that be enough?

 

[Larry C]

These were taken with my SP350, supermacro, autofocus, backlit. The 100 probably might be tough to focus. They move in and out with the surge so much that it's just pure luck when you get one to stay in the viewfinder and get some kind of focus. This is the first time I've seen the little guys here. Usually we seem to get mostly Moons, Sea-Nettles and Purples. Most are gone now, but there's still the occasional sighting and who knows what will come in.

 

[ryssyr]

awesome pics! I saw a ton of these last week, but had my 100mm macro and didnt get one clear shot. The shots last week that came out were from one dive where I had my wide angle lens.

I've never seen this kind of jelly life around until the last month.

 

[Jim Ernst]

Hey Larry..

How are you Buddy?

Larry these are some really cool shots, I have also not ever seen these jellies around Monterey.

And what excites me even more is the cleaner shrimp riding on them!

Great shots my friend!

 

[Larry C]

Thanks Ryssyr & Jim. The jellies seem to be gone now, didn't see any today, but the vis was a whole lot better to make up for it. Green layer was completely missing today. A few days of sunshine and it'll be back though, I'm sure.