The continuing sagas of the Blue Heron Bridge

[BHB ScubaTroll]

Since I'm a noob to all this, I do a lot of Google searching to figure out different creatures I find at the bridge. Here's one of my favorite ID sites:
Caribbean Reefs - Groupers - Seabasses - Basslets - Soapfishes

That looks like a lantern bass. The first time I saw one was this past Wed. when I went snorkeling at the bridge. I got a good pic of it, and when I got home I used the above site to ID it.

Without the tail fin (four black spots), it is impossible to be completely sure, but all other tell-tale signs point to Lantern Bass including the dark rectangular marks toward the bottom. This is obviously a member of the Bass family and based on the brown markings on top (vs. the black rectangular markings of the Harlequin Bass). It is most likely a Lantern Bass.

 

[jet126]

I agree with Jim: a lanturn bass.

After looking through the books and link (Thanks Z!), KP must have mis-captioned his photos. He also took this and I think it's the juvenile puddingwife.

 

[mntlblok]

Lanterns and pudding

I agree with Jim: a lantern bass.

After looking through the books and link (Thanks Z!), KP must have mis-captioned his photos. He also took this and I think it's the juvenile puddingwife.

View attachment 91813

Lantern bass sounds right to me, too. I get a big kick out of puddingwives (wifes?) in all their sizes and colors. Photo'd one that was no more than an inch long at the bridge last Wednesday.

A lot of those seabasses look similar. A buddy photo'd a pygmy seabass on a dive last summer when I had seen and photo'd a bunch of lantern bass. Lanterns are amazingly colorful and I still can't pass one up. PC290076a John'sPygmy Sea Bass | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Couldn't get back up to the bridge the rest of the weekend, but did manage a Friday night beach dive at LBTS. One lousy octopus that hid on me pretty quickly. I gotta come up with a "middle mounted" focus light. . .

Kevin

 

[mntlblok]

Dang. I gotta be doing something wrong in regards to seeing octopusses. I seem to find plenty of other cool stuff, but those little guys just don't appear for me.

That's two great pics of sea spiders now. Never even heard of them before a couple of months ago.

Have only run across a couple of mantis shrimp so far, but look forward to finding many more. They're some of my favorites.

Need to look into adding a second strength of "readers" into my dive mask, and make them trifocals. What's in there now (on my favorite mask) is too strong.

Love the pics. Looks like a good week for me for catching up on photoshopping chores. Maybe I can get some decent stuff posted.

Kevin

Two hour dive at BHB today. If one stayed south of the west span, visibility was outstanding. Viz dropped significantly near the channel wall and the western piling (the wall) due to the number of divers. Even some of the photographers were kicking up storms. Saw many interesting things today including this caribbean sea spider

Kevin: saw this guy roaming around and eventually make its way to a bottle, where it stuffed about half its body, but never went fully in.

Again, what a fantastic day with mild current, great viz (where other divers were abscent) and lots of lots critters. I did see two other caribbean sea spiders, a mantis, a couple of immature mantis shrimp and one of those odd pointy nosed blennies.

 

[fisheyeview]

It's a Lantern Bass alright.

 

[trigfunctions]

Originally, I thought so too.. but the face shape is all wrong, and the body coloring is wrong too. I think a key identifier (and why I chose this pic) is the top of his dorsal fin where the front is longer and has white.

I agree Jenny. There's something about your fish that makes it not look like a lantern bass. Did you get a good shot of its tail? Lantern basses have smooth, curved tails (lunate?), and in your picture it looks like the tail is jagged. Also, the head and back look different. And lastly - it's missing the yellow "lantern" spots.

I'll bet the Name That Critter folks can ID it.

 

[sportxlh]

had a nice day of diving the afternoon/evening at the bridge. dove mostly south of the west side: viz was decent, but dropped significantly once the rain rolled in. a bit of a surge developed too. the normal tidal current was barely perceptible.

lots of octopi again. also saw three flying gurnards combing through the rubble and sand together. saw some more caribbean sea spiders.

This little guy scrambled to a bottle when he saw me, but did not enter.

I should probably know this already, but what in the world is this thing?? they were all over this evening

 

[Scuba_Jenny]

Ok.. got a few more photos...

 

[jet126]

had a nice day of diving the afternoon/evening at the bridge. dove mostly south of the west side: viz was decent, but dropped significantly once the rain rolled in. a bit of a surge developed too. the normal tidal current was barely perceptible.

lots of octopi again. also saw three flying gurnards combing through the rubble and sand together. saw some more caribbean sea spiders.

Video Dude and I were there, too. I wish I could have introduced myself. We were in our "usual" spot - picnic table closest to the shower by the playground.

We spent all our time east and south. Today's theme was "Rocky" (as in Balboa). A stone crab wrestling with a tumbleweed, two hermit crabs in a clash-of-the-titans battle, a half-eaten but still kickin' flounder. Two very shy octopi, yellow stingray, sea robin, two garden eels, school of juvenile barracuda, and weird gelatinous tube egg casings everywhere (what the heck are those?)

Viz was pretty bad on the east side - 8-10 ft at best. And dropped significantly when it started to rain. We called the dive at 1:25. I had 72 for the water temp. If anyone is up later in the week please post conditions. There's supposed to be a night dive on Friday but if viz is this poor it won't be worth the drive.

 

[mntlblok]

Looks like I need to spend some more time south of the west side. Cool stuff yer finding. The white thingies immediately made me think of brittle star arms, but I suspect that would have been obvious if they were. You are the king of sea spiders. Gotta get me some new specs.

Kevin

had a nice day of diving the afternoon/evening at the bridge. dove mostly south of the west side: viz was decent, but dropped significantly once the rain rolled in. a bit of a surge developed too. the normal tidal current was barely perceptible.

lots of octopi again. also saw three flying gurnards combing through the rubble and sand together. saw some more caribbean sea spiders.



I should probably know this already, but what in the world is this thing?? they were all over this evening