GPO egg hatching

[ljjames]

They are still hatching... more it seems than have been reported, a pretty steady onesie two-sie stream.

[YellowEye]

Cool pics Mike!

We went there tonight and the octo was still there alive and well releasing eggs! It was sad to see quite a few more rockfish and sailfin sculpin are moving in for snack time though....

Other cool sightings:

I counted over 200 pink-mouth hydroids on the structure the octo is under!!! The structure also has some patches of white colonial phoronids if you look close. So cool!

We also saw two white tipped nudis, a red gilled nudi, and another cryptic tiny nudibranch on some hydroids (maybe a doto?). We didn't see any hooded nudis though.

Josh found some opal squid larva moving around in their egg casings!

[verrinne]

It was cool and thank you for the awesome dive. Now I know I need a drysuit

[ScubaJess]

What a fanstastic dive! So many critters out and about. Thanks to YellowEye & Josh (Verrine) for the fun night. Also it was really great to meet Laura! Can't wait to see your video!

Really cool pictures MPenders!!! I could just watch those babies all day. They were amazing! I saw the Mommas Eye, she is so spectacular!

[Gdog]

Nice shots Mike! Yeah, that one guy seems a little handicapped.... We are all so fortunate to be experiencing this hatch right now. Cool that so many of us are able to enjoy it. Laura, looking forward to the video!

[ljjames]

Mostly it's me flailing around with macro... Not enough density coming out of den to set it and let them swim through. Will likely head out again... Hoping to get my macro chops dialed by the cove 2 hatch.

phpBB [video]

[Scubie Doo]

Laura, so cool to see this on video. Thank you.

[Scubie Doo]

Penders. Way to show off by adding a lumpie to the mix great shots dude.

[Tangfish]

Great video Laura and awesome photos Mike!!

[verrinne]

awesome video and sumed up what we saw last night

[derekcs]

Hey DerekCs,
Happy Thursday!
Did you get any pictures from the AMAZING dive?

Happy Friday! Thanks so much for letting me tag along the other night. Finally got around to finishing the photos today. I did not get as great of baby photos as the rest of you, but I'm happy with what I did get.

https://derekcs.smugmug.com/Underwater/ ... -20150818/

P.S. Anyone know what fish this is? https://derekcs.smugmug.com/Underwater/ ... /i-mWb5cKQ

[derekcs]

ICYMI, I sent you a Dropbox link for the pictures you took with my camera by PM. (Finally...)

Hi
ScubaJess, DerekCs and I went tonight. Totally EPIC!!

It was definitely one of my best dives ever...

Seeing the octos try to swim up out of the den was so fun, we were cheering for them under water!

On top of that: great viz, mating squid in the shallows (many of which were quite curious), hooded nudis, tons of alabasters of all sizes, opalescent nudis, small salmon, small octos on the walkout, gunnels, pregnant rockfish, lots of shrimp and crab of various species, bright green kelp isopods (haven't seen these in a while!), longfin sculpin, moon jellies, ratfish, huge schools of shiner perch, and so much more!

A Discovery: the structure the octo is under is covered with pink mouth hydroids on the top ridges all around! I've never noticed this before. I even got to witness them extending, fanning out their pink egg-like structure. Bizarre and cool!

Another discovery: did you know that kelp byozoan colonies chain react and retract all at once when a small part of it is disturbed? So cool!

I came into the dive thinking the spectacle was probably already over, having heard it usually takes 3-4 days to hatch the eggs and for the octo to die. But no! Octo mom is still looking healthy, and there look to be lots of eggs left; she may be doing this for a while longer.

[YellowEye]

Hey Derek!
Got it, thank you!

You got some good pics! I *think* your fish may be a pacific tomcod.

I heard thru the grapevine that one of the popular-to-see octos in cove2 has died :( looks like before all the eggs hatched. Not sure of the state of the other(s). Has anyone visited the TTN octo lately? I get my camera back hopefully early next week!