Whidbey Island Critters

[LCF]

Very cool! I'm going to have to take closer looks at the glove leather from now on.

[Jan K]

This Lingcod male was little frazzled, keeping Sunflower stars, Striped perch and other Lingcod
off his four egg masses.


It must be a lonely life for the juvenile Yelloweye rockfish. I never seen more then one fish at
any given location, I find them always alone. And very shy..

[Dusty2]

Nice shot on that yellow eye Jan. Tough little guys to get close to.

[nwscubamom]

I love Yelloweyes!! Haven't seen any in quite some time, so it's good you saw one. Maybe there's hope....Somebody's having babies.

[LCF]

The ones I've seen, I've seen deep. I've seen them on the Possession Point fingers, and on Davidson Rock, and on Waterman's Wall, but always in the 90 to 100 foot range.

[Jan K]

Not sure about the ID - orange siphons, but the shape of the shell doesn't fit the description -
Reminds me of a movie goer wearing 3D glasses :cylon:


Col. Quaritch: You are not in Kansas anymore. You are on Pandora, ladies and gentleman.
Selfridge: [from trailer] This is why we're here, because this little gray rock sells for twenty million a kilo.
Jake Sully: [from trailer] They've sent us a message... that they can take whatever they want. Well we will send them a message. That this... this is our land!
Jake Sully: Everything is backwards now, like out there is the true world and in here is the dream

[Dashrynn]

Not sure about the ID - orange siphons, but the shape of the shell doesn't fit the description -
Reminds me of a movie goer wearing 3D glasses :cylon:


Col. Quaritch: You are not in Kansas anymore. You are on Pandora, ladies and gentleman.
Selfridge: [from trailer] This is why we're here, because this little gray rock sells for twenty million a kilo.
Jake Sully: [from trailer] They've sent us a message... that they can take whatever they want. Well we will send them a message. That this... this is our land!
Jake Sully: Everything is backwards now, like out there is the true world and in here is the dream

oh wow that does look like a pair of 3d glasses

[Jan K]

When I arrived at the scene, the cleaner Scalyhead was not interested in being photographed and settled nearby, waiting for me to leave. The Lingcod, while guarding two egg masses under its body kept his mouth wide open. Unfortunately, it was nesting between the rocks of the jetty, so I could not get a frontal picture ..

[Jan K]

There seems to be some disagreement about the benefit of the split fin design.
Copper Rockfish seem to like them :biggrin:

[Jan K]

The realm of juvenile Yelloweye rockfish.

[LCF]

Great one, Jan! I saw my first juvenile yelloweye at the Fingers, during a class, and I had no idea what it was except that it was sure brightly colored.

[Dashrynn]

wished i could have dove this with yall, i would love to see one of these little guys. The pictures make them look so beautiful.

[Jan K]

More from the Fingers...

[smike]

The realm of juvenile Yelloweye rockfish.

A year or so ago, on 2 dives, 2 months apart, I saw 10 or so juveniles at 100' rock. That is the only time I have seen them. I didn't know what they were till I saw them on this site. I thought then, "We DO have fish here that are bright and pretty" - I had thought that was reserved for warm water.

I would sure like to get back there. One of these days I want to dive the fingers too, I hear they are pretty cool to dive.

[nwscubamom]

When I arrived at the scene, the cleaner Scalyhead was not interested in being photographed and settled nearby, waiting for me to leave. The Lingcod, while guarding two egg masses under its body kept his mouth wide open. Unfortunately, it was nesting between the rocks of the jetty, so I could not get a frontal picture ..

Hey Jan, did you send this to Tony Parra? I bet he'd like to see this photo.

- Janna

[Jan K]

[quote="nwscubamom"
Hey Jan, did you send this to Tony Parra? I bet he'd like to see this photo. - Janna quote]

Yes Janna, I am working with him on the Lingcod cleaning project..

[nwscubamom]

Wonderful! You sure do get around!

[Jan K]

This critter is from last summer, as you can see by the Bull kelp which just now begins to grow up again at Keystone.
I was going through some old files and found the shots of anemone larva feeding on its host jelly, so I decided to share it with you, since many of you come across these two antagonists during dives..

[nwscubamom]

Cool!! Grow your own anemone.

[LCF]

Once again, very timely, Jan! When we got into Cove 2 yesterday, the shallow water was absolutely packed with those jellies, and I kept trying to get my bifocals on what was riding along with them. Now I know!

[Jan K]

Romance is live and well at Keystone Jetty :luv:

[nwscubamom]

WHOA! Never seen the dark (what I assume to be) male before! Look at those cirri too!

[Dusty2]

Yes they were getting busy at Hudson point a couple of weeks ago. Some of the males get almost totally black. I have never seen them on nests though so I am wondering if they tend their nests or simply lay their eggs and leave?

[LCF]

It's interesting the intense color changes some fish go through during mating season. The first time I saw a male Painted Greenling in mating colors, I wasn't even sure what he was!

[Dashrynn]

ahh the rebel sculpin with the oh so gentle pink girlfriend....stay away from him! hes a bad to the bone kind of guy!