Blog Log, 28 Sept 2008 (Part II)

September 30, 2008

I didn’t even realise that this gorgeous little winged pipefish was spotted at Hantu this weekend till I saw the pictures on Chay Hoon’s Blog. The winged pipefish is by far my favourite pipefish. I first encountered one in the water’s off North Sulawesi and was thrilled when I had my first encounter with this critter on a night dive in local waters in March 2005! Since then, it’s been spotted by our volunteer divers and the likes of Chay Hoon on a few other occasions.

Chay Hoon has a real keen eye for spotting little tiny things on the reef. So much so that she sometimes misses the BIG STUFF since her keen are are calibrated for critters below an inch in size! The Chromodoris fidelis (top) is a nudibranch that can be found throughout the Tropical Indo-West Pacific, and can grow up to 25mm in length. At the bottom is Cadlinella ornatissima. Chay Hoon spotted 2 this weekend! I spotted this critter for the first time 2 months ago. This creature can grow up to 34mm and has a characteristic pattern of single-celled, flask-shaped and compound mantle glands.

A larger nudibranch is Hypselodoris emma (left) with its gills and rhinophores a brilliant reddish orange. And on the right is Bornella anguilla, a large nudibranch (up to 86mm) with a characteristic mosaic-like colour pattern. Its name (anguilla = eel) refers to its method of swimming. while most species of Bornella can swim by a lateral flexion of their body, in B. anguilla a muscular wave travels down the body to produce an eel-like motion. I first spotted this nudi in 2004.

Pictures: Colourful Clouds Source: Sea Slug Forum

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