Where did I go with my force fins?

[castanagajt]

Water has usually a soothing and relaxing effect on the mind so I hoped that underwater we were able to cool off our spirits and shut all the bickering off!

Instead coping with the spare mask (there was no room for my fingers to close the nostrils from the front so I had to shut them from below and I constantly had a layer of water that kept my nostrils submerged...All the attempts of clearing failed "Better not inhaling through my nose!" I thought), my unstable buoyancy (now that I think about it I was using different tanks and I was probably overwheighted) and my significant other buddy who was going up and down like a yo-yo because he did not have ankle weights supplied us with fuel for bickering with bubbles and hand signals during the first part of the first dive. When we finally reached our depth and began to swim back up we finally relaxed and marveled at the fact that we were in the middle of a 'colony' of Orange Sea Pens that slowly were swinging calmly and patiently with the current.

An Orange Sea Pen looks like one animal from a distance

instead it is a colony of polyps like a coral

The animal can retract all of its body completely into the sand

Unfortunatelly for the Sea Pen there is also another animal that lives in the same moonscape muddy habitat...

the Striped Nudibranch! and guess what does it eat? Orange Sea Pens!

During the first dive it seemed that there was a huge underwater party going on!

A Striped Nudibranch hurries to go the party!

Those Striped Nudibranchs were absolutely everywhere! In some spots they were on top of each other at the base of Orange Sea Pens taking bites off of those hopeless 18 inches long orange animals.:shocked2::depressed:

Orange Sea Pens, Striped Nudibranchs and, of course, flat fish are not the only one that hide themselves under the sand. During a safety stop I saw this guy

...any guesses?

We also saw white elongated blobs that littered the bottom...

...any ideas?

To cut a story that is already too long at the end of the second dive my buddy and I were smiling at each other and remarked how great it had been diving among Orange Sea Pens!

If I remember right those white blobs are cuttle fish eggs or squid eggs.

 

[sambolino44]

Sorry, it's a mistake!

 

[Soakedlontra]

If I remember right those white blobs are cuttle fish eggs or squid eggs.

Thank you for the clue. I checked a couple of ID books and looked at other images on the net. I think those white blobs are the eggs of the Opalescent Squid. Too bad that the squid was not there!

The fish buried in the sand may be a Pacific Staghorn Sculpin.

Cheers

 

[Soakedlontra]

The dogfish has a very striking appearance. In fact it's so startling to see one in the wild that the sight of a dogfish has been known to make even skilled divers lose control of their buoyancy and do an ass-plant right in the middle of a bunch of plumose anemones! Not anyone I know, though.

These anemones were harmed in homage to Michelangelo.

...and I keep thinking about this:

 

[Bob Evans]

Soakedlontra, seeing the Sistina Chapel brings back good thoughts. I live in Roma as a child, just down the street from the Vatican. I was very lucky to go down below Saint Peter's Basilica seeing stuff tourist never had a chance to view. Italy has to be one of my favorite places to visit, great people, wonderful wine and food. Plus the fire and rescue teams use Force Fin Pro's in Roma.

 

[Soakedlontra]

Soakedlontra, seeing the Sistina Chapel brings back good thoughts. I live in Roma as a child, just down the street from the Vatican. I was very lucky to go down below Saint Peter's Basilica seeing stuff tourist never had a chance to view. Italy has to be one of my favorite places to visit, great people, wonderful wine and food. Plus the fire and rescue teams use Force Fin Pro's in Roma.

WOW! UUUH! AHHH! The world is really small... I am glad that you had the opportunity to live in such a beautiful yet crazy country!

I must have seen the Cappella Sistina when I was a child but I am not that sure because I don't remember anything! I never visited it as a grown-up...(what the hell I was doing in those days? I am wondering now...)

 

[Soakedlontra]

It seems that summer is already on its last leg...at least here in the Pacific Northwest.:depressed: With the warm season shrinking slowly but steadily the opportunity of snorkeling without wearing a cumbersome wet suit and weights is shrinking too!

I try to take advantage of these few days of sunny weather left to go snorkeling in the local lakes. My favorite so far is Whistle Lake even if every time I go there I have to put up with teenagers' yelling and screaming that last for hours on end (or until their throats become bone dry and have run out of soda pops and/or beer!)

I cannot keep my hands still so I always end up collecting trash from the bottom of the lake...(well near shore because apparently the bottom is about 150ftw deep!)

Why on earth somebody would want to through golf balls (among other things) in this beautiful lake and leave them there?

...Humankind never stops to surprise me!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNHqxRNHcrI

Have a great end of summer!

 

[castanagajt]

Thank you for the clue. I checked a couple of ID books and looked at other images on the net. I think those white blobs are the eggs of the Opalescent Squid. Too bad that the squid was not there!

The fish buried in the sand may be a Pacific Staghorn Sculpin.

Cheers

Dang how did you do that? You broke it down to the exact fish species that is amazing. I think I remember seeing about these squid eggs from my father whom he always went to the public library and borrow dvds from the travel section. That fish I would have thought it was a flounder. :doh2:

 

[Soakedlontra]

Dang how did you do that? You broke it down to the exact fish species that is amazing. I think I remember seeing about these squid eggs from my father whom he always went to the public library and borrow dvds from the travel section. That fish I would have thought it was a flounder. :doh2:

When I got too close to the fish it swam away like a maniac as if it had seen a ghost! I was able to recognize its body shape and it was not one of a flounder (If you look carefully at the picture the head of the fish is too 'lumpy' to belong to a flat fish and its eyes are too far apart). I have been seeing several Pacific Staghorn Sculpins lately and they have big pectoral fins like this one. I also ruled out the possibility that it may have been a Plainfin Midshipman, another fish that buries itself in the sand, because it has smaller pectoral fins and its color does not match with the one of the fish that I saw.

 

[Soakedlontra]

I've heard the word "transparent" used to describe how, when something works right you don't notice it; you don't think about it. That's the way my Force Fins have become: transparent. I don't think about them anymore, they just work.

Instead, I'm thinking about things like, how's my new buddy doing, or look at that neat grunt sculpin that Soakedlontra pointed out. Or occaisionally thinking about some other piece of gear that isn't quite as "transparent" as my Force Fins.

...or like a tablet of Alka-Seltzer in a glass of water...