dwashbur
Contributor
We went out to the Metridium field yesterday but didn't find that Mola, dawggonnit 
Oh well, that's how it goes. We did a second dive at the Breakwater, where we found this Dendronotus iris just wandering around. He caught my interest partly because he's missing most of his left rhinophore. It looks like something bit it off and it's only just starting to heal up/grow back/whatever they do. Anyway, as we watched him, he launched himself off the bottom and started swimming. My wife and I immediately switched our cameras into video mode, because footage of this phenomenon is always good. Well, in this video by my wife you can see him swimming right at me. I was really glad she captured what happened next, because how many times will you see such a thing????? Here's the video. Watch it before you scroll down and finish the story:
dendro_wheeee.flv - Video - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting
Yes, he swam right into my bubble stream and wound up about 10-15 feet further up than he intended. You can see my daughter there by him, keeping her light trained on him, as we went up to check on his condition. He had stopped moving completely and was just drifting, and I thought "Oh no, I killed him!" It took another 2 minutes for him to drift back down to the bottom, and we stayed with him all the way. When he touched down we watched for movement and didn't see any for several seconds, but then he slowly began righting himself, got his foot spread out, and started crawling again. I was quite thankful, because I was afraid I had done some real damage, however accidentally. I can't help wondering what he's going to tell his friends about his little "trip"?????? "Dude, I got some bad air and you wouldn't believe what kind of hallucinations I had! I think that guy was eating onions or something!"
Oh well, that's how it goes. We did a second dive at the Breakwater, where we found this Dendronotus iris just wandering around. He caught my interest partly because he's missing most of his left rhinophore. It looks like something bit it off and it's only just starting to heal up/grow back/whatever they do. Anyway, as we watched him, he launched himself off the bottom and started swimming. My wife and I immediately switched our cameras into video mode, because footage of this phenomenon is always good. Well, in this video by my wife you can see him swimming right at me. I was really glad she captured what happened next, because how many times will you see such a thing????? Here's the video. Watch it before you scroll down and finish the story:dendro_wheeee.flv - Video - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting
Yes, he swam right into my bubble stream and wound up about 10-15 feet further up than he intended. You can see my daughter there by him, keeping her light trained on him, as we went up to check on his condition. He had stopped moving completely and was just drifting, and I thought "Oh no, I killed him!" It took another 2 minutes for him to drift back down to the bottom, and we stayed with him all the way. When he touched down we watched for movement and didn't see any for several seconds, but then he slowly began righting himself, got his foot spread out, and started crawling again. I was quite thankful, because I was afraid I had done some real damage, however accidentally. I can't help wondering what he's going to tell his friends about his little "trip"?????? "Dude, I got some bad air and you wouldn't believe what kind of hallucinations I had! I think that guy was eating onions or something!"
