SoCal marine creature identification?

[minnesnowta]

Hi So Cal peeps!

Hubby and I just spent a long weekend in San Diego and we dove La Jolla Cove and La Jolla Shores.

We saw so many cool fish, creatures and "microlife"...but can't identify some of them! I keep referring to "the orange fish," and saying, "Sheephead...was that a sheephead?! What is a sheephead."

Can anyone point me in the right direction towards a free online fish/marine creature ID? I did some googling but must be using the wrong keywords because I can't really find anything.

Creatures I know we saw include seals/sea lions, leopard shark, spiny lobsters, juvenile wolf eel...some kind of crab...tons of fish...halibut. But there are lots more that I can't identify.

Much appreciation! We loved SD and SoCal diving!

 

[Bopper]

There's a sticky thread at the top of this forum called the Online Field Guide for Fish and Nudibranchs.

Where did you see the juvenile wolf eel?

The "orange" fish are usually the State Marine Fish: the Garibaldi. Sheephead tend to be more of a grey or in the case of males, black/red. A common crab in the area you dove is the Sheep Crab.

Glad you enjoyed So Cal diving!

 

[minnesnowta]

Ah! Thank you! Perfect.

The juvie wolf eel was on Vallecito's [sp] Point off La Jolla Shores...about 45 or 50 ft. He was just hiding in a hole. Cute!

 

[fnfalman]

Glad you enjoyed the dives.

 

[drbill]

Although it is certainly not a definitive site (I really need to update the species and images), my web site has a lot of the more common species on it plus over 550 weekly newspaper columns about marine life, mostly in SoCal.

 

[tracydr]

I always think of sheepshead as pink and grey. Sort of an orangey pink. They kind of remind me of a bump head parrot fish, shape-wise. They are very cute and some of the most tropical looking of the CA fish.
You were very lucky to see juvie wolfseel. Seems like maybe there's been a bumper crop of them, lately.

 

[Bob DBF]

Sheepshead are the fish that have the toothy grin and come right up and say Hi.


The Labrador Retriever of the sea.

Photo taken off Santa Cruz Island, Chanel Islands National Park.



Bob
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I may be old, but I’m not dead yet.