today, today

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Ooo, not so bright!  The sun  just went behind a cloud.  What's that lumpy thing?










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Oh, a big sponge, maybe a yard, meter, tall and across.  A tube sponge of some sort, where's my book?  These guys are filter feeders, animals, you know, not a fungus or odd plant.  They take in seawater through their sides, and it's expelled out of the holes, in this case the end of the tube.  There are cells that have little whips that bring the water in through the sides of the tubes.  There can be quite a current coming out. 



Once I was on an "Underwater Poker Hunt"   Where a deck of cards is cut into little pieces, and the bits are put into film cans(remember those?)  The film cans are left in bags, around the reef, in places marked on a map.  You find each bag, get one film can, and go to the next bag of cans, using your compass.  Can't cheat!  The bits of card must be dry!  Best hand wins.  Anyway, just for fun, a diver put a film can in a tube sponge, and it popped out!  One more time, boom, popped out like a low-pressure gun.  "Exo-current" holes, they're called.  A goodly current coming through.
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OK, a little more color.  A gold colored star coral, coral has patterns on the surface, remember.  And some sponges with their holes, and some green algae, "Antler Algae"??  Where's my book!  I took it another room, and it hasn't found its' way back.  And some purple/red stuff, haha!  My ID score is pretty low today, hey?  I do sometimes get tired of being an encyclopedia.

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Hey, fish swimming away.  Owell, it's tough being a Giant Bubbling Monster and trying to take photos.  Lots of fish tails.  And what's that orange stuff?  Certainly is bright!

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Both holes and patterns.  Neither sponge nor coral, I'm cheating here, because I already know it's some sort of Tunicate.  ??  A Tunicate is a little sea creature that siphons seawater for food.  There's an 'in' hole, and an 'out' hole. (Oh no!!)  Some are free swimming, and some glob together in a little family like this one.    I am coming to believe they live only a year or two.  Or maybe something eats them, as I don't find them year after year like corals or sponges.  These guys have one 'out' hole, and lots of 'in' holes that look like speckles.  Cute little guys!  They're fun to find, but they just sit there, you can't play with them.

And one last thingie, 

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Another plant-looking critter that an animal, or rather hundreds and hundreds of tiny animals, kind of sharing the same body.

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A closer view, lousy focus, but you can see the individual polyps.  They grow only from the top, one at a time.  This thing could be thirty years old, or more.   The blue fish is a Blue Chromis, and there's a Brown Chromis, too.  Pretty little fishes.  They don't do much, as far as fish behavior goes, just swim around.

OK, have fun when you can, and thanks for stopping by!

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