21 Mar - Snorkeling Half Moon Bay
on the weekend i snorkeled both days .... Sat right in town at Half Moon Bay ...
my first stop was under the dock on the left side in the photo ... i've always found lots to look at here ... ScorpionFish, Eels, Octopus, and Lobster ... i only found lobsters today .... :( ...
but i did see several large TrumpetFish ... hanging vertically, along poles or posts ...
they are sleepy-looking characters ...
i saw a very large lobster ... walking around .... and trying to climb up into some coral....
but when i looked, there was another lobster in there ....this is their mating season ... so i assume that is the reason why ... the big healthy ones are out looking for a mate ... i did some research on lobsters while i was volunteering on Utila .... fun facts on
Lobsters Mating Habits:
--A lobster’s shell can not grow, it must shed its shell (molt). After molting the lobster's body is very soft and it can take a few months for its shell to harden again leaving itself open to cannibalism and predation.
--The female also has to molt to mate. The female will approach the male's den (females make the choice and prefer the biggest male in the neighborhood) and send out pheromones which tells the male she is ready to mate.
--He usually emerges with an aggressive posture—lobsters don’t like company. She returns his aggression or ignores him, either ploy works, and the male soon settles down and allows her to enter his shelter.
--Once inside, the female molts and leaves herself entirely vulnerable. If the male chose to eat her now, she would have no way to protect herself. But the male (who retains his shell) carefully cradles her during mating and will protect her afterwards.
--The female stays in the male's den for about a week, just until her new shell has grown and hardened.
this is possibly what is happening in the first part of the video below, ..... a lobster climbing up some coral, and you can see the other lobster in there ...
that's your Lobster Trivia for the day ....
it has been REALLY calm on the waters here ... such a nice change from Utila ... and really calmer than i've seen it here as well ... so i took advantage of the calm seas and ventured out of the Bay around both sides where i'd never snorkeled before because it's usually too rough beyond the protection of the bay.... it was fun exploring ...
so, on outside the Bay on the left side, beyond where you can see in the photo above....
there is another 'can you find the fish' photo .... such a master of camouflage !
it's a large Scrawled FileFish that was feeding and hung around for a
long time .... it was difficult to keep track of him with the sunlight
coming through the water ....
he was big ....
and didn't mind me getting in real close... there is a little bit of him swimming around in the video too ...
i swam across the channel ...carefully ...to the other side outside the Bay ... i say carefully, because the boats go too fast and are not good at watching... before i got here, 2 people were hit by boats in one week ! ..... that news woke me right up, to be extra vigilant when snorkeling .... the Marine Park is making more and larger bouys to put in the Bay, to try to get boats to slow down ! ....
on the right side, outside of the Bay, i saw a Tiger Grouper ... it's always pretty exciting for me to see a Grouper in Honduras ...
a Caribbean Reef Squid ...
always fun to watch them swim .... backwards ... a bit in the video of that too :)
and another lobster ... they are so colorful ..... NOT red, like when they're dead :(
i watched this one for a long time ....
he was big ... and very active ... a lot of this on the video ...
then i swam back across the channel and watched the 'kids' playing on this sailboat that someone moored in the Bay for them to play on ... they get that boat rocking back and forth to get the best swing ... the boat is just off the dock on the left side; but wasn't there when that photo was taken ... kids, big and small, love it ... today i was big kids ...
found the old sunken submarine ... with another big lobster crawling over it ...
and then he ran for cover under the submarine and poked his head out ...
this pretty Black Grouper was hanging around the top of the submarine too....
and a Scorpion Fish in the grass ...
some girls showed up and i showed them the Scorpion Fish ... they said they never would have seen it :) ...i love doing that :)
they countered with, 'we just saw a turtle on the other side, over there' ... so i went back across
i search of the turtle, but did not see it :( ....haven't seen a
turtle in Honduras yet !
the video from today :
