A collage of various colorful sea slugs
Happy National #SeaSlug Day!
They are one of my favorite things to show people who don’t know about a local urban wildlife, especially since they live closer than you think! #nudibranch #marinescience #marinelife #underwaterphotography
Wow this poster is sick! I’ve been experimenting making my own but this looks very professional.
A rainbow tripod fish looks directly at the viewer with large green, blue, yellow, and purple fins that radiate in almost a complete circle from its body. The fin ray tips end in purple tips.
The legendary rainbow tripod fish ( #Bathypteroisphenax) eventually settles on the seabed and lives its life sitting on its fintips above the silty abyssal plane. In its larval form is is one of the most stunning fish we see on our #blackwater dives. #deepsea #marinelife
Wow a very insightful and fantastic read!
Three views of a red and purple larval blanket octopus. It has little bubbles on its arms and sticks two little arms in front like superman
A #blanketoctopus (genus #tremoctopus) three ways. The little bubbles on each of her back suckers are pieces of siphonophore that it tears off to use as a “spicy” stinging shield. #marinelife #plankton
Fun fact, the worms have eyes, THEY CAN SEE YOU 👀
I can't tell for sure which type this species would have, but they are all cool 🧪🦑
www.cell.com/current-biol...
A close-up of several colorful Christmas tree worms, showing their symmetrical spiral feeding crowns in orange, purple, and blue hues, radiating like fireworks across the reef.
A small spinyhead blenny with bright green eyes peeks out of its burrow. Behind it, a large pink-and-orange Christmas tree worm is softly blurred, creating a dramatic background.
Christmas tree worms extend their spiraled feeding crowns, while a spinyhead #blenny peeks from its burrow in front of one—two tiny reef icons sharing the same real estate in #PuertoRico. Life on the reef is small, colorful, and endlessly intertwined. #marinelife
An artistic photograph of an orange longsnout seahorse, the background has red streaks and it it hiding among the hydroids.
This longsnout seahorse (hippocampus reidi) has been taunting me by hiding inside of hydroids for my last few visits, but I finally found him puttering about at night. I love how striking they are compared to the typical lined seahorses. #seahorse #sygnathid #marinebiology #marinelife #ocean
A side profile of a bearded fireworm, its eyes and long mouth are visible with orange skin with white spots, and the stinging bristles throughout
A profile of a bearded fireworm, its eyes and long mouth are visible with orange skin with white spots, and the stinging bristles throughout.
I was recently challenged by a scientist to image the pharynx of #HermodiceCaruculata, the bearded fireworm. This was my best attempt at playing #fireworm dentist. Imaged using the Nauticam SMC-2, the
most powerful underwater magnifier in the world. #marinelife
An image of a blue and yellow larval tube anemone with the text “Hey Baby, I’d settle down with you harder than an anemone larva on a prime piece of substrate”
A collage of various stages of larval crabs with text that reads “Hey girl, our love is more complicated than a crabs lifecycle… but luckily I’m into it”
An image of a blue larval dragonfish with text that reads “Hey girl, I’d go through 17 awkward larval stages just to be with you. Happy Valentine’s Day”
Image of a blue and purple Portuguese man of water and man-o-war fish swimming in the tentacles. Text on the image says “hey girl, our love is like a siphonophore… technically a colony but still a big beautiful mess. Happy Valentine’s Day”
For my #plankton lovers I have a few blackwater and larval #marinelife Valentine’s Day cards you can steal for your special someone. #valentinesday #marinebiology 🦑
Valentine’s Day card featuring a yellow and blue nudibranch and the words “Hey girl, are you a nudibranch? Because you’re outrageously colorful, kind of toxic, and I can’t stop staring at you. Happy Valentine’s Day!”
Happy Valentine’s Day from my ocean to yours! #valentinesday #marinelife #underwater #nudibranch
This is a pelagic #mollusk called a sea elephant and they’ve never known a hard surface in their entire life. What do you think this one’s name is. I think they look like a “Gumbert”
#marinelife #plankton
A yellow and blue nudibranch crawls towards the viewer on a bed of algea. It’s two blue rhinophores look like bunny ears.
A yellow and blue striped nudibranch crawls on a white background.
At nearly 6 inches long Felimare juliae are one of the biggest nudibranchs we have on the Florida reef tract. This giant has striking aposematic coloration warning predators of its toxic body. #nudibranch #seaslug #scuba #underwaterphotography #marinelife
A translucent dragonfish larvae squirms and looks at the camera with a goofy smiley face in inky dark night time. There are pink dots that run the length of its body.
The black adult form of the dragonfish lives beyond the reach of sunlight in the mesophotic zone. Illustration by GM Woodward public domain.
Last night we encountered 8 species of #dragonfish larvae will drifting in the Gulf Stream. Goofy as kids, they have a goth glow up as adults. At this stage their digestive tract trails outside of their body for some reason. #marinelife #plankton
A blue, silver, and black man o war fish swims in the pink and blue stinging tentacles of a Portuguese man o war. Image taken at night, the fish is reflected on the mirror like surface.
Nomeus gronovii, or man o’ war fish, share a symbiotic relationship with the Portuguese man o’ war. Partially immune to the venom of the man o’war, these fish can live among the man o’war’s tentacles and feed on them. This particular one hit me in the head while I drifted offshore. #marinelife
A seahorse looks at the viewer with a grumpy face. Fleshy cirri are visible on its head and back
This has been my face for the last ten or so days. Pelagic lined seahorse found drifting in the gulfstream. #seahorse #marinelife #grumpy
A doctorfish seemingly smiles at the camera while getting swallowed by a lizardfish. The lizardfish has sharp needle like teeth but the doctorfish doesn’t seem to care.
Titled “Everything’s A-OK” I am reminded by this bold doctorfish to hold fast with a smile, stay prickly when challenged, and calmly know we’ll make it through. I am pleased to have secured First Place in CUPOTY with this image today. #marinelife #fish #doctorfish #lizardfish
This is incredible, do you have a color version knocking around somewhere?
A jelly like siphonophore has dozens of siphons like bells placed over a mess of fine jelly tentacles on a black background.
It’s #siphonophore Sunday!!! I believe this is Forskalia formosa and they can pack quit a sting if they bump into the space between my mask and my stache. #marinelife #plankton #blackwater
“Phil Foster Steakhouse Special”
At night, a diver looks on from the background as an orange, red, and white mottled sea slug crawls along sand and gravel.
Recently we were treated to fantastic visibility under Blue Heron Bridge, so much so that I couldn’t help but bring out my wide angle lens (for once!) in the first image we have a big ‘ol 12oz steak size Warty Sidegill slug, Pleurobranchus areolatus. #marinelife #seaslug 🦑 #malacology
Granger here loved seeing this polka dot batfish. An orange triangular batfish swims on a rubble bottom with a scuba diver looking on from behind.
A yellow seahorse perches on an orange sponge with a diver looking on from behind. The water is blue and the surface is visible.
Just letting Bluesky know that I am an independent dive guide that specializes is showing all the weird and exotic underwater #urbanwildlife you see on my feed to my guests. If you ever want to see the very best critters in Soflo, check out my website in bio. #scuba #marinelife
The side profile of a seahorse on a white background. Its fleshy cirri function as camouflage in the seagrass.
Hot on the heels of naming my #simplifiedseas project I present an image of a lined seahorse from earlier this week. On the shallow seagrass beds, these are the big dogs, effective pipette feeding predators that need to eat almost constantly. #seahorse #white #marinelife #underwaterphotography
A closeup of a manatee taking a breath at the waters surface with its reflection looking back at it. The image is flipped 180 degrees to emphasize the reflection. The manatees big tooth is visible through its floppy lips
This is kinda different than my normal type of picture, but I enjoyed the reflections made by the manatees against the still spring water. #manatee #reflection #marinelife
A mullet fish swims directly in front of a manatees face, making the fish eye appear to be the manatees eye. A scar on the manatees head makes the fish eye look like an angry eye
Two Florida manatees swim in crystal clear blue spring water over white sand. Their reflections appear on the waters surface
The Mad Manatee’s Mullet Monocle. I had fun swimming with these Potatoes in the springs today. #marinelife #manatee #marinemammal #underwaterphotography
Yes it looks right at you and sometimes I think it even rolls it’s eyes
A bright orange colony of anemone-like cup coral extend their tentacles like fireworks on a white background
The orange cup coral was first observed in Puerto Rico in 1943, scientists believe these corals first made their way to the Western Atlantic from the indo-pacific by hitching a ride and spawning along the way inside of the ballast water on ships. #invasivespecies #coral #marinelife
A semi transparent pelagic snail flaps its wing like appendages to stay afloat in the plankton cloud. On one side you can see two googly eyes and a pinkish swirling shell.
The #Atlantidae is a group of planktonic gastropods, which all demonstrate a strong adaptation to pelagic life. I love them because they endlessly flap those lil wingys (part of its mantle) and have funny googly eyes. #marinelife 🦑 #plankton #blackwater
These guys live in the brackish drainage ditches south of homestead, they get flushed every once in awhile but I plug my ears and make sure I don’t have any cuts before getting in the bacteria water where they live.
Most divers need to fly to Indonesia to find the legendary Leaf Sheep/Shawn the sheep/Eyespot Costasiella, but we have a population living in a ditch on the side of the road right here in South Florida. #marinelife 🦑 #seaslug #sacoglossa