Here are some photos from our vacation in Holland, MI. We stayed on Lake Makatawa and had the beach of Lake Michigan right behind us. Overall a great time, and only a 2.5 hour drive to get there. Maybe we’ll retire there some day.
Here’s a pic from my reef tank of a new fish addition I made yesterday. Just acquired these clownfish from another reef enthusiast who is retiring from the hobby. There are two, a mated pair (Christine and Rico). The female, pictured below, is larger that the male, and they are a breeding pair that should spawn about every two weeks. Some enthusiasts raise the fry and sell them. At this point in my tank, when they hatch, the fry will be feeding the other fish and corals. They are hosted by a red bubble-tip anenome.
Well we only got in one more dive due to windy weather. These are from a night shore dive off Turtle Point. It’s cool cause you can see what some of the corals look like when their polyps are open and feeding nocturnally.
This is a Basket Star, a large brittle starfish:
Below’s a Lobophylia (I think), and classifies as an LPS (Large Polyped Stony) coral. At night the big round polyps are somewhat deflated/shruken, and the rows of short tentacles are filter feeding for tiny plankton.
Below a Gorgonian that feeds almost exclusively on plankton, as opposed the more common hermatypic corals than live mostly on energy from their symbiotic photosynthetic zooxanthellae algae.
Here’s what the little knobby stony corals look like at night with the polyps open for feeding. During the day their zooxanthelae feed them.
Here are some captures from yesterday’s dives here in Grand Cayman. I’m using a Canon G11 with a Sea-n-Sea external strobe. Love this camera for carrying around on travel and for the reasonably priced underwater housing that’s available. Nikon doesn’t compete in this format.
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