Who's Who: World Under Water

August 21, 2012


The sun smiled down upon us with rare favor, the usually turbid water relaxed at low tide- with amazingly high visibility, and the birds (read: ducks and chickens) sang (quacked and clucked) to us all day (ALL day).  Several ʻUlili, or Wandering Tattlers (Tringa incana), trilled as we passed by.  

Judy informs us today will not be business as usual. We might as well call it a holiday.

Our Mission: 

Collect and identify pond life at specific sites. 

Method: 
Seine net, hand net.

 After several dry runs with the seine net, into the waiting water we go. 

Judy gives final instructions as we attempt our first in-water seine attempt.

Our first few attempts were successful in dragging up algae, but not much else. 

Let's see... seaweed, check.

 

 

Emptying the seine net into our collection bucket.

 

Seaweed Stew, anyone?

Behind us, clouds loom ominously.

Ikaika leads the way to our next site. Along the way he alerts us to about 5 eels- good thing we're following him!

Young Undulated Moray, Gymnothorax undulatus.

Ky is clearly unafraid of a silly little eel.

At our next site, we have a bit more luck in catching something not attached to the pond floor.

Ikaika and Andrew, our top fishermen.

The catch: Nehu, or anchovy, Stolephorous purpureus.

Ty and Kaua enjoy the natural "infinity pool" action the mākāhā offers.

When it rains, it pours; from here on out, we're getting buckets full of interesting life.

A type of cardinal fish.

Isopod.

Ikaika and the best catch of the day.

Lissa brought pie!  In the spirit of identification, it was pineapple and banana, with a homemade crust.  Now it's a party :)

Young Blue Pincher crab (Thalamita crenata) on Samoan crab (Scylla serrata).

Did you notice there are no pictures of the actual identification process? 
I became too distracted with the pie, and the feeding of identified fish to the chickens and ducks...

Another day of enlightenment and play in Hawaii Nei.