Dauin Biodiversitygasm 2018

I’ve been back in Dauin since the beginning of the year now, and the marine biodiversity has, again, not disappointed. I’ve had the chance to observe and photograph quite a number of rare, intriguing and beautiful fishes so far. As usual, I have been keeping an eye open for gobies. This one is a real highlight, even after years of goby-watching, a fish only described a few years ago, Ancistrogobius yoshigoui:

This close up shot of a whip-coral goby’s head shows a huge parasite encapsulated near the left gills of the fish – such a parasite must consume a massive load of the fish’s biological energy. Whip coral gobies, exposed to the current on their exposed whip coral homes, seem to be especially often afflicted by parasites. There is so much natural history to learn underwater in Dauin for anyone who knows how to look.

The seahorses and their relatives, the pipefish, are always well represented in Dauin; I like this shot I got of a stick pipefish. It’s ~ 20 centimeters long, but easy to overlook, since it barely ever moves as to not break its camouflage as a stick of wood:

I was quite happy to notice that the ghost pipefishes were occurring in good numbers in Dauin early this year. These are also seahorse relatives, highly camouflaged as invertebrates or marine plants, such as this rough snout ghost pipefish (Solenostomus paegnius):

The absolute highlight in the last two months of diving, though, was the Ambon scorpion fish, spotted by my friend Laura, in the shallow part of the dive site “Poblacion”. This very rare fish (it was the first time I had seen it!) camouflages itself expertly as a piece of seaweed. What a fish!