Missing the Muck

As of now, I am back in my native Austria. Great to see family and friends, interesting culture, much better food than in the Philippines, but no ocean. I’m looking forward to being underwater in the warm ocean of the coral triangle again. To ease the ocean-home sickness, I have been re-watching some of my footage from the last few months:

In the first video, I am summing up my observations and conclusions about the biology of a very impressive animal, the helmet snail, Cassis. They are, I believe, mainly predators of sea urchins which burrow under the sand. Also, they form their own little reef in the muck habitat:

Mating sea slugs, who doesn’t love seeing that? Filmed mostly at night off the coast of Negros Island in the Philippines:

Mantis shrimp are in fact crustaceans only widely related to what is usually called a “shrimp”. I see several species of them in Dauin, including a smaller one, which is well camouflaged for the “muck”, soft-bottom habitat. Again, we see species which have evolved to thrive specifically in sandy planes underwater – the “muck” habitat is a special, unique place, not just the absence of corals.  The mantis shrimp in this video were very curious about my camera, which I had just placed in the sand.

I hope you enjoyed these,

Best Fishes,

Klaus