Things Are Evolving

   Yesterday was a gorgeous day here in Kailua Kona.  At 10 in the morning it was in the upper seventies with a charming breeze.  As we made our way down to Alii Drive, I noticed a number of buoys and what

A High School Paddling Team on a Gorgeous Day

 looked like a race committee boat at the far end of the pier.  The general absence of a crowd, not to mention the ease with which we had parked, lead me to comment, "I wonder if there is going to be a regatta tomorrow?"  A lady passing us at a good clip said, "There's a regatta right now."  to which I replied, to her receding derriere, "It must not be much of a regatta, or we wouldn't have been able to park."

   I think I saw her nod, but my attention was drawn across the street where a paddling team, of about twenty high school age boys and girls in matching blue T shirts, was going for a run up the street.  Garments below the waist were up to the discretion of the athlete, as was footwear; most of the paddlers were running in bare feet, while a few pantywaists were running the pavement in flip flops.  I was reminded of sending the soccer team off for a run, but, of course, the lads were all wearing sport appropriate boots.  Not to mention that the golden bodies

Adolescent Blacklip Butterfly, Dec. 10, 2015

that pranced by looked nothing like those found on the pitches of Oregon.

   I could dwell at some length on the differences in physiognomy between a 17 year old girl soccer player and her Polynesian paddling counterpart, but then Captain Priapism, who lives next door, would call the thought police and that would be it for the the old blogmeister.   Let us say that one might title such a blog, "Beauty and the Beast".  I leave it up to you and your vivid imagination to correctly assign the roles.

    As it turned out, it was a dual meet, with only two crews on the water at any one time.  Hence, the area around the kiosk was only lightly employed.  As we were donning our neoprene, who should happen by but our friend Marilyn from Alii Villas.  After appropriate greetings were exchanged, she averred that it was cloudy today (meaning the water, of course.)  I asked her if she had seen the blacklip butterfly, knowing full

Mature Blacklip Butterfly, January 16, 2016

 well that she is one of the "All the Pretty Fishes" school of snorkelers.   Although she wouldn't know a blacklip butterly from a black-headed grosbeak, one still has to give Marilyn credit.  As she had hip surgery a few years ago and is therefore unable to safely put on flippers for fear of a dislocation, she still gets down to the pier to enjoy the fish.

    As I was telling her that the blacklip butterfly could be found right in the shallows where she paddles, a young man (which is to say he was under forty) asked if there were any sharks here.  He proceeded to describe the small school of milkfish and I was happy to fill in some gaps and put a name on his find.  What joy to be the yoda of the fish.  Following this mini-dissertation, which Sandra bore stoically, we headed down to the water.

   This January the water is not quite as cold as one might expect.  And contrary to our friend's admonition, it was well on the clear side of diluted milk.  Such was the clarity in the shallows that I was able to nab a

picture of the blacklip butterfly, which has now persisted, as I prognosticated back in December, in the very

I'm a Crab of Constant Sorrow

same spot for over a month.  Not only that, but in my prescience, I have taken a picture of this unusual fish each time I have seen it and now have a series of photographs detailing the development of C. kleinii from adolescent to mature.

    I am sorely tempted to call this fish a waif.  It is living in a space whee none of its ilk are ever seen. Clearly the egg moved by current from another area, most likely somewhere else on this island, but almost certainly from below snorkeling depth.  I ask you, was little Orphan Annie less of a waif for being born in New York, not far from the home for foundling girls?  Was Daddy Warbucks a Democrat?

   Our experience with waifs is elegantly spelled out in The Ballad of Jeff and Sandra, recorded by Ulysses Everett McGill and the Soggy Bottom Boys. (I hope you received a copy of the CD in your Christmas stocking.)  The ballad recounts our experience with a tiny white crab, a humongous jellyfish and, notably, the

Immature hawkfish, P. forsteri,  in recovering coral.

Notorious PID.  Everyone agreed that our Phoenix Island Damsel was a waif, and no one thought the egg came from Phoenix Island.  In fact, the water-borne egg probably came from Maui.  Possibly it came from a nest on (shudder) this very volcanic isle.  Sandra and I were lucky to find the first one, who lived by himself in the Valley of the Sun, a depression on the wave swept reef in front of Alii Villas, for over a year and a half.  Many fish watchers, including the Great Oz, himself, came to see and bask in the glow of his waifliness.  A handsome photograph of the Notorious PID may be found on page 80 of the Ultimate Guide to Hawaiian Reef Fishes.

     All blathering aside, I think this blacklip qualifies as a waif and I hope you enjoy the pictures showing his development.

    Swimming out, we  saw lots of fish but nothing dramatic.  Way out by the last swim buoy, which corresponded with the five colorful buoys marking the finish line for the dual meet,  I spotted a handsome

 adult ornate wrasse in about ten feet.  I dove down to get his picture, but by the time my camera and I got 

An Ornate Wrasse that didn't get away.   Ho'okena 2012

to the bottom, the ornate wrasse was long gone Luckily, nearby was an immature freckle-faced hawkfish, This green capped fellow was perched on a piece of recovering cauliflower coral.  As you can see, what a few months ago (back when Freckle junior was just a flicker in his daddy's fin) would have looked like a bleached coral of incipient death, is now greatly recovered.   There was no reason for any of us, from mere novice to professor of invertebrate zoology, to know that so much of the coral would recover.  The evolution of the over heated and bleached coral is an ongoing experiment right here in Kailua Bay.  Those of us who gather around the swimming cubby and take notice of such things are greatly heartened by this partial recovery.

     On the way in I stalled to point at a stocky hawkfish.  As I surfaced a ladylike voice behind me asked, "What are you pointing at?"

You don't want to mess with this waif.

     "A stocky hawkfish."  I replied after pulling the snorkel from my mouth.  Turning a bit I saw Sandra  swimming five yards away.  Turning a bit more, I continued, "You're not my wife."

   The lady could have said, "Thank God for that!"  But instead she said, " I was hoping you had an octopus."
  
  To quote the Wyoming sheriff cum philosopher Walt Longmire, Boy Howdy.  I guess that I,too, was hoping it was an octopus.  But things are evolving and it was still a  great day a the beach.

jeff