Potter's Gets Cleaned at City of Refuge Or The Snorkelkids Meet the Dragon Flower

   Today we went to City of Refuge for the first time in, like, forever.  Although city is one of our favorite snorkeling spots, rough ocean conditions earlier in the year kept us away.  More recently, we have been

Seven Eleven Crab, C maculatus  City of Refuge  June 2017

dealing with busy schedules.  But really, there is no excuse.  City is a great place to go snorkeling and we are appropriately ashamed.

   We arrived early, about 8:30 AM, and we were in the water by 9.  As one would expect, it being almost the 4th of July, the water was a very pleasant temperature and for the most part fairly clear.  We swam along looking at the usual suspects until about ten yards ahead a thirty something young man yelled, "Hey dad!  Come here!  Its a great big crab!"

   Well,  I wasn't his father,as far as we know, but I got there in advance of the pater familias.  What they had was a seven eleven crab hunkered down under a rock in about ten feet.  As Sandra noted, this was pretty good spotting,  Although this is indeed a pretty big crab, he isn't all that brightly colored and he was pretty deep.  She thinks the youth in question made a random dive and got lucky.  We dove the crab several times

Potter's Angelfish and City of Refuge, June 2017

for pictures and thanked the young man for his fine spot.

   Moving along, we enjoyed a large number of menpachi, as epaulette soldier fish are known in these Very Sandwich Islands.  Its interesting that when a fish is highly edible, it is known commonly by a Hawaiian or Japanese name.  The epaulette soldierfish is a delicacy, like opihi, which is served by locals at weddings, graduations, etc. If they weren't edible we would know them simply as soldierfish and limpets.

    Looking at all the soldierfish and squirrelfish, we were lucky enough to spot a bigeye out in the open and a brick soldierfish, which I have not seen in a while.  Both these fish were skittish enough that when I dove for a picture, they retreated to cover.  Before we turned around, I spotted a Potter's angelfish that was being cleaned in about ten feet of clear water.  Cleaner wrasses, as we have noted in the

Spiteful Cone 

past, can be quite an asset to the fish photographer. In this case, the shy Potters just hung there in the clear water twelve feet down, while I dove for a few pictures.  You will note that this fish does not have a very red head and I speculate that it is either young or a female.  Never the less, this was a fantastic opportunity and I have to give the cleaner wrasse a lot of credit.

   Before we made the club house turn, we enjoyed a handsome spiteful cone sitting peacefully on a ledge about eight feet down.  Diving the poisonous snail, we were able to see the venomous mollusc lurking inside the shell.


   On the way back in, we were treated to a pair of Hawaiian dascyllus spawning.  Wearing very black faces and tails, which contrasted nicely with their virtually white flanks, this elegant pair circled each other and wiggled frenetically over a patch of stones for about a minute.  Following the courtship, one took off
(probably the female) and one remained, inspecting the spot where the deed was done and making modest efforts to keep other fish and humans at bay.

Spawning pattern, Hawaiian Dascyllus

   Back on shore we reclined in our chairs and had tea, or possibly lunch.  It certainly wasn't brunch, because who in their gastronomic mind would call a salami and cheese sandwich brunch?  As we were finishing, the dolphin pod came in a d gave everyone a great show quite close to shore.

   Before heading home we decided to take the one lane road across the desert to Napo'opo'o.  About halfway across we encountered a miracle of nature. The scraggly cactus that we see here in Kona was in bloom.  There were lots of large white flowers poking out at us from the side of the road.  I found a pull out and sweetie disembarked to take the picture you see here.

   Our destination was the coffee company about two miles up the hill from Napo'opo'o.  There we met Angel, who was wearing a Guadalupe hat.  I guess if you are wearing a hat emblazoned with the Virgin 
(pronounced beer-hen) it is odds on that you are Mexican.  That was indeed the case, Angel hailing from Michoacan, was full of good cheer.    We had a great time telling tales of the land of Montezuma.

A Kona Still Life    Pomegranate, Egg Fruit and Aguacate

 Before saying adios, we purchased a pomegranate and an egg fruit, for although they would like to sell you coffee and chocolate covered Mac nuts at great expense, this tienda frequently has unusual local fruits and vegetables at a reasonable price..

   We got the pomegranate because Sandra said it would make excellent coleslaw and we got the egg fruit because I'd never seen one before.  Angel said they had an acre or so of egg fruit trees  (Pouteria campechiana)  up the hill.  The tree is an evergreen tree native to Mexico.  The fruit is the size of a small apple.  One is required to wait until the fruit starts to get soft before cutting into it and enjoying its dry, sweet flesh.  It is not clear if there is an historical basis for the Mexican folk tale in which Guillermo Tell saves the pueblo from the local bully (who may or may not appear in Donald Trump's genealogy) by shooting an egg fruit off his son's head with a  pistol similar to the one that Martin Short used to defeat El Guapo in The

Dragon Fruit Blossom  photo by Sandra Gray

Three Amigos. 

   Just as we were ready to depart, I asked Angel if he would like to see the pictures that Sandra had taken of the amazing blooming cacti. He graciously looked at our pics and said that they looked a lot like dragon fruit flowers.  Of course, he was exactly right and too polite to mock us.  The creeping cactus that grows commonly near the beach is indeed dragon fruit cactus.  Hylocerus undatus, that green scruffy looking cactus, is seen everywhere along our roads and rock walls.  In my consummate ignorance, I had no idea that it was the source of  that oddly shaped red fruit we know as dragon fruit or pitaya.   We see the fruit in the markets occasionally, so I would guess that it is cultivated.  In the wild, it flowers following a large amount of rain.  Well, the recent Kona weather has certainly punched that ticket. The flowers, one of the largest produced by any cactus, turn to fruit over four weeks.  Suffice it to say, it is our intent to get back to those cactus in a few weeks and catch a swim at City in the process.  I hope you enjoy Sandra's wonderful pictures and the next time you see dragon fruit in the market you can put it together with the large yellow and white flower and the scraggly roadside cactus.

    Back at Casa Ono we are incubating our egg fruit with baited breath.  Stay tuned for the exciting tasting notes.

Harry Potter and the Curse of the Cleaner Wrasse

The Cauliflower Coral Caper

 A couple days after returning to Hawaii, I received a group email from a local biologist, Lindsey Kramer.  Lindsey works for the Department of Aquatic Resources, based in a trailer hard by the fuel dock at Honokohau harbour.  She is also the coordinator for a loose knit organization called Eyes of the Reef.  I suppose that my presence on the mailing list, makes me an EOR observer.

   The email I received heralded the moment when cauliflower coral, Pocilipora meandrina, would be, or

A Healthy Cauliflower Coral, Kailua Bay 2017

should be, spawning on the leeward side of the Big Island.  I'm sure many of you recall that the cauliflower coral took one hell of a hit n the summer of 2015, when the inshore ocean temperature went up above 90 degrees and stayed there for over a month.  Much of the coral, not just the cauliflower coral, expelled its symbiotic algae in response to the heat stress, bleached and died.  Lindsey's email suggested that 3 to 5% of the cauliflower corals survived this event.  My feeling is that this number is outlandishly high, at least in the Kona area.  In some locations (e.g. Paul Allen's Reef and the bay south of Magic Sands)  it was closer to 100%!  This is based on my observations in early 2016. Last year, a small amount of spawning was reported from City of Refuge.  In other areas in Kona there was none.  It was Ms. Kramer's hope that the EOR would spot multiple spawnings along our coast. 

   Cauliflower coral was so common that we took it for granted.  However, those of us in the business of

Lots of Fish , Lots of Dead Coral    Kailua Bay 2016

finding unusual fish and critters, have always been aware that this branching coral serves as a valuable hiding place.  It serves an important nursery function for some juvenile species of fish, it is home to some small and secretive species (e.g. coral croucher, speckled scorpionfish and fourstripe wrasse) and it serves as a protective home for a variety of hermit crabs.  Not only that, but about six months ago, while listening to Hawaii Public Radio, I learned that P. meandrina protects exposed shoreline, such as we have at Paul Allen's reef and Alii Villas by buffering the surf.  Suffice it to say, we are not taking cauliflower coral for granted any longer. 

   Since the summer of 2015, in some spots the cauliflowers and some other corals have been making a bit of a comeback, although the areas I mentioned above remain decimated.  One essential component of coral recovery is their ability to propagate.  It is possible to break off a piece of coral and attach it to a suitable spot in the sand or by physical means to a rock or piece of metal and it may grow.   But  hopefully recovery will be accomplished by spawning.

   Each species of coral spawns at a certain moment, based on the lunar cycle and water temperature.  At the

What Ant Doesn't Want to Eat a Bale of That?

genetically programmed moment all the coral of a species release their sperm and eggs.  There is a lipid component to these gametes, so they float to the surface, where they seek out a partner, joining to form an embryo.  In the case of coral, this embryo is called a planula. As our friends at NOAA explain:  Planulae float in the ocean, some for days and some for weeks, before dropping to the ocean floor. Then, depending on seafloor conditions, the planulae may attach to the substrate and grow into a new coral colony at the slow rate of about.4 inches a year.

   Most coral species spawn at night, but P. meandrina spawns just after sunrise. We have known about this for about ten years, going so far as to contact a coral biologist at UH Hilo to the find correct day.  But we have never taken the opportunity to get up early and be in the water at sunrise to observe the cauliflower coral spawning.

This Lovely Snapper Greeted Us Early Sunday Morning

     I have a friend at the Kona Public Library, Jennifer Lossalio, who is going to help us put together a display of paper mache Hawaiian dascyllus, to demonstrate the plight of the cauliflowers.  I was telling her this story and when I got to this part about not getting out to see the spawning in previous years I invoked Willie Nelson.  Willie has been quoted, referring to his colleague Waylon Jennings, that Waylon is too lazy to walk across the street to watch a piss ant eat a bale of hay.  It made Jen smile, but I'm sad to say that I may have been that lazy. 

    So last Sunday, we skipped church and  entered the water at the foot of the pier at about 6:45.  Knowing the water was cool, I encouraged Sandra to wear her wet suit.  We identified a few likely looking corals, paddling from one to another for about an hour, not seeing any spawning and getting progressively more chilled.  We waited till about 8 AM before getting out. It should be noted that there were a surprising number of reef fish swimming about, so it wasn't boring, just cold.

Lots of Stocky Hawkfish But No Planulae

   The following morning, Sandra had a doctors appointment so I went by myself.  On my walk to the pier, I crossed Alii Drive and spoke to one of the many anglers who were fishing from the sea wall.  While we were chatting,  the adjacent fisherman landed a fine scale triggerfish, perhaps the one Sandra and I were following the day before.

   The water wasn't any warmer, but I did meet, ever so briefly, a lady named Barbara, who was doing the same thing I was, swimming from coral to coral to basically no avail.  And there was still some fish watching to do.

   There is a certain genre of ladies around here who come to the beach to get in the water and paddle around and gossip.  On this morning two such were floating near the first swim buoy and I heard one exclaim to her friend, "I think he's looking at me!"   There was no way that I could resist that, so I swam over hoping for an octopus.  As it turned out, they had a scorpionfish and immediately started warning me to stay away.  Muy peligrosso!  So I dove down and held onto a nearby rock and got his picture.  I guess I'm a bit like the

I Swear he Was Looking At Me.  Devil Scorpionfish,  Kailua Bay  2017

barber in Penney Lane, with a picture of every stonefish I have known. (And the fishes that come and go, stop to say hello.)  This was my first Devil Scoriponfish for 2017, so I was very pleased.  In addition to being very cold.

  Sandra made her doctors appointment and the following day I saw my dermatologist who excised another skin cancer.  The healing wound kept me out of the water for the rest of the week.  On Friday we were perusing the paper at Jennifer's library and discovered that Kailua Bay had just reopened.  It had been closed to swimming starting Monday morning when a sewage leak was spotted near the King Kam Hotel.  I doubt that had anything to do with the coral spawning (or not) and I didn't get sick, but like so many things in life, I found it a curious coincidence.  If someone had checked the water sample a few hours earlier I wouldn't have met Barbara, or seen the stonefish and we would all be wondering whether or not the coral spawned.

   At the end of the day, we didn't see any coral blooming.  And neither did any of the other EOR watchers along the coast.  I suppose it is possible that a few planulae will float in and start infant coral heads in Kailua Bay.  Luckily, as you can see from my pictures, some of the surviving cauliflower coral is looking pretty good, so we have reason to hope that the normal life cycle will reassert itself next year. 

Spawn, Dammit!

   

The King Kamehameha Day Parade in Kona

The Royal Court of King Kamehameha

    Although this blog is primarily aimed at fish identification and events surrounding that most worthy of endeavors, occasionally we feel the need to talk about events happening on our #Island in the Pacific.  This blog falls into that category.

   Yesterday Sandra and I attended the King Kamehameha Day parade here in Kailua Kona.  This was

The Grand Marshall in Top Hat

substantially different than anything I might have expected, which might just show how oblivious I am to events happening around me.  After all, we have lived through at least three of these parades, which certainly make the news.  But I think you might be surprised at what we saw and my conclusions.

   The day was relatively cloudy and a bit cool for the season.  Because Sandra wanted to sit on the sea wall, we were facing east, into the rising sun.  The parade started at 9 AM as the first event in a day of dance, music and other festivities, so as we were sitting on the seawall, the sun was rising in the east.  

   The parade was different in another mundane way (aside from occurring in the morning instead of the late afternoon)  It progressed form the Royal Polynesian resort in the south, north to the old airport; the opposite of all other parades that invariably go from north to south.

    I figured that this would be a fun, festive parade with kids on floats and bands, and there was  a little of that, but basically this was a parade of equestrian groups representing all the islands.  These groups were termed Pa'u units.  They consisted of from three to five women and two men, all riding horses bedecked with leis of plants relating to the pa'u tradition of their particular island. 

   All these horses were brought into Kailua Kona along with their riders.  As you see, the women are clothed in remarkable fashion, the men to a slightly lesser extent, but still consistent with their island theme.

   Pa'u means skirt. You will note that the women are riding astride their mounts and wearing a long culotte, hence the pa'u.  These outfits date back to the introduction of horses in the Hawaiian Islands, the year 1805.  At that time only the Alii were permitted to ride and the Alii women formed the first pa'u groups.  After the royal Hawaiian government was overthrown by the United States military, the pa'u tradition withered.  The

The Pa'u Queen

tradition was brought back about fifty years later and women and their male attendants have been riding in pa'u units for over a hundred years.

   You may recall that I said at the beginning that this procession was not frivolous.  In fact, there was little cheering as the 19 equestrian groups paraded by.  Most were mounted, but there were a couple horse drawn carriages.  The Grand marshall in top hat, drawn by two magnificent draft horses.  And before I go on, I need to mention that the parade was started by a male Royal Court, dressed in alii garb, lead by bearers of kahilis, those feather dusters on steroids that the royal Hawaiians used as standards.

   There was a queen with her own mounted court astride big, strong horses, and she, in fact, was a big strong woman, not some wimpy homecoming queen type.  Each pa'u group that followed was in the color traditional to their island.  In addition (and this surprised me) each island sent a pa'u unit to Honolulu for their King Kamehmeha Day parade.

   So here is my take.  As you may know, there is a significant movement to bring back the royal Hawaiian

Princess Raisha Karratti and the Hawaii Island court

government.  When he was campaigning here, John Kasich was asked what he thought about it and was quoted as saying he was unaware of it.  And why should he be...its not like its really going to happen.  But the Hawaiians take it seriously.  One sees lots of bumper stickers and such supporting the idea.  

   I believe these pa'u groups are representing that ideal.  The mounted princesses were mostly at least part

The Roving Marshalls Brought Peace to Alii Drive

Hawaiian, they represent the deposed government.  The mounted princesses held themselves with a restrained grace as they gave signs of greeting to the crowd.  and at the end of the day, we do live in a Hawaii that until recently (in the great scheme of the universe)  was ruled by the Hawaiians.

We're Back in Kailua and So Is the Milletseed

     After a two month hiatus, during which we exposed ourselves to art in the low countries and hobnobbed with our friends and relatives in the PNW, we have returned to our beloved Kailua Kona.  Although we

Milletseed Butterflyfish,  Kailua Kona,  June 2017

were too exhausted to go snorkeling the day of our arrival, I hit the pier and Kahalu'u on the following two days.

    It only took a moment, as I swam out by the swim buoys on the Ironman side, to know that I had returned at the right time for snorkeling.  The water was really flat and just a little cool.  At 8:30 in the morning there
were already plenty of fish doing their thing among the coral that really looked pretty good. The recreational swimmers were plying the lane beside the buoys, their numbers somewhat reduced from peak tourist season.

   I swam out to the area where, just before we departed for the art of Amsterdam, I had seen the trio of sharks.  I didn't see them that morning and there was no one familiar on the pier to ask for an update.  Swimming seaward I was joined by a turtle who swam right up to me and hung on the surface for a minute catching his breath.  And then a little further out, we hit pay dirt in the form of a single Milletseed

Six Red Labrids  Coris Gaimard,juv

Butterflyfish.

    The milletseed was once seen in large schools while snorkeling in Kailua Kona, but now the individuals that appear at snorkeling depth are so rare that I wonder each time if this will be the last one I will see.  I did not see any in 2015 and saw but one in April of 2016.  I hope to see more than one this year, but I'm not holding my breath.    I did need to hold my breath to get the picture you see here.  This milletseed was in the deep spot past the last swim buoy where we sometimes see scribbled filefish, about 12 feet down.  A
couple good dives and we nabbed the photo.

Yellotail Coris  Terminal Male  Kahalu'u June 2017

    The following day I went down to Kahalu'u.  Sandra tagged along, but didn't swim, choosing instead to work the crowd under the big top.  The tide was out, so I crawled through the sand channel like some amphibious creature from Disney's Rite of Spring.   It was early so there were not a lot of swimmers, but
there was a nice variety of fish. A tiny four spot butterfly was playing hide and seek around a rock near the entrance, but my efforts to get his picture were futile.

The Rubenesque Mermaid by Mary Deveraux

     A patch of shallow coral yielded a novel site: six red labrid wrasses swimming together in a school.  Coris gaimard, schooling together.It made for an interesting sight.  A few moments later, their proud father cruised by and I nabbed his picture as well.

    Occasionally one sees this juvenile (that the uninitiated mistake for Nemo) swimming with a school of small mixed fry.  Its not unusual to see aggregations of baby belted wrasse,for example, but I have never seen a large grouping solely of this species swimming together.  In addition, these youngsters were very approachable.  Usually I encounter a single red labrid juvenile who does his best to elude my photographic efforts.  I'll be back to Kahalu'u soon and I won't be surprised to see this group still hanging out together.  Maybe I'll see you there, as well.

    Over by the decommissioned hotel, hoping for an octopus, my swim was interrupted by a Rubenesque young woman who took a break from swimming to stand on a patch of sand that happened to be right in my path. She was wearing a mask but swimming barefoot.  Having just returned from the art museums of Holland, I was bemused by the idea that she might be a mermaid model for Peter Paul Rubens.  And I wondered, did that giant of the Dutch renaissance ever paint a mermaid? Although we commonly use the term rubenesque to

Rubens and his wife, Helena Fourment

imply an obese woman, that really wasn't the case. Ruben's women carry a little extra weight, but its not excessive; pleasingly plump might be a fit.  One need to look at the self portrait of Rubens and his wife to see where his tastes lay, as it were. 

    So bemused was I, that I swam progressively into the shallows by the breakwater.  By the time I had exited my reverie, I was in quite a pickle. A very shallow coral carpeted pickle. Luckily, there was little surf and so I crept out of the very shallow coral without injury.  During my escape, I saw a pair of saddleback butterflyfish (which are clearly more common that milletseeds.) 

    As it turns out, Rubens did not paint a mermaid.

   My beloved was awaiting me back in the kiosk,  First she needed to warn me about a young man hanging by the stairs with his pants half off and spouting twisted religious jargon.   Then she introduced me to a pair of toddlers who were dancing to the music provided by a gray haired group of ukulele players.  Matt and Donny looked moonstruck as they attempted a few steps.

   On my way to the changing room I was accosted by the young man in the advanced stage of de-pantsing.  He blew smoke in my face and said, "If Donald Trump was Jesus, would we need a special prosecutor to crucify him?"

    We're all set to go swimming with Reverend Sunny this morning and I believe I will pose that question to her, if only to keep her on her ecclesiastical toes. In the meantime, keep strumming your ukulele and keep your eye out for that Rubenesque mermaid.

jeff