Peaceful Mahukona

    Thursday morning Sandra and I made our way up to Mahukona. Hawaii Island is still shut down to tourism and so traffic up and down the Kona Coast is usually minimal. Thus we arrived at Mahu at about 9:30. There were a few cars in the parking lot, but not another soul to be seen, either on land or in the water. We had planned the trip to coincide with a high tide and the peaceful sea was lapping the top step of the ladder. Sliding into the bay, we discovered that the water was cooler than expected, perhaps in the very low eighties, and remarkably clear.

A Handsome Mu at Mahukona, August 2020

   August is the month when one can hope to see the juvenile threadfin jack. This strange little fish is diamond shape, about three inches on an edge and trails a number of long threadlike fins from both its dorsal and ventral fins. Our one encounter with this marvel was in the lagoon at the Waikoloa Hilton. This is a peculiar venue, in that although it is obviously man made, it is not stocked; whatever you see there has washed in over the breakwater. In this way it's sort of like a bird feeder (actually more like a crab trap) and so, applying bird watching rules, I believe that the fish you see there, no matter how artificial the environment appears, can be counted. With that single peculiar observation whetting our appetite, we are vigilant as the summer wears on, in hopes of seeing a threadfin in a wilder locale.

  With threadfins on the brain, we entered the water with consummate stealth. A close encounter a year or two ago serves a lesson. If one isn't swimming quietly it is likely that you will frighten this skittish fish. So Sandra and I swam quietly across the bay and saw no threadfins. Only a handsome mu, with creamy body and three dorsal bars was there for our amusement. Throughout our hour in the water we encountered many more mus.  Otherwise know as big eye emperors, the name refers to the title of

Small schooling fish with curious face pattern to be named later.

executioner in a Hawaiian society.  In at least two instances I saw four mus swimming together. Inconceivable! Occasionally we see one or two mus on a swim. This plethora of was unprecedented. 

    A few strokes further and we encountered a huge number of small fish. There were literally sheets of these fish.  Each fish was about two and a half inches long with a faint blueish dorsum and a noticeable lateral line. I had never experienced anything like it. The first school we encountered might have contained a thousand fish. As we made our way around the bay we encountered a few more immense schools of these small fish. 

    Back at the ranch we looked at the pictures of these small fish, which showed a curious face pattern, a series of white and black lines reminiscent of the aku, otherwise known as skipjack tuna.  I then headed for John Hoover's Ultimate Guide.  The bible revealed at least three small schooling fish that might vie for the ID. It seemed most likely that these were delicate roundherring, Spr. delicatulus.   In preparation for the blog I sent the picture to Peter, who has one more week of quarantine to endure up in Kapa'au and, in a separate mailing, to the Great Oz, himself.  Peter noted that several of his friends had alerted him to

The Supermale Fivestripe wrasse cavorts among the rocks.

these huge schools of small fish at Mahukona.  He agreed with me, that they might be roundherrings,based on the behavior noted in Hoover (large schools near the surface.)  John Hoover said that he didn't have any (expletive deleted) idea what they were and would send the picture along to someone more conversant with small schooling fishes.  Actually I made that up...John Hoover would never use such an expletive.

    In any event, it was strange swimming through this mass of tiny fish. 

     Not only had we chosen this day to come to Mahukona based on the tide, but also on the prediction of very calm water. Luckily this was the case and it permitted us to swim safely and easily over the shallow rocky shore of the north cusp of the bay.  This area is renowned as a spot where that very rare fish, the fivestripe wrasse, is a virtual certainty.  Ordinarily one is attempting to photograph these fish while shooting back and forth with the incoming swell over ten or more feet of shallow rocky
bottom.  This is a situation that is both photographically daunting and smacks of a certain degree of personal danger.  On this day the seaward reef gave up like a lamb and we nabbed the pictures you see here.  Probably not the best picture ever of the fivestripe super male, as this golden flanked beauty led us on a merry chase.  But not too bad.

Fivestripe Wrasse, Mahukona August 2020

    We also spotted a couple Christmas wrasse, one as fat as a king salmon.  The islanders among us seem to spear and eat almost anything, but I don't think I have seen a Christmas wrasse, no matter how plump, on a stringer.  This may speak to taste or, more likely, to their propensity to flee. 

I'm including a picture of one of those Christmas Wrasse as well.

    Following our fun on the seaward reef, Sandra and I headed back across the bay.  While still over the outer, deeper section I caught a glimpse of an orange tail, and I expected that far below was a nest of yellow tail filefish.  I waited patiently and what should appear, ever so briefly, but a file fish with a bright orange tail with a terminal

Prettier than a king salmon, but not as tasty.

black band: the ever so rare fan tailed filefish.  In the mid -eighties this fish was super common.  I remember standing on a pier at Honokohau Boat harbor with the boys, aged six and three, and watching these small, pretty fish swim under the dock and around the pilings.  Now I'm lucky if I see one a year peeking out from a rocky hideaway. 

     The fantailed filefish has always been known, like lemmings, to have a boom and crash population.  Around 1990 the population crashed, never to return.  In ancient Hawaiian lore these population fluctuations were known to coincide with important events.  I'm going to predict that when Donald Trump is dragged from the White House kicking and screaming, pacifier firmly planted in his deplorable puss, that we will see a rebound in the population of fantailed filefish.  You heard it here first 

When it comes to pacifiers, the First Crybaby prefers the Sean Hannity autograph model.

    I dove down to try for a picture.  My best effort is about fifteen feet; this time I go deep enough that I could feel the pin prick of pinched facial nerves ... and I wasn't even close to the bottom.  So clear was
the water that I swear I was seeing the fantail filefish form at least thirty feet.  Kohala crystal!

   The rest of our swim did not reveal any special fishies...no barracuda, unusual butterflies or rock damsels.  Ashore there were now plenty of people including one family gathering under a cabana playing birthday music.  The ersatz shower was inoperative, but that may be just as well.  Wendy Noritake warns us that a friend recently got a bit of that water in her mouth and developed a vile dysentery.  So don't get anything nasty in your mouth and I promise in seven weeks the bad taste will be gone.

In seven weeks it will be bye bye birdie!

jeff