Favoritos de christrent

Was resting on the shoulder of the road amongst some weedy vegetation. Had just emerged from the holes under the rocky boulders of the canyon wall just off to the side of the road. I only saw it because of the shine in the headlights and the head which was lifted up. Didn't bite until near the end of my time photographing it. Three nights in the Chiricahuas, with the first being too wet and the third being not humid enough. The second day, the day I found this snake, was warm and humid with dry ground, the perfect Green Rat weather. I was really hoping to get lucky enough to see one of these beautiful and elusive snakes and was super excited when it actually happened. This is by far one of the coolest creatures I have ever seen in the wild and I am so fortunate to have seen this species in the wild on my second attempt!

A congregation of Polycera atra mixed with Polycera hedgpethi was located on their food source, Bugula neritina, amongst detritus on a sandy slope at a depth of 70 feet. The slope is part of a submarine canyon and the detritus is washed down the slope from a pier above. Note the Polycera egg ribbon on the far left and the individual of Doris montereyensis. Water temperature was 53 degrees F.

Pacifia goddardi was located at a depth of 35 feet on reef. Lengths were 1 cm. Water temperature was 56 degrees F.

Nudibranchs are commonly found near their food. In this image there appears to be one type of hydroid. The food source of P. goodardi is reported to be Bougainvillia-like species B (Goddard & Hoover, 2016). The thecae of this species have been observed to be sand encrusted and the hypostomes were salmon-colored. The thecae in the lower left of this image appear to match the description of the food source of P. goddardi, but in the present image the hypostomes of the hydroids appear lighter in color. It is not clear if the hydroids in this image are the food source of P. goddardi. Considering that this species has been found repeatedly at Point Dume during the last 5 years, and that 5 individuals were observed during this survey, Point Dume would be a good site for further attempts to document feeding behavior of P. goddardi.

Goddard, JHR, Hoover, CA. 2016. Distribution, seasonality, and prey specificity of Flabellina goddardi Gosliner, 2010 (Gastropoda: Nudipleura: Aeolidina). Nautilus, 130(4): 146-152.

Flabellinopsis iodinea laying eggs was located at a depth of 35 feet on reef. Length was between 3-4 cm. Water temperature was 56 degrees F.

Note the open gonopore in the lower left part of the image.

Female 1178 - born in the wild!

Flock: So Cal
Hatched: May 11, 2021,
Age in this photo: 1 yrs 5 mos
Hatch Location: Wild
Father: 20 Mother: 654
Biological Siblings
45
46
47
67
68
71
72
96
105
106
116
117
137
158
168
181
199
209
221
247
279
336
454
504
594
635
676
726
933

Source: https://condorspotter.com

Really cool experience seeing this Red Abalone Spawn in the wild. I went to check on an abalone I often see, but when I peered down in the crack I realized there were now two of them. This one (pictured) had crawled out from deep around a corner in the back of the hole and positioned itself front and center at the entrance of the crevice. Within three seconds of me seeing the abalone, it began releasing eggs into the water. Im not sure if it was also doing this before I showed up. I snapped a couple photos- only one of which was decently in focus because I turned off my focusing light as to not scare the abalone. I watched it for about a minute an a half until it stopped and began reseeding way back into the crevice. When I came back ten minutes later, only one abalone was left, the one spawning had crawled back deep in the hole and around the corner where it was no longer visible.