we reach a large expanse of shallow water littered with coral bommies. We find a crimson crinoid shrimp that has vacated the sanctity of its host’s feet and is crawling openly along one of the arms. Tickled by the movement on its sensitive hairs, the crinoid curls its arm inwards but the shrimp hops onto the adjacent arm and scuttles along the length to the tip. There is excellent diving


both to the east and west of Menjangan. To the east lies Puri Jati, a sheltered bay that has evolved from being a fishing village to becoming a popular dive site recognised for its unusual fish species. It has an easy shore entry from the beach – the first 30m of black sand slopes gently down to a depth of 6m. This moonscape is seemingly devoid of life. We swim over hundreds of thumb-size corals dispersed across the slope. We pass over meadows of short sea-grasses as we search for strange and unusual creatures. Longspine urchins congregate in patches and


46


their pansy shell skeletons lie scattered over the reef. As we reach the deeper water we find many sand anemones hosting a variety of sea life. A large female anemone shrimp reveals her intestines and clutch of eggs on her see-through body. Nearby, another anemone is swarming with baby damselfish. The damsels are nervously crowding together as they desperately seek shelter in the flat anemone. Something is worrying them. It takes a few minutes before we realise that the adjacent tangle of dirty reef debris is actually a hairy frogfish hunting the vulnerable damsels. We start to look closely at all other bundles of debris and discover more hairy frogfish, juvenile lionfish and flying gunards. A mess of floating reeds and fishing line turns out to be a pair of hairy ghostpipefish. Unlike their relatives at Menjangan, these are drab in colour and swim horizontally in the sea-grass. PJ’s certainly offers some weird looking critters.


September/October 2011


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