Note: If he took these out of the water to photograph them, I find that disgusting. If not, I find that brilliant. We shall see.

Enchanting nudibrach glam-shots:

Marilyn sez, "David Doubilet is the Annie Leibowitz of the marine gastropod world. He took all but two photos in this amazingly beautiful gallery of nudibranchs to accompany a feature story on the same subject in the June Nat Geo magazine, online now."

Link to article, Link to gallery)

(Thanks, Marilyn!)

Posted by mikki at 02:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It seems that with the advent of point and shoot digital cameras and cheap underwater housings, just about everyone has a camera to go diving with. This phenomenon has many pluses and minuses, but I must say that the minuses thus far, at least in my experience, seem to outweigh the pluses.

Without trying to be an elitist snob diving takes practice and skill. In order to achieve proper buoyancy, one must be comfortable in the water, and must know where all body parts and all extensions like fins are at all times in relation to the world around you. Most of the places we dive today are protected (thank goodness), meaning you are not allowed to touch the reef or the creatures living there. A careless fin, laying across coral for a photo, standing on coral, etc. can cause significant damage that takes a great deal of time to repair. I must say that I'm very lucky to have been originally introduced to ocean diving by people who took their responsibility to the environment very seriously, and taught me not to ever touch live coral or other creatures.

In order to shoot photos with most cameras (especially point and shoot digitals), you must get close to your subject. As you get close to your subject while diving, you generally must get close to the reef. As you get close to the reef, lack of buoyancy control will cause you to trash everything around you as you madly flail in order to get that picture that your family and friends just MUST have.

The more excited a photographer gets about the subject being photographed, the more he or she forgets that there are living creatures around (including fellow photographers). This week, I have watched a person lay on the reef and become incensed when the divemaster picked him off the coral and told him not to do this. I watched an excited photographer kick another photographer in the head as he cut her off for a picture of a file fish. I've seen numerous people kick over gorgonias, sponges, and soft corals while trampling each other for a photograph of a seahorse. I was personally shoved to the side by someone who wanted a picture of a frogfish I was filming (I have video of his camera cutting in front of mine), and the ruckus caused the frogfish to just give up and leave, moving to another spot. Unfortunately, that didn't stop the paparazzi, who chased him to the new spot and started all over again.

So, as a dive instructor and an underwater photographer and videographer, I have some suggestions. 1) Do not put a camera in your hands until you can demonstrate proper buoyancy AND dive without using your hands. 2) If the subject you wish to photograph is in a poor spot for you to get close enough without banging into something, come back later. It might have moved. 3) Take turns. Just like in kindergarten. Chances are, the subject won't be going far. It is not a feeding frenzy, and you'll likely stress the animal and yourself before you get a decent picture. 4) Make sure you are weighted properly for all aspects of the dive. Late in the dive with a light tank is not the time you should find out you can't hold position to shoot that squid who is coming right at you. 5) If you see ME shooting...do not taught happy fun recalcitrant videographer. I will bite, or inflate your BCD and send you to the surface.

I did laugh pretty hysterically today when the paparazzi chased a turtle around the reef. As they all clamored for position, the turtle took off and hung out with me for a good 4 minutes of video. He got so close that I had to pull back so he'd be in focus. Same thing happened with a frogfish. He wound up directly in front of me where I got some great video. Ditto with a seahorse.

To see video shot without crashing onto reefs, go to this handy link

Posted by mikki at 08:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Although if some dweeb in a boat is on meth and pot mistakes you for a creature smaller than a beaver but larger than a muskrat that only lives in the south, and you happen to be in Oregon, you're kinda on your own I'm afraid.

Snorkeler mistaken for rodent, shot in face - CNN.com:


EUGENE, Oregon (AP) -- A snorkeler who was shot in the face after he was apparently mistaken for a swimming rodent was in good condition after surgery, a hospital said Saturday.

John William Cheesman, 44, of Springfield, underwent eight hours of surgery Thursday to remove bullet and bone fragments from his face, said his wife, Shelley Cheesman.

"He's doing really well," Shelley Cheesman said. "The bullet hit in front of his right ear, where the bone is the most dense. It just fragmented and didn't go into his brain."

He was listed in good condition at Oregon Health & Science University Hospital in Portland.

William Roderick, 60, of Reedsport, has been charged with assault, being a felon in possession of a firearm, and possession of methamphetamine and marijuana. He was being held in the county jail.

Roderick told deputies he thought Cheesman was a nutria swimming in the Smith River near Reedsport, about 90 miles southwest of Eugene, and shot him with a .22-caliber rifle, police said.

A nutria is a water-dwelling South American rodent species that is larger than a muskrat but smaller than a beaver. It was introduced to U.S. waters in the 1940s, according the National Wildlife Federation.

Cheesman, an avid diver, was in the river looking at different species of fish, his wife said. He swam to the river bank and yelled for help.

Roderick and another man came to Cheesman's aid in a boat, called 911 and drove him to an ambulance.

"I do give him credit for helping him," Shelley Cheesman said of Roderick.

Posted by mikki at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, Wes' credit card expired so DirecTV called with a recorded message at 8:30 am, waking me up. So Wes goes back to the DirecTV website and fixes the credit card. 1PM same recorded message. Hmmm. This could be annoying. We hoped that the record would catch up ASAP. Fat chance. Next morning, 8:30 am, waking me up, yet another DirecTV call. And again at 1pm. So I sent them an email telling them in writing to stop calling, explaining what happened. They said that because of the expiration, there was a balance on the account. I told them to bill it to the credit card now on file. Did they? NO! Next day, they called THREE times with the recorded message. This was a Sunday, and xmas eve. I called them and YELLED at them to stop calling. They promised they would. I emailed to follow up. Xmas day, no calls. Wow! Tuesday morning, 3 more calls. This time I contacted complained to the Federal Trade Commission under the Federal Fair Debt Collections Act which requires a creditor to stop calling if you tell them to cease, AND also prohibits calls at "inconvenient times" according to the consumer, AND prohibits "excessive calls." This morning, woken up again at 9 am.

When I had called DirecTV, I was told I was an "A list customer" which means that they "jump through hoops" to keep me happy. If THIS is happy, what do they do with "non A list customers?" What in the name of the Goddess does one have to do to get these people to STOP CALLING?!?

Posted by mikki at 09:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Census of seas reveals amazing forms of life - CNN.com:


WASHINGTON (AP) -- Peering deep into the sea, scientists are finding creatures more mysterious than many could have imagined.

At one site, nearly 2 miles deep in the Atlantic, shrimp were living around a vent that was releasing water heated to 765 degrees Fahrenheit. Water surrounding the site was a chilly 36 degrees.

An underwater peak in the Coral Sea was home to a type of shrimp thought to have gone extinct 50 million years ago.

More than 3 miles beneath the Sargasso Sea, in the Atlantic, researchers collected a dozen new species eating each other or living on organic material that drifts down from above.

"Animals seem to have found a way to make a living just about everywhere," said Jesse Ausubel of the Sloan Foundation, discussing the findings of year six of the census of marine life.

Added Ron O'Dor, a senior scientist with the census: "We can't find any place where we can't find anything new."

This year's update, released Sunday, is part of a study of life in the oceans that is scheduled for final publication in 2010. The census is an international effort supported by governments, divisions of the United Nations and private conservation organizations. About 2,000 researchers from 80 countries are participating.

Posted by mikki at 03:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Boy, 3, bitten by octopus | NEWS.com.au:


A THREE-year-old boy is in intensive care after a bite from a deadly octopus at a south-east Queensland beach.

Jane Moss said today her son Anthony had been playing with the blue-ringed octopus in the shallows at Suttons Beach at Redcliffe, north of Brisbane, when it bit him yesterday.
He was rushed to hospital unable to breathe, and put on life support overnight.

He was still in intensive care tonight, but could be discharged as early as tomorrow.

Ms Moss said Anthony and his twin brother had been "messing with" the octopus, and Anthony showed symptoms only minutes after they put the creature back in the water.

"He said to me, 'I can't walk,' and his legs were all floppy," she told the Nine Network.

Attacks by the blue-ringed octopus in waters off south-east Queensland are considered extremely rare.

Posted by mikki at 02:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Once again this year, Bonaire was a fantastic vacation. Poor Wessiepooh destressed a little bit, making it possible for him to breathe that little bit easier. I had a great time diving, and learning more about how to shoot video from Hendrik Wyuts, a Dutch videographer I met 10 years ago when he taped our crazy little group during my first real dive trip. Two classes with him and I was ready to take over the world. We'll see whether the videos improve when I get a new camera.

It was great to see old friends again, even though some had moved to other jobs. Karen who fed the kittys and took care of their medical needs was no longer at Habitat. Ernst the sometimes grumpy German photo shop manager had retired back to his catamaran just off the shore at Habitat. Wilco was still as Wilco as ever. Netto was still finding strange and unique underwater creatures. All else was pretty much as we left it.

Bonaire is still the perfect place for diving. We didn't bring our still cameras this time due to the extra weight and the desire to take a bit of a break. The gear brings our baggage totals to about 120 lbs each. Wes didn't feel much like shooting anyway (although I think he regretted that choice later in the trip). I shot a lot of videos that are now all up happily at http://web.mac.com/mikkibarry and there will be more when I have time to put everything onto Final Cut HD so I can find some more creative ways to edit the 'good stuff." More on that later.

Right now, we're just sitting here in this wonderfully crowded departure lounge in Bonaire, waiting for perhaps some word on our friends from Air Jamaica and wondering when we're actually going to take off for Montego Bay, and whether or not we are actually going to reach home at some point today. Wouldn't it be nice to find out?

Posted by mikki at 03:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"No problem, mon" is Jamaica's unofficial slogan. Seems that nobody bothered to tell their national carrier, Air Jamaica. You really kinda know when you book Air Jamaica to Bonaire that it is indeed possible that things are not going to go quite right. In the "olden days" AJ would indeed hold flights for later connections coming in from the US to Montego Bay so that they could catch their Bonaire connections. But apparently, that doesn't work the same way anymore. Our friends were stranded the last time they tried that connection, and had to go back to Miami to catch another flight to Bonaire, as AJ flies to Bonaire only once a week these days.

Our connection down here was flawless. They held the Bonaire flight the few minutes it would take to get us on board before we winged off to Bonaire, arriving a few minutes early. Poetry in motion even. We got there early enough to purchase our upgrades, and all was perfect. On our way home, however, things immediately started looking not so wonderful when we found that the island's Internet service was basically not working, then we found that even worse, all of AJ's computers across the Caribbean were out of service. This made it necessary for the poor contractors behind the counter to have to hand write everything including boarding passes. So they decided they were not going to let us buy upgrades, and otherwise caused mass annoyance as we were not allowed into the air conditioned departure lounge until we had real boarding passes, which couldn't be provided until they called Montego Bay and then got what seats were available and blah blah blah. When we finally got into the air conditioning, things were much better, albeit crowded. Our flight was scheduled to board at 2, take off at 3. It is now 3:05 and the inbound has not yet arrived, and nobody seems to have any word on whether it is going to, so there you have it.

So why do we fly Air Jamaica with its spotty service? Because our alternatives are not fantastic. AJ goes BWI to Mobay to Bonaire. We CAN take American, which would go Dulles to Puerto Rico, 9 hour layover, then Eagle to Bonaire, arriving in the evening. Departure back to the US is at some ungodly hour like 6 am, with another 9 hour layover in Puerto Rico. The Dash 8s that Eagle flies are literally painful because the seat pitch is rather crappy. They are also rather expensive, Puerto Rico is really horrible, and 9 hours is a very long time. Other options are Dulles to Newark, Newark to Bonaire on Continental, with an arrival sometime around 4:30 AM. We don't know what the flight back is like. They also have an overnight flight from Houston. Not sure about the layovers, or the connectivity time, but I'm told that the seat pitch of the Continental Jets is not much better than the Eagle Dash 8, and the cabin service apparently is horrible.

As I look up here at 10 past 3, KLM has landed another MD11 and has offload ALL of its passengers into the tiny departure lounge It's starting to get pretty hot and stuffy. Wonder when any updates will come.

Posted by mikki at 03:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are scheduled to go home on Saturday. We have been kept busy busy diving several times per day, hanging out on fun dive boats with fun people doing fun things. We also have many more lovely dive videos. They have been placed on a link off of my .mac site which should make it very easy for everyone to find should they so desire. Check out this handy link.

Posted by mikki at 12:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, we had a bit of wet string upload time on our hands, so we put up some photos taken with a funny point and shoot, and some videos hosted right here at home. Constructive comments are very desired and welcomed. Please feel free to have a look at this handy link

Posted by mikki at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are having a wonderful time in Bonaire, after a relatively painless trip via Air Jamaica (when it works, it works well. When it doesn't... well....). We are at Captain Don's which had advertised many innovations. In truth, the only thing new we found were hair dryers and new safes :-). Some of the old dive staff had changes, which was sad because we really liked Karen and Ernst, but Wilco, Netto, Chris, and some of the others are still here. Crazy Sherman had left awhile before.

The diving (the most important part of the trip, of course) has been Bonaire perfect. Today we saw the first shark we had seen in 11 years of trips to Bonaire. Only about 2 feet long, black tip reef shark, which I didn't get on video very well, but really DID see. Woo hoo.

Hopefully the fish tanks, the doggies, the birdies, the kitties, and everything else are fine as we continue to have fun here. Email is spotty here, but we will keep trying. The advertised "wireless access" only works in a few areas, and it's pretty weak when it does work.... so there you go. Party on.

Posted by mikki at 03:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In my copious spare time, I make videos of various and sundry things, mostly surrounding being surrounded by salt water and cool fishies and critters. YouTube seems to be the perfect place (mostly) to upload these videos for the enjoyment of whomever is interested in enjoying my various and sundry things :-).

You can see my happy fun videos at this link or just go to www.youtube.com and search for ooblick. What more fun could anyone want?

Posted by mikki at 11:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

CNN.com - Study: Scuba diving doesn't appear to hurt lung function - Jul 17, 2006:


NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Contrary to some reports, scuba divers do not appear to have an accelerated decline in lung function, according to researchers at the German Naval Institute.

"Obstructive changes in lung function have been reported with cumulative scuba diving exposure," Dr. Kay Tetzlaff, of the University of Tuebingen, Germany, and colleagues write in the medical journal Chest.

To look into this, the researchers studied in 468 military scuba divers and a comparison 'control' group of 122 military submariners, all of them men. Specifically, the team tracked the participants' decline over time in lung performance -- measured as the maximum volume of air expired in one second (called the FEV1).

Tetzlaff's group conducted the tests in all of the subjects on at least three occasions over a period of at least 1 year. The average follow-up was five years.

Posted by mikki at 01:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Caribbean coral suffers record death:


By Seth Borenstein

A one-two punch of bleaching from record hot water followed by disease has killed ancient and delicate coral in the biggest loss of reefs scientists have ever seen in Caribbean waters. Researchers from around the globe are scrambling to figure out the extent of the loss. Early conservative estimates from Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands find that about one-third of the coral in official monitoring sites has recently died.

"It's an unprecedented die-off," said National Park Service fisheries biologist Jeff Miller, who last week checked 40 stations in the Virgin Islands. "The mortality that we're seeing now is of the extremely slow-growing reef-building corals. These are corals that are the foundation of the reef ... We're talking colonies that were here when Columbus came by have died in the past three to four months."

Posted by mikki at 03:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While we are finding new forms of life, we're also busily killing existing ones.

Rising Tide of Ocean Plagues:


Changes in the sea -- possibly the result of human meddling -- spawn diseases that are claiming the lives of sea lions, manatees and dolphins. Scientists warn they could reach out and strike humans on land. By Randy Dotinga.

Posted by mikki at 01:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bizarre looking crustacean discovered:


David Pescovitz:

Scientists just announced the discovery of this strange new crustacean 900 miles south of Easter Island. According to a report in the journal of the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, divers first found the creature last year at a depth of 7,540 feet. From the Associated Press:

Scientists said the animal, which they named Kiwa hirsuta, was so distinct from other species that they created a new family and genus for it.

The animal is white and just shy of 6 inches long — about the size of a salad plate.

In what (the French Institute for Sea Exploration's Michel) Segonzac described as a "surprising characteristic," the animal's pincers are covered with sinuous, hair-like strands.

It is also blind. The researchers found it had only "the vestige of a membrane" in place of eyes, Segonzac said.

Posted by mikki at 01:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Major Coral Bleaching Event Expands Across Caribbean: "NOAA reports that a major coral bleaching event is underway in the Caribbean and may result in significant coral death in much of the region. Currently, the bleaching is centered in waters adjacent to"

(Via Witchvox - RSS Feed - News from the Nest.)

Posted by mikki at 08:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There are no happy fun underwater pictures today, however our above water pictures may be seen at this great link

We woke this morning to quite the thunderstorm, with lots of rain and wind and all that stuff. It was quite the fun. Today is the most unhappy day of the trip, since we get to spend it packing. And with all the gear we have, that is not a trivial task. There is the dive gear, which consists of buoyancy compensators, regulators, find, masks, repair equipment, wet suits, etc., and the photo gear which consists of more pieces than most people imagine. Housings, strobes, strobe arms, strobe arm connectors, repair equipment, spare o rings, grease, batteries (shitloads of batteries), chargers, lenses, camera bodies, memory cards, ports, etc. Then there is the regular stuff you have to pack for vacation. Put it all together, and we each have approximately 120 lbs of baggage that thankfully is on wheels.

On the last day, one should not dive too close to one's flight. DAN says 12 hours but we stretch it a bit. We had the option to dive this morning, but chose not to since we are pretty well exhausted by the great time we had. The "last day" is also the "scuba equipment drying day" in hopes that things dry enough before you have to stuff them in the dive bags where they will spent a mushy journey home.

And, of course, the list of things that have to be done when we get home goes through one's head...as the brain begins to seep out the ears. Oh well. Such is life. Maybe someday we can live here :-)

Posted by mikki at 01:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's Underwater pictures are at this happy fun link.

Yet another beautiful day on Bonaire. I don't quite understand how anyone could have a "bad" day on such a fabulous island as this, even if it pours with rain. Today I switched to wide angle while Wes shot macro. We went out on the reef in front of Habitat (which we still think is the finest reef on Bonaire) for a time, then went out to the Salt Pier with Netto. Netto is one of the divemasters who has been here forever, knows everyone and everything about the island, and is kind and open to tourists. Most Bonarians are quite nice to your face, but would rather not deal with you if they don't have to. Rather similar to Americans in that way :-). Netto, however, is an exception, sharing with us all kinds of interesting information on island life, island regulations, laws, etc. One of the Bonarian sayings, "don't hide and throw stones" is quite an interesting one. He explained how when you hide and throw stones, they can still tell where the stones came from and know who did it.

We had a lovely dive at Salt Pier where I had a French Angel who must have been a professional scuba model because she would go to every place I pointed to and pose. At the end of the dive, we became part of a bait ball. That was a truly interesting sight. Thousands upon thousands of anchovies, swimming all together in a circle. As we came up to them, they surrounded us, still swimming in circles. It was truly beautiful. As we climbed out of the water, we found the pelicans were swarming, getting ready for an anchovie feast. It was a lot of fun.

When we got back, we barely had enough time to shower and get ready for our trip to Casablanca, an Argentinean restaurant with a MASSIVE amount of really great food. It was hard to believe the quantity of chicken, steak, ribs, blood sausage, etc. that we had. The meal was great, the company was wonderful (Luv Monkeys, Eli, Dan, and Karen the divemaster and her husband Bud.) and we ate entirely too much and fell into bed for a very nice sleep.

Posted by mikki at 11:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's underwater photos are right here

Another happy fun day on Bonaire. I could get use to this. Went out to two dive sites today - Windsock and Small Wall. Both were beautiful. Windsock is by the airport (go figure) and had some interesting cleaning stations, LOTS of juvenile spotted drums, and lots of eels. Small Wall had two frogfish in the same coral head. That was really cool.

We got to see our friend Walt, the tech diving instructor who was our rebreather teacher. Really nice guy and fun. Our other pal, Jason, was not on the island this week, and we missed him. However, we will survive and continue to have fun despite these little stumbling blocks :-)

Silly me got too much sun yet again, so I had to take a long afternoon nap. Nap was broken up by Wessipooh wishing me to get my arse out of bed to go to dinner at Capricios, our favorite restaurant on the island. It is an Italian restaurant that has some of the best wine in the Caribbean, having won the Wine Gourmet award every year since 2002 or something like that. Anyway, the food as always was fabulous, the deserts more so, and the wine, even the "house wine" was yummy.

Posted by mikki at 08:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's underwater photos are at this happy link

As usual, we really don't want to leave the Island, although our time is growing short. I am recovering from the whatever bite, and was actually able to do a bit of diving, which is always a good thing. Did a boat dive and did not die, although I DID jump in without my weight belt. (Gee, why can't I descend.... I wonder what's going on.... ooooops). As always a quick trip back to the boat to ask nicely for one of them to hand my my belt yielded much better results than hanging out on the surface all day :-) I got to be the day's "disaster diver." *snicker*

Today's boat dive was at a site called "Knife" on Klein Bonaire, which had been closed for many years and recently reopened. The Bonarians take preservation of their coral reefs VERY seriously, and periodically close sites that look like they have taken damage through storms, overdiving, boat problems, etc. in order for them to recover. Although there are many dive sites on Bonaire, it is always interesting and fun to see one that we have never seen before.

Every time we come here, we seem to spend time plotting and planning how we can eventually LIVE here. We have all kinds of ideas in the works, and we will see if one day they become more than dreams.

Tuesday night is lobster night at the Lion's Den (the restaurant next door to Habitat where we much prefer to eat :-)) and we had a magnificent dinner with John, Deane, Eli, and Dan. They are all fun people who are good to dive with.

Only 2 1/2 dive days to go :(. Bummer central. You can't dive to close to flying, since the change in pressure can possibly do bad things to any residual nitrogen in your system, and you may get bent on the airplane. Not a fun thing to do, so we will be good and follow all DAN (Divers Alert Network) guidelines like good little people who wish to live a long time :-).

Posted by mikki at 09:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's underwater link is right here You may notice that today there are not as many different photos. There is good reason for that. I spent the entire day, except for a short jaunt to town for fluids, either in bed or in the bathroom. You see, I was the victim of some type of bite overnight.

The locals aren't sure if it was a spider, a scorpion, or whatever, but whatever it happened to be, it knocked me for a LOOP. Add to this a certain person's snoring all night, and I had no sleep and was very sick. The bites on my hand were itchy, large, and starting to have icky dead spots in them. I couldn't keep down any food or liquid for most of the day, but I am much better now, thank you.

Hopefully I can find the dive doctor tomorrow to make sure I'm ok before hopping into dah water again. Happy bubbles to all, and to all a good night.

Posted by mikki at 01:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hopefully this won't cause any paranoid "shark killing" escapades.
WOODS HOLE -- A nearly 1-ton shark, similar to the great white in the movie "Jaws," swam to within 10 feet of one of Cape Cod's Elizabeth Islands yesterday, drawing curiosity-seekers and boaters -- including one brazen kayaker who had to be shooed away. (Beth Daley, Globe Staff) [Boston Globe: Local]

Posted by mikki at 10:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

An interesting story about scuba. The Psycho Sensei loves scuba, and you should too, so READ THIS AT ONCE :-)

He looked like the type of macho diver who prefers speed over underwater life. [Christian Science Monitor: All Stories]

Posted by mikki at 07:58 PM | Permalink

Make that 210,001 when I'm in the water :-)

210,000 Life Forms Estimated in Oceans There are more than 210,000 life forms in the oceans, but this could be a small number of the total number of marine species, according to early results of a marine census released yesterday. [Washington Post: Nation and Politics]