John (divemaster), Barney and Liz (UK), Jennifer (NY), Robert (Guam), Heinz (Switzerland), and Linda (buddies)

Yap Divers
http://www.mantaray.com/

Eye of the cuttlefish Videograph by Rich Torkington in Yap 2001

Dive Journal: We collectively vote for a reef dive this morning, so John takes us across Goofnuw Channel and a bit further west to this site. There is a mild current heading toward the west, and John instructs us to drift along with it and the boat will simply pick us up wherever we finish.

We are immediately entertained by tons of fish! There are first big schools of fusiliers, and then, one of my favorites, tremendous schools of pyramid butterflyfish! I love it! The current sweeps us peacefully along the slanted reef wall as we see 3 great circular spadefish and an interesting green nudibranch.

Midway through the dive, I see all the other divers stopped and looking in unison. I finally see them – two cuttlefish! Janel would be so jealous! They’re hovering just over the edge of the reef wall like weird spaceships and they don’t seem to be overly shy of us divers. I enjoy capturing plenty of video footage of these odd creatures. These cuttlefish are the highlight of the dive for us.

We also enjoy a plentiful school of big parrotfish, a red ribbon wrasse, and a unbelievably beautiful oriental sweetlips. There is also a small group of black-and-white snappers and a nice splotchy colored damsel fish near the end of the dive – I’m not sure of the damselfish species, maybe Johnston.

SUMMARY OF SOME FISHES OBSERVED ON THIS DIVE:

This list was created by looking over the video footage and identifying each species.

• Blacklip butterflyfish
• Bluestreak fusilier
• Whitebelly damsel
• Bennett’s butterflyfish
• Pyramid butterflyfish
• Thompson’s surgeonfish
• Dark-capped parrotfish
• Yellowstreak fusilier
• Circular spadefish
• Orangefin anemonefish
• Cuttlefish
• Moorish idol
• Black snapper juvenile
• Red ribbon wrasse
• Oriental sweetlips
• Johnston damsel
• Reticulated dascyllus

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