What’s Big & Fat @ Pulau Hantu?.....

No, I am not referring to myself lah (even though I also fall in the same category). :op

I was talking about this BIG & FAT Pufferfish that I came across during yesterday dive at Hantu with The Hantu Bloggers.


Paiseh, but this is the best shot I could get as I was adjusting my camera’s setting from Macro mode and snap this before it swam away. You can see that the Pufferfish was very BIG & FAT by comparing it to the Copperbanded Butterflyfish next to it (the Butterflyfish was about half a A4 size paper). Think this is the BIGGEST Pufferfish that I have ever seen in our water!

Other than this Pufferfish, there were also other fishes such as :


A Grouper hiding in crevice, a well camouflaged Filefish and the common sighting of Copperbanded Butterflyfish.

Then there’s always the corals:


Staghorns corals, Mushroom corals and maybe Pore corals(Porites) in the last pic (or anyone can help with the ID?).

Not many flatworms today. So here’s the two that we managed to see :


But the seabed was littered with Icon Sea Stars.


And yes, here's my favourite creature again.....Sea Slugs!


A few Phyllidia sp,




Gymnodoris sp,


A Dermatobranchus sp,


An Armina sp,


A Black-margined Nudibranch(Glossodoris atromarginata),


A Sap-sucking Sea Slug(Thurdilla sp) and


Lots and lots of Blue Dragon Nudibranch (Pteraeolidia ianthina)

It was an enjoyable dive yet again! And thanks to Marcel for the guiding and Kah Chine as my dive buddy!

First Leisure Dive @ Kusu Island.....

Second time diving at Kusu Island but this morning was my first leisure dive there. The vis today was about 2-3m and some currents but was manageable.

Kusu is known for its currents. That's why you get to see lots of Gorgonian or Sea Fan. The Sea Fan here are HUGE!


This one was about a meter wide from its base on the left to its tip on the right of the pic. Besides HUGE Sea Fans, it was also first time that I have seen a HUGE Neptune's Cup Sponge that was about a meter tall!

As there's lots and lots of Sea Fans and Sea Whips, one just had to search for the commensals. Here's some that we had seen.


Allied Cowries can be seen if you look very careful as they are pretty small and well camouflaged for they tend to look like a part of the Sea Fan or Sea Whip.

Besides Allied Cowrie, there's also Sea Whip Goby.


Other divers also managed to find the Gorgonian Shrimp.

There's also lots of Crinoid or Featherstar and this particular one was very HUGE too. It was at least 25cm across from the right to left of the pic. And the arms are not even open up yet!


Also saw a couple of Stonefish Sea Cucumbers.



A little Cuttlefish who doesn't seen very happy to be discovered.



Lots of Flatworm too!



A few Nudibranch and Slugs.


(From top down : Phyllidia sp, Thurdilla sp, Pteraeolidia ianthina and Ceratosoma gracillimum)

As I was searching for commensals on the Sea Fans and Whips, I also noticed that there's some of this stuff on the dead parts of the the Sea Fans/Whips.


Some have white tentacles too.



Think this is a Gorgonian wrapper (Nemanthus annamensis). What do you think?