It’s a little bit like when you see the first Christmas decoration in early December: You know it’s the start of a veryspecial season. And its the same in summer in Lembeh. In late July early August the water Temperature drops and you start freezing (hey … it’s actually really like Christmas) – but that’s Ok. Because we know that this will also bring in the “Critter Bloom” again. And besides many different Nudibranchs one of the top indicators that the High Season is knocking on the door is the sudden appearance of juvenile Frogfishes. And literally every Muck Diver loves these fingernail sized beauties.
During the last weeks we have seen so many of them – in various colours, in various sizes, on various dive sites and almost all the species. There were tiny Painted Frogfish (Orange, White, Yellow, Spotted etc.), small Warty Frogfish (Yellow-Red and White-Red), juvenile Spotfin Frogfish and Scarlet Frogfish (Grey, Brown, Orange, Black and Whitish), young Hairy Frogfish (Brown and Orange), medium small shaggy frogfish and not-yet-giant Giant Frogfish (grey and pinkish) as well as mini Randall Frogfish (white-pink). Thats 8 species of juveniles just in the last 2 weeks … we have seen Sargassum Frogfish as well but that one was too big to still count as a juvenile.
PS … for everyone that is not too much into Frogfish: There is also a lot of other critters around and it seems we will be getting a very good high season.