This has to be one of the most beautiful molluscs we get. It is circumtropical, but this is the first one I’ve seen in Lembeh. It is about 5cm long and it was a pleasure to watch this wonderful creature.

I found this on a night dive, moving around on the sand. The Paperbubbles are a type of marine snail and feed on small segmented worms. Their shell is very delicate, from where they get their ‘paper’ name from. As you can see they have a large foot/mantle, which cannot be completely retracted into the shell.

They burrow into the sand and completely disappear, which probably explains why we do not see them that often.

Beautiful but deadly!!!

These stunning orange nudibranchs harbor an evil secret….they eat other nudibranchs alive!!!

While most other nudis munch on algae, hydroids and other such stuff, these ones make a meal out of other nudis. They find the slime trail left by another nudi then follow it from behind, catch it’s tail in their mouth then proceed to swallow it’s entire prey whole.

It was quite fascinating to watch. The entire process took about 16 minutes. At the end of the video I have sped up the entire clip into 30 seconds, so you can (quickly) watch the whole process there.

These large nudibranchs are carnivorous and have a great way of feeding.

They throw their ‘head’, an oval veil, in front of them, and using hairs around the edge, attempt to scoop up whatever they can find, usually small Crustacea.

You can watch this Melibe moving around, searching for food. About 2/3 of the way through you can see the Melibe captures a small shrimp in it’s mouth and then holds it shut until the shrimp is, presumably, devoured!!

These wonderful little crabs are one of the most aptly named crabs we get here in Lembeh.

Orangutan (Orang Utan) literally means ‘man of the forest’ in Indonesian, and these crabs really seem to look like their land-based namesakes.

Orangutan Crabs are covered in ‘hair’, which I presume is some sort of algae. They can be nearly hairless to very shaggy indeed, as these two are. We find them in many places, including Bubble Coral, sand and sponges.

Not only do they resemble Orang-utans with their hair, but they also seem to sway their front legs from side to side in a very good imitation of an ape!!

These shrimp are not super rare, but are very very rarely seen. The reason for this is that they live underneath Crinoids.

Crinoids, or Feather Stars (as they are also known) are echinoderms. There are many of them in Lembeh, but these shrimp seem only to live under the orange coloured ones.

You can very carefully turn the crinoids upside-down to see these wonderful critters.

They are called ‘snapping’ Shrimp, as they can ‘snap’ their large pincers to create a loud noise. As you can see, one pincer is always much larger than the other. You can also see that it can be either the left or right pincer that is the large one. This pair has one partner with a larger left pincer and the other with a large right pincer. Why this is the case, I have no idea.

This video is of a wonderful family of Harlequin Shrimp we found recently. There is Junior, who is determined to get his bit of yummy starfish food, dad, looking proudly on and pregnant mum.

These shrimp are the ‘royalty’ of the Crustacea, and this is good paparazzi footage of them ‘at home’.

Junior is obvious to spot. He’s the tiny one. The difference between the male and female shrimp is easy to see in this video, as the female is pregnant and ‘fans’ her eggs from time to time, to keep freshly oxygenated water flowing over them.

You can see that the female has a much wider abdomen, and this is where she keeps her eggs. This is true with most crustaceans and one of the ways we identify sex and can tell, from the fanning action, if they are pregnant.

These seem to be all the rage in Lembeh at the moment, so here’s my video of them. These shrimp are a definite ‘unknown’ and have been spotted in a few places around Indonesia. They were seen for the first time in Lembeh about 6 months ago.

They are tiny and seem to like stretching from time to time, as you can see in this video. They also seem to like poo-ing, again as seen in this video.

It is worth watch this full screen to be able to catch all the detail.

This wonderful Seahorse is a very rare variety of a Longnose Seahorse. Although it is known here as a Zebra Seahorse this is not quite the correct name, as the Zebra Seahorse is only found in western Australia and is, perhaps, even rarer than this one.

Whatever it’s correct name, there is no denying that this is one of the most beautiful seahorses I have ever seen. According to one very experienced Dive guide, this is the first time in about 15 years that one with this pattern has been seen in Lembeh. Another remarkable critter from Lembeh

These particular shrimp are often overlooked, as to the casual eye or photographer they are perhaps deemed ‘boring’. They are almost transparent and do not seem to have another very interesting ‘feature’.

However, while shooting macro video, you start to see something fascinating, something that a photograph cannot reproduce…..

I was filming this shrimp, which is only found in Indonesia, this week and as I was filming an extreme closeup of it’s head I started to see some amazing images. These shrimp are small, their body length about 3cm long, so you cannot see very much detail with your naked eye. And what made my discovery possible was the fact that it is mostly transparent.As I was watching my monitor I noticed an organ inside it’s body, just behind it’s eyes, that was pulsating.

It was mesmerising, watching this little organ, inside a living body, in action. And something that only video can show.

I think that it is either it’s heart or it’s stomach. If someone knows, please can they let me know.

Spiny Devilfish usually, as one can guess from their highly camouflaged appearance, do not move very much.

I came across three of them in quite an excited state on a dive this week. There was one big one, the female, and two smaller ones, the males, and the males were obviously very excited about the female and kept chasing her around.

As she was moving around, escaping the attention of the two males, more male devilfish kept appearing out of nowhere!! First there was a third male joining the group, then a fourth and finally a fifth!!

They would all chase her around, then she would stop, they all pile on top of her then everyone stayed very still…until the female swam off again, and they all repeated their actions..