New header for the sea witch

Hello everyone.  Was in the mood to switch out my header again so I went back to the Cancun photos to see what I could find to share with you.  This shot was taken at the same lovely reef, Machonies - Cancun Mexico. 

 

Visibility was good and the sun was shining through the waters so lots of color was there to see.  We had a little bit of surge or subsurface motion, the wave like motion of rocking back and forth under the water.  You can see the surge movement by the lean of the soft branch corals to one direction.  The brilliant cobalt blue fish you see are called Blue Chromis.  Usually no more then 6 inches or 15cms in length, they are a shimmering blue with a black dorsal shading, forked tail and dark eyes.  Usually shy, they will often dash to the cover of reef when it feels threatened and has been observed to dim its bright blue coloration to a duller gray. 

(google photo of closeup)

Chromis will travel in multispecies schools, especially when feeding, but are territorial when feeding on algae and will defend an area against other algae-feeding species.  I have seen these little blue fish go after larger ones at a rocket speed, it is amusing to watch.  My  own observation with Chromis is they like to huddle next to large coral patches and hiding themselves deep into the soft, flowing corals when they perceive danger. 

This school of Chromis hovered around this soft coral patch with no fear of me taking the photo. Usually they will hide when "large swimming creatures" enter their space, but when there is surge in the water, I do not swim towards them, I allow the surge to carrgy me to their location which gives the illusion of another water creature along for the same surging ride.  That is how I got this shot. 

Wishing everyone a "surge free" but colorful weekend.  Sea Witch