From yesterday's afternoon dive . . .
Large Eye Toadfish
The Large Eye Toadfish (Batrachoides giberti)
is one of two species of toadfish in the Caribbean;
this one along the Central American coast.
(The other species is found only around Cozumel.)
The branched barbels along its chin identify it as a Large Eye Toadfish.
Its name, of course, reflects the croaking sound it makes.
SUNDAY, 4 SEPTEMBER DIVE - MORNING
Making progress!
Spotted a whale today, but it was a Sperm Whale.
Too skittish to swim with, but we got a good look at it anyway.
Also saw and swam into a fish boil;
not the up Nort' Wisconsin kind in a pot,
but the ocean kind: a ball of baitfish rounded up
by tuna or dolphins to feed on.
Getting in some good drift diving . . . we see much more reef that way,
and don't have to swim in a circle back to the boat.
Gary & Dale are nice guys, too.
There are five of us, plus Jon still as divemaster.
The other boat (Neptune) had a group of new divers on it;
if we all had been crowded in there.
it would have been a real cattle d(r)ive.
It's nice that Kisty (and/or the resort)
is letting us experienced divers/photographers
have our own boat so that we don't hear complaints
about missing lunch because we can do a
60-minute+ dive instead of the 45-minutes,
or less, that newbies usually get.
This is what draws the whaleshark . . .
. . . as well as other sharks & dolphins!
On the way back from the dive, we first spotted & stopped at this boil,
hoping to spot a whaleshark.
While some of us were in the water, Captain Willy, without the aid of binoculars,
spotted the sperm whale spouting, 1-1/2 miles away!
He asked if we wanted to see it;
the last time one was in Utilan waters was more than five years ago,
and you could count on one hand the number of
boat captains on Utila who have seen a sperm whale.
Preparing to sound . . .
. . . sounding - there he goes!
We approached and watched on the surface for 15-20 minutes.
We asked about getting in the water,
but Willy said every time they had tried that,
the whale dove and was gone.
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