Although Nemo’s friends explicitly warned him not to touch
the butt, he still goes and does it anyway. Which obviously gets him into some
trouble. Today there were no clownfish near our boat but there was a whole
school of yellowtail snappers who were most definitely touching the butt.
Luckily for them, we were just swimming alongside of them with no intention of
capturing and bringing them halfway across the Atlantic Ocean.
Snorkeling over the reef, I was also able to spot many other
Finding Nemo characters. Blue tangs seemed to swim around aimlessly as Dory always
does. Tad, the spotfin butterfly fish, and sea turtles like Crush made their appearances
throughout the reef, as well. Mr. Ray the spotted eagle ray and Anchor the
hammerhead were observed by some divers near the reef’s ledge. It was interesting
to see and identify these species and make the characters come to life.
Barracudas were another fish species commonly found during
our snorkeling and diving trips. I have
always thought it was some sort of shark who came and ate Nemo’s mom, Coral, and
all but one of her eggs. But today I learned that it was actually a barracuda.
Barracudas don’t typically eat fish eggs, or even clownfish for that matter,
unless provoked for some reason (like Coral swimming out of the protection of
their anemone and diving directly towards her eggs leading the barracuda right
to them). They are more attracted to shiny objects and tend to eat smaller fish
like grunts, snappers, killifish, and anchovies. However, they are still predatory
creatures and ultimately led to the touching of the butt through a chain
reaction of events. Something as simple as this shows how predators can have a
huge impact on an entire marine ecosystem when disturbed.
Some other characters we noticed were the annoying seagulls
and the pelican who helped Marlin and Dory. These sea birds are always typically
found near the water as they’re constantly looking for some fish to eat. These
characters seem to stay true to their real life personalities, seagulls being
dumb food fiends and pelicans more friendly and to themselves.
I like how you tied the movie Finding Nemo to our snorkeling and scuba diving trips. I guess the writers of the movie perfectly represented the personalities of the various species of fish and birds.
ReplyDeleteI also find how you were able to accurately compare the animals we saw to their fictional counterparts. While i did not see any baracuda while i was in the keys (sadly), i did see a few smaller ones while snorkeling in Venice florida. They kind of have an unnerving look to them, they appear to sort of just watch you, often times with their mouths wide open exposing their dagger like teeth and then they just dart off in a flash and they are gone like magic! They are incredibly fast because they are basically all muscle which makes them incredibly explosive.
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