Damsels of darkness

Like the colorful damselfishes that bring life to a tropical reef during the day, cardinalfishes take over the night shift, emerging from their daytime shelters to hunt for small invertebrates. They may not look like it but they are truly the damsels of the night.

The crocodile hunter

Stealth, good judgement and patience are the virtues of reef crocodile fish as they lie in ambush waiting for their next meal.

Dance of the Jellyfish

A juvenile trevally escorts a jellyfish through the clear blue waters off Sri Lanka's east coast: As we completed our final decompression stop after a deep wreck dive we noticed numerous jellyfish swimming around us, each with its retinue of juvenile fish. Often overlooked, these fascinating and beautiful creatures were an amazing sight and wonderful distraction during a long and otherwise boring deco stop.

Reef rhapsody

An eternal autumn

Like trees with colorful leaves of change in autumn, soft corals can create colorful underwater vistas in tropical seas. But despite their beauty, soft corals may sometimes indicate a turbulent past in a reef ecosystem. Soft corals are successful colonizers and are often among the first species to appear on damaged reefs. Several areas in the Indo-Pacific have seen an increase in soft corals since a major coral bleaching event destroyed many of the hard corals that dominated shallow coral reefs. Similarly, they often dominate reefs that have been subjected to dynamite fishing in the past.

Manamaalaya

The blue ring angelfish is the most common angelfish in Sri Lanka. It is particularly common on the western and southern coast where it prefers shallow inshore reefs. Juveniles of this species can be found near estuaries and on silty coastal reefs while large adults are often found on rocky reefs and shipwrecks. In Sinhalese, this fish is sometimes called 'manamaalaya' or bridegroom on account of its vibrant colors.

Stairway to Heaven