Crustaceans

Crustaceans (literally "with shells") are a large group of mostly aquatic invertebrates, including shrimp, crabs, and lobsters. Our first dive site at Akumel was called Lobster Condos but they warned us we probably wouldn't see any lobsters. Of course, that meant we saw a number of them, both on that dive and on other dives. Most of them were Caribbean Spiny Lobsters. If you see a live lobster up close they really are bizarre looking creatures. (Crustaceans are a kind of Arthropod, as are insects and spiders. Think about that next time you're eating lobster.)

On our deeper dives we saw more barrel sponges. I always like to look inside them. Usually there's nothing there, but occasionally something will be hiding inside. I poked my head over the top of this one and was a bit surprised to have a big lobster waving its antennae at me.

The other kind of lobster we saw were the Spotted Spiny Lobsters. They were smaller but I liked their coloring.

We saw Banded Coral Shrimp a few times but they tend to hide in places where they are hard to photograph. All you see are their antennae poking out. Pederson Cleaner Shrimp are often together with Corkscrew Anemones. Like with clownfish, the anemone protects the shrimp and in return the shrimp's waste is a source of food to the anemone.

I just happened to see this Yellowline Arrow Crab move when I went by. Otherwise I wouldn't have spotted it.

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Fish

The most common fish we saw while diving were the little (5 cm, 2 in) Caribbean Sharpnose Puffer. They didn't form schools, there were just individual fish everywhere. Some of them seemed quite curious and would swim right up to you. Of course, when you tried to photograph them they would not sit still. They have quite fancy coloring if you see them up close.

Stoplight Parrotfish were also quite common. The females and males have quite different coloring - easily confused as two different kinds of fish. The interesting part is that they start out female and change to male when they get older. Here are the two different colors:

Atlantic Blue Tangs were also common, both as individuals and schools. They are yellow as juveniles and blue as adults.

Surgeonfish are related.

We saw a few nurse sharks and a bull shark but only disappearing into the distance. The next biggest fish we saw were Barracuda. This big one (4 ft) let me approach quite close. Maybe it was big enough not to be afraid of me.

Fish come in all shapes and sizes. Long and skinny like the trumpetfish, and short and stubby like the trunkfish and porcupinefish.

Lionfish are invasive and quite a problem in some areas. Here we only saw a few.

I was happy to see a few of the hard to spot fish, like this Peacock Flounder. (It stands out in the photo more than it does in the water.

Usually jawfish disappear into their burrows when you get close, but this one actually came out to have its photo taken.

I only saw a few angelfish, they didn't seem to be as common here.

A nice big Queen Triggerfish

I don't usually think of stingrays as fish, but technically they are. They are cartilaginous like sharks (rather than bony). We saw a few Southern Stingrays. They often hide in the sand but if you get to close they'll shake off the sand and swim away.

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Sea Turtles

Akumel (where we were diving) means "place of turtles" in Mayan. And we have seen turtles on almost every dive. They also seemed less afraid people. Other places turtles tend to swim away as soon as they see you.

The turtles often had shark sucker remoras with them. They didn't seem to be attached, just hanging around.

Sea turtles are actually quite graceful swimmers.

Most of the ones we saw were Green Turtles, but looking at my photos afterwards, I realized one had been a Hawksbill. The main difference is the shape of their head and beak.

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Dry Land

We're in Akumel, south of Cancun. Most of our time we're spending diving and I've got lots of underwater photos. I don't have as many dry land photos so I'll share some of them first.

Great-tailed grackles are super common here. They are the local scroungers.

There is a Golden-fronted Woodpecker around the place where we're staying. We also saw them in Belize.

And a Yucatan squirrel that was collecting material from a thatched roof, presumably for a nest.

There are also lots of little lizards. I think they're Brown Anoles. This one was on a metal sculpture.

First thing in the morning sometimes we spot the Agoutis (related to guinea pigs). 

A Coati showed up at the dive shop. At first I thought it was a cat but then I saw the pointed nose. It had stolen a tortilla from a diver and scrambled over the fence and up a tree to eat it. I only had my dive camera but at least I got a record of it.

Even here a lot of the flowers are imported. I think this is a Jungle Flame from Asia.

Halfway through our diving we took a day off and hired a guide and car to take us to Otoch Ma'ax Yetel Kooh - a nature reserve with Spider and Howler monkeys.

There was lots of evidence of leaf cutter ants - bare dirt trails and ant "cities" but apparently these ones are only active at night.

I did find a few other insects.

Driving back, we stopped at the lake in Coba and spotted a few more birds.

We even spotted a crocodile (barely visible)

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Window Seat

We're on our way to Mexico to do some scuba diving. Most of the flight all there was to see was solid cloud, but the mountains poked through a few times. And it cleared a bit over the flat farmland.