Clownfish Attack

We did our Enriched Air (aka Nitrox) dives today, one in the morning and another after lunch. In the especially clear waters around Shelter Island (off Sai Kung), we spent at least an hour in the waters for each dive. It was a nice warm day, lots of sunshine but wasn't overly humid since it's autumn in HK now.

We saw more clownfish (like those orange ones in the cartoon Finding Nemo) this time round, and being the inquistive sort, they will swim towards you to check things out.

Anyway, I found clownfish to be really cute and decided to just kneel on the seabed to observe two medium-sized clownfish which were about a metre away from me. Within seconds, two larger ones swam up by the side to join the ones which were already in front of me. For those few seconds, we were just facing each other, one diver and 4 clownfish having a staring match. I decided to swim over them so as to join D and another diver and that was when things went kinda wrong.

One of the larger clownfish swam up to meet me and with amazing speed, chomped on my index finger. Thank God I decided to wear my gloves. Gee, now what did I do to this guy? I flicked my hand vigorously and finally I got the psycho clownfish off my finger. My finger is ok, the gloves are thick. I sure hope I didn't knock that fish out or worse, kill it.

I read that clownfish are aggressive and protective over their young. It's probably their breeding season now, as there were many which I saw that were close to their anemones, protecting their homes and possibly their young. Nothing like the cute Nemo in the movie...

We are diving again this Sunday at another part of HK near the China border for our Peak Performance Buoyancy course. I definitely need to tune my buoyancy capability. I am growing to like diving, although climbing still takes the top position. And through these past few weeks of diving, I realise it's not that simple... you need ot do it often, much like climbing as the more you train, the better you become. One thing I hope to do is to dive with the rays... these are magnificent and amazing creatures. Slow, steady but graceful, as they cut through the waters, unlike me who is still a clumsy ox trying to be consistent with the buoyancy issue.