Arc-eye hawkfish and bleached coral

This is a typical pose for an arc-eye hawkfish, keeping very still as it nestles in a head of cauliflower coral. But the coral is not well. This patch is mostly bleached. The causes of coral bleaching include warmer than normal water temperatures, pollution, and sunscreens containing coral-killing ingredients.

Because of this third factor, Hawaii has passed a bill which will ban the sale of sunscreens containing oxybenzone and octinoxate. This law goes into effect January 1, 2021. While this will help, it won’t do anything to keep harmful chemicals out of water runoff, and it won’t do anything to prevent the warming of the Pacific Ocean.

Last fall, we had a coral bleaching event here because of warmer ocean temperatures. It wasn’t as bad as feared, but still did damage to corals that were just recovering from previous bleaching events. There are one or two snorkeling sites here that I don’t visit anymore because the state of the coral is just too depressing. I’d like to think that this degradation can be reversed but, honestly, I’m not optimistic about that.

Halo around the sun

I was about to set out on one of my regular walks at Upolu, when I looked up and saw this halo around the sun. It’s the first I’ve seen here (which doesn’t mean there haven’t been others).

In days of yore, halos were considered a sign of impending bad weather. In this case, there’s some evidence to back that up. The ice crystals that cause halos are found in clouds, high in the troposphere, and these clouds are often a sign of an approaching weather front. Sure enough, the next day was fairly wet though, ironically, not in the area where I saw the halo.

Dwarf date palm

This is a dwarf date palm (Phoenix roebelenii), which I like particularly for its nobbly trunk. It hails from Vietnam and Thailand an is also known as pygmy date palm or miniature date palm

SSV Makani Olu

I was on my way to work one morning when I noticed the sailboat in the top image. The array of white sails caught the early morning sun and stood out against the deep blue water. I pulled over, took this photo and headed on in to work.

I saw later that the boat had anchored in Kawaihae harbor, so on my way home I stopped by to check it out. The SSV Makani Olu is a three-masted staysail schooner (SSV stands for Sailing School Vessel), and is used as a training vessel for various programs run by Marimed Foundation. The boat is based at Kaneohe Bay, on the east coast of Oahu.

In the photo to the right, the boat appears to be four-masted, but that’s just because the mast of the boat behind it lined up perfectly.

For more information about SSV Makani Olu and Marimed Foundation, go to marimed.org.

Green anole

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Green Macro or Close-Up.’ See more offerings here.

Here’s a green anole (Anolis carolinensis) perched on a green ti leaf so that I could take its photo (possibly). Light greens in the sun, dark greens in the shadow. With all this, I can forgive the anole its powder blue eye-shadow.

Long John Mantis

This week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme is ‘Rails.’ See more responses here.

Here’s a praying mantis on a railing. Typically, I line up photos where horizons are horizontal and strong vertical lines are vertical. This photo’s an exception. I think the off-kilter lines complement the off-kilter appearance of the mantis, especially since this mantis had lost an eye and a leg, hence the title of this post.

Goats butting heads

A herd of goats mill about on a trail in South Kona. In any sizable gathering of goats I usually see younger ones butting heads as they tussle with each other. This is practice for when they’re older and the jousts become a more serious contest for position within the group.