Underwater in St. Maarten

[gflat65]

I just posted a big thread with some pics of my trip to St. Maarten that I thought some might find interesting. There are a ton of pictures (70ish).

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1203502

This one is on the dive shop we dove with.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=10732399#post10732399

 

[dww]

Great Photos. I really love to see, the underwater life.

Donna

 

[stevensmd]

those pictures are awesome, thanks for sharing.
dave

 

[Fishboy42]

Great shots Gary, thanks for putting them up for us.

I like the Sgt. Major nest shots...it seems that some males take-on more eggs than they can guard!

Matt

 

[EvilMel]

NEAT!

 

[gflat65]

There were purple clutches everywhere. The funny thing is that the only fish that attacked me was a 3" black damsel. The big Sgt. Majors would act like they were going to attack, then swim away. While at the site those pics were taken, we had to be careful around them because there were so many fish waiting for a chance to get some fresh caviar. On the closer to shore dives, I didn't see as much predation.

I was really impressed with the dive shop working on every dive to put gorgs, fans, etc. back up on the reef from the sand bed. I lifted about a 10-15 pound piece of A. palmata out of a sand pit and lodged it back in place where it had fallen from. Had to inflate the BC to ascend. Jenn was getting on to me in Cozumel last year when I was trying to fan the sand off of the corals. These guys (Jeff and Luciana were awesome) would have been right beside me.