Barra do Camaratuba aka the Blog of Seahorse Videos

My First Seahorse!

(click on the link above to see a video of the first seahorse I found)

WOOP WOOP! I found my own seahorse baby! All on my own! Without claiming that it was a "we" find, this one is all about me! I found my first seahorse baby!! It was a boy! 14 cm, brown, hidden in the mud, holding onto a branch. What a feeling, What a find!

This picture above, is what I first saw in the mud. Can you find the seahorse hiding in this photo? Well my little guy was quite shy and not very photogenic, the photo below was one of the best photos I could get of him.

So perhaps I should step back for a minute and set the stage for my story. It's a saturady morning early. Gabi has picked me up and we are on our way to the Bay of Camaratuba for another field session. Low tide is at 9:30, which means that Gabi and I are already on the road by 6:30 AM since it's about a 2 hour drive to this field site.

The Bay of Camaratuba is pictured above. It's a quiet place and we had to traverse some very bumpy dirt roads to get there. On the way, we pass tons of windturbines, which makes me think that Don Quijote in his quest for windmills in this day and age would be quite happy here.

We jump right in, and immediately sink up to our knees in the sediment and muck of the estuary. Great, I think this is bound to be a disaster. Gabi tells me that they have only been here a few times before and we are on a scounting mission. They have only ever found one seahorse here and everyone, including yours truly stuck up to her knees in muck, is hoping that we are more successful today.
Gabi starts swimming close to the mangroves and within minutes calls out "I found one!" (click on the word one, to see the video of the seahorse she found) Just in case your internet connection is as slow as mine, you can see the first seahorse we found.

And isn't she a beauty? What a clear photo! And she's got her little tail wrapped around some habitat, which is exactly what I'm studying. Elementary my dear watson, I say in a scientifically pompous voice, she's got her tail wrapped around a Rhizophora mangle (aka mangrove branch).

We finish swimming along one side of the estuary and start on the other. Within minutes on the other side, we (and by we I mean Gabi) have found an Orange Princess. Her coloring is so amazing, and she is such an interesting subject, I take another video: The Orange Princess Part Deux.

Then, all of a sudden with Gabi swimming in what I like to call the hot zone aka the environment where one is most likely to find a seahorse, right along the mangrove roots and me swimming in well no man's land, aka farther away from the mangroves where the water is deeper and I have to duck under the water to see the bottom, out of the corner of my eye, I see a small dragon-like figure (think miniature Pete's Dragon or Puff the Magic Dragon.......... or I guess you could picture a seahorse) slithering around on the mud, rocks and branches. I do a double take, could it be? COULD IT BE I FOUND MY VERY OWN SEAHORSE?!?!?!?

..........obviously yes. A big male, the biggest we had found so far in the estuary. And I found him without help, in an area where it is hard to find seahorses!!! Aghem stand up and be measured Mr. Seahorse. That's right! You are 14 cm tall! And quite fat you are (although you can't really tell from the photo that he's a chubby). He is a well fed little seahorse and he has the presence of a pouch for the babies (also unfortunately not pictured below). This guy is a survivor and he is bound to live a long happy life sharing his genes and having lots of seahorse babies. I mean if I were a female seahorse, I would set my sights on him.

After the elated shouts and scientific procedures were accounted for, I said good-bye and set him free....sniff, sniff. Although my sadness was quickly displaced by Gabi finding another big bad boy seahorse, this one even bigger and fatter than the last one!! (see below)

We found one more seahorse after this one, making the total 5. The last one was an itsy bitsy, teeny, weeny one, that was too small to photograph. But what a memorable morning! 5 seahorses! Count 'em 5! AND my first find too! You know what they say, you never forget your first. The Bay of Camaratuba and our 5 seahorse morning will ensure I'll never forget my first seahorse!