Sea Fan at Eagle Ray Roundup

 

Sea Fan and Blue Chromis

 

A Sea Fan sways in the surge at Eagle Ray Roundup reef. A Sea Fan grows from a skeleton that looks like the branches of a plant. However, the Sea Fan is not a plant. It is a colony of animals. The Sea Fan grows perpendicular to the current, so it can catch plankton in its net of branches. These Sea Fans were 2 to 3 feet tall.

The small, blue fish in front of the Sea Fan is a Blue Chromis. Blue Chromis are a common fish. Blue Chromis sometimes gather in vast schools of many hundreds of fish. This Blue Chromis was 3 inches long. A Blue Chromis can be identified by its bright blue color, a deeply forked tail, and dark stripes along its back and on the borders of its tail.

Eagle Ray Roundup is a reef at Jackson's Bight north of Little Cayman island. A bight is a bay formed by a curve in the coastline.

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