anemone shrimp @ surprising cyrene

anemone shrimp @ cyrene reef from BeachBum on Vimeo.
[click on the vimeo link for better video quality]

It's always a joy to wake up really early (5am) and head out of the house in search of adventure. Today (Tuesday - 22 July 2008) was no exception.

Cyrene Reef (Terumbu Pandan in Malay) was full of surprises as usual. There is always something new to discover.

The clip shows an (actually two) anemone shrimp in a carpet anemone.
The shrimp benefits from practising commensalism where it lives in a symbiotic relationship with the anemone which is not harmed. Usually, there are two shrimps...one male (smaller) and a female (bigger). The males are usually less spotted and are more transparent. The females have more noticeable spots.

Have a look here for a more detailed narration of the wonderful trip to Cyrene!
http://wildfilms.blogspot.com/2008/07/another-cyrene-walk.html

More links...on Anemone Shrimps :
http://www.divegallery.com/anemone_shrimp_P_brevicarpalis.htm
http://uforest.blogspot.com/2008/03/anemone-shrimp.html
http://budak.blogs.com/the_annotated_budak/2007/07/anemone-shrimp.html

Fancy a scientific article on the life and times of an anemone shrimp? Costs and benefits of the symbiosis between the anemoneshrimp Periclimenes brevicarpalis and its host Entacmaea quadricolor http://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v129/p77-84/ - co-authored by Dr Daphne Fautin who recently visited Singapore to research Singapore's anemones (see  http://www.wildsingapore.com/news/20070708/070804-2.htm and http://wildfilms.blogspot.com/2007/07/show-me-mone.html)

Dr Fautin's website : http://hercules.kgs.ku.edu/Hexacoral/Anemone2/