Cardinal Fish with Eggs

[Karl]

Here is a couple of shots from my dive this morning. It is of a male Cardinal fish with eggs in his mouth - the male keeps the eggs in his mouth until they hatch and every few minutes he opens his mouth and sucks in fresh oxygenated water to keep the eggs alive.

I spent about 40 mins with this guy and these are some of the better images.

All shot with the Olympus OMD EM-5 & 60mm macro lens.

Karl

[Donald]

Wonderful Karl. Not very pretty .... but wonderful. I'm sure his mother loves him!

I remain in awe of you underwater photographers and just enjoy being taken to places that I certainly never will reach.

[ktuli]

Karl,

I search for fish with eggs in their mouths on every dive I go on, but so far I haven't been lucky. For most of my dives, it has been Yellowhead Jawfish that would be holding eggs, and I've seen photos of them that look great when they are doing so. If I remember correctly, this is at least the second cardinal you've shared with eggs! Lucky dog!

Your focus here is phenomenal! I can even see the tiny little eyes in the eggs and the babies develop! I'm not familiar with the behavior of these fish, but one suggestion I have for next time is to get a little lower - because the eggs are in the lower half of the face, I think it might look more appealing to be below the fish shooting upward slightly. What do you think?

Nice shots... Seriously, that offer for a gear carrier is still on the table!

- Bill

[ScoutR]

Wow, now there's something most of us will never see. Great shots

Wendy

[terrib]

I especially like the second one. Thanks for sharing these! They are so clear.

[HiImTom]

So awesome, thanks for sharing the experience. Your photos are superb.

[Karl]

Karl,

I search for fish with eggs in their mouths on every dive I go on, but so far I haven't been lucky. For most of my dives, it has been Yellowhead Jawfish that would be holding eggs, and I've seen photos of them that look great when they are doing so. If I remember correctly, this is at least the second cardinal you've shared with eggs! Lucky dog!

Your focus here is phenomenal! I can even see the tiny little eyes in the eggs and the babies develop! I'm not familiar with the behavior of these fish, but one suggestion I have for next time is to get a little lower - because the eggs are in the lower half of the face, I think it might look more appealing to be below the fish shooting upward slightly. What do you think?

Nice shots... Seriously, that offer for a gear carrier is still on the table!

- Bill

Bill,

Thanks for that - yes have a few of these photos - they breed here from mid Nov - Jan / Feb and they are territorial so once you know where they are they are easy find. They tend to stay in a small area but are very skittish and move around a bit so you have to follow them which makes it hard to frame a good shot.

As the eggs mature and become golden they open their mouth fairly regular so it is just a matter of patience. I spent about 40 min or so with this one guy and will go back soon to find him and his mates to see if I can get them with the golden eggs

Only downside again is the water visibility - about 4m and very milky - so again it is a bit difficult to get a nice 'clean' image but I will keep trying.

Also will up the F stop next time to about F16 -these were at F8 - to try and get a better depth of field.

Karl