Some sea slugs are in season. One of the prettiest is Chromodoris fidelis, a little nudibranch with a mantle of milk ringed by a vermilion skirt and traced by a band of richer red. Most are no longer than an inch and despite their brilliance, offer a sensory challenge to divers more used to crystal clear waters. But of late, the sponge hunters have turned up on slightly less demanding shores to prowl on Pulau Jong's reef flat, the muddy shoals of Pulau Tekukor and patch reefs in the south.
While the dorid forages with unperturbed grace, another opisthobranch exhibits greater agility when faced with a barrage of flash lights. Pulau Hantu offers surefire opportunities to catch this dendronotid as it follows the scent of fresh hydroids, but the the pale and orange slugs have also been sighted at shores such as Pulau Semakau, Pulau Subar Darat and Beting Bemban Besar. A larger congener boasts the ability to flee like a fish, but this species merely flexes its body to lift off from the seabed in an evasive dance of slow, silent rhythms.
A good majority of large anemones on the shores house a pair (and occasionally a threesome) of five-spot anemone shrimp, which enjoy immunity from roving predators in soft beds of undulating tentacles. Sometimes, the shrimp share their home with a family of restless anemonefish. But both symbionts must at times find temporary lodgings when the tide leaves their homes high and a little too dry. A few burrow into the damp folds of their host, while others languish in adjacent pools. This female, however, found refuge on an octocoral that remained immersed while its usual quarters hung limp and livid from an outcrop at Kusu Island that endured a brief morning of exposure to the sun of a scorching spring.
The tables are turned for long-jawed spiders in the genus Desis, who must make the most of every falling tide to capture prey and meet mates before retreating into pockets of thin air in thick rubble. The arachnids seem to thrive even on patch reefs that offer them mere hours of breathing room each week. It's clearly enough, though, for the desids to colonise almost every rock that raises its head from the sea to recall the days of its youth before the waves surged high to wear down its dreams and wreck its sunken heart.
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