This blog contains a wee bit of self-mockery as well as a LOT of joy at what others saw during the most recent dive trip I organized to God’s Pocket Resort.

There is so much I DID see and learn from when on this dive trip about 40 km north of my home on northern Vancouver Island. But there are three sightings by others that led to an unfamiliar upwelling of emotions for me and strange contortions near my jaw line. I think I may have been pouting. Not a good look!

Why? Let’s look at this case by case.

Sighting Number 1 – Mola / Sunfish documented by Timothy Manulides
I had a brilliant dive and was back on the dive boat. Timothy walked over and said, “I think I saw Sunfish.” I am sure my initial reaction. was to blank-stare him. I thought he was joking and poking a little bit of fun, knowing how much I would be happy for him, but sad for me.

Super biologist Isabelle Cote was also on this trip and said, “I saw them too!”.

It’s not that it’s impossible to see Mola (aka Sunfish) in this area. This year in particular has been remarkable for how many sightings there have been by scuba divers in the Browning Pass area (with possible repeat sightings of the same Mola).

Timothy may also have said: “I’ve never seen one before” to which there may have been the response: “Neither have I and I live here and we study them!”

We at the Marine Education and Research Society are involved with a study into the two species of Mola off the coast. While I have seen them while doing surveys from a boat, I have never seen one while diving.

I was on the same dive and very near to where Timothy and Isabelle sighted them! Thank goodness Timothy managed to get this video.

Here’s what I posted about this sighting on our Marine Education and Research Society social media:

“So thrilled that Timothy did see and document them so that we know (thanks to Dr. Marianne Nyegaard) that these are most likely juvenile Mola mola (Ocean Sunfish), not the other Mola species found in these waters Mola tecta (Hoodwinker Sunfish).

From Dr. Nyegaard about this sighting: ” . . . they look to me like very young Mola mola – the belly curve still has that angular look to them, which is the last remnant of the babyness.”

You may note that the Mola on the right has an injury on their tail. These juveniles were about 60 cm across.

The video also gives you a sense of how fast Mola are. They are often erroneously thought to be slow because, when at the surface, they are “sunning” to warm up from being in colder, deeper water. They can also be fairly stationary at the surface to present themselves for parasite removal by birds like albatross.

The other fish species in this video are Widow Rockfish and Yellowtail Rockfish.

This year it is extraordinary that we know of about 7 sightings of Mola in the Browning Pass area by scuba divers. We will be reporting on the other sightings once we have some more information. We will try to determine if they are repeat sightings of the same fish.

To report a sighting (with photo and/or video) and read about the differences between the two species, see www.mersociety.org/mola.

As the name “Hoodwinker” suggests, Mola tecta was hiding in plain sight. (“tecta” also means “hidden” in Latin).

It was only in 2017 that research was published on the very existence of the species and it was thought to only range in the temperate waters of the southern hemisphere. Only since 2019 has it been questioned whether they are found in colder waters and – they sure are! They’ve been mistaken as being Mola mola, the Ocean Sunfish.

We are collaborating and collecting the data for Ocean Sunfish Research.“

Sighting Number 2 – Medusafish seen by Shireen Shipman.
On one day of our dive trip, the wind was howling so fiercely that we could not get out in the boat. Thankfully, we could dive in the bay right in front of God’s Pocket. After one of these dives, Shireen showed me her stunning pictures and asked me if I knew the species.

My jaw may have dropped. Yes, my face got a good workout on this trip.

I thought this may be a Medusafish (Icichthys lockingtoni to 46 cm). But I had to check with expert Andy Lamb. I have never, knowingly, seen one. Their range does include where I often dive but sightings and photos of them by divers are rare. As the reference to “Medusa” suggests, these fish often are in amongst the tentacles of large jelly species. Even in Andy Lamb and Phil Edgell’s fish ID book, the only photo of a Medusafish is of a dead individual at the surface.

Andy confirmed this was a juvenile Medusafish and I am sure he is keen to use Shireen’s photo in future to help others ID the species.

The known range of Medusafish is the North Pacific Ocean: Japan and Gulf of Alaska to central Baja California, Mexico.

How wonderful that Shireen noticed that this was a unique fish and took beautiful photos. You can see how shallow they were. Oh and did I mention? I was on this dive.

Sighting Number 3 – Male Rock Greenling seen by John Congden and Janice Crook
I was to dive with Janice and John but I could not clear my one ear. So I dived very near the surface telling myself that a byproduct could be . . . seeing a male Rock Greenling (Hexagrammos lagocephalus to 61 cm)! One had repeatedly been seen at this site. They are highly territorial AND in the shallows in sites with high surge like this.

There appears to be little known about Rock Greenlings and there is even scientific debate if the Rock Greenlings seen in Russia are the same species as those along the North American side of the North Pacific Ocean. Dr. Milton Love discusses how observations of this species from eastern Kamchatka and the Sea of Okhotsk are that they are in schools. While over on this side, they are observed to be solitary and very territorial.

Back to me diving . . . in the surge. I spend an hour at no more than 6 metres depth and looked, and looked for the male Rock Greenling. I was back on the dive boat when my beloved dive buddies, Janice and John, surfaced from their dive ecstatic because . . . the fish was where they had done their safety stop. Janice and John’s photos of the male Rock Greenling follow.

You can see how astoundingly, flamboyantly coloured mature male Rock Greenlings are and yet, also despite their territoriality, they can clearly be so difficult to spot.

I was so lucky to later see a mature female Rock Greenling on another dive, darting in and out of the Surfgrass. My photos of the female Rock Greenling are below.

There is much discussion about how territorial mature male Rock Greenlings are. But the mature females sure seem territorial too (based on my sample size of exactly ONE observation of a mature female Rock Greenling). 🙂

So why the pouty face?

Why indeed did my face do something similar to pouting upon not being part of these 3 sightings? The important things are:

• Timothy’s video of the Mola was contributed to research.
• Shireen’s photos of the Medusafish will help others ID the species.
• Janice and John’s sighting of the male Rock Greenling was something they too had tried so hard for, dedicating many dives to being in the shallows, rocking back and forth in the surge. Between them, they have 59 years of diving, much of it in British Columbia’s marine waters and they have never before seen a Rock Greenling. Until this sighting, they had been referencing the species as the “mythic unicorn fish” of the northwest Pacific Ocean.
• By being able to use their photos, I can still educate and hopefully increase care, understanding and action for the fragility the life in dark water. Thank you, dive buddies!

I actually looked up the definition of “to pout” for greater insight into what neural wiring leads to such a facial expression. I was gifted with: “to push one’s lips or one’s bottom lip forward as an expression of petulant annoyance or in order to make oneself look sexually attractive.” I assure you it was not the latter! Nor was it the former actually.

My inner 8-year-old is alive and well in this 60-year-old body. She’s the one who pouted, wanting to be filled with wonder too.

The more adult me loves the wonder of NOT seeing these fish. You can be on the same dive, at the same time, and not have the same experience. Isn’t that the truth! I love the metaphor it gives for life. I love how much more there is to marvel at, and to share.

It tests me too. Can we care and take action for species we have never seen, or may ever see? Can we do so with the understanding of how little is known about them and how that too threatens their survival? You, dear reader, know that answer to that in how YOU feel right now.

YES we can and yes, we must. 💙