Sea cucumbers in Lembeh aren’t generally a good enough reason for people to travel all the way to the ‘muck diving capital of the world’! However, these unassuming creatures lay the foundations for the marine ecosystem and shouldn’t be passed over on a dive – you can often find them hosting much rarer and more exciting creatures on their bodies – and here at Two Fish Divers Lembeh, our experienced and talented Dive Guides know exactly what to look for!
Relatives of starfish, sea cucumbers feed on algae and other detritus on the seafloor. They live on the seafloor, either on the sand or underneath it, and spend their lives using the tentacles around their mouths to shovel in tiny particles of food. If threatened, they may release a sticky mucus or, in some cases, take the rather extreme measure of ejecting their internal organs out of their anus! I suppose anything is better than being eaten…right?
Unless you have a particular interest in them, most divers don’t pay much attention to sea cucumbers and they certainly are not the reason inspiring a visit to Lembeh! However, if you want to see the best of what the Lembeh Strait has to offer then you need to look in unusual places. Checking the body of sea cucumbers can often reveal special shrimps, nudis and crabs. Emperor shrimp especially can be found hitching a ride from feeding ground to feeding ground on board sea cucumbers with small nudibranchs and other slugs. If you’re willing to get up close to the cucumber’s rear you may find crabs that hide from danger in the anus! Yikes!!
Two Fish Lembeh Resort has hosted Kristy this week who has returned to Indonesia after a short break to complete her PADI Divemaster training. It’s been great to have her here and we’ve had fun during search and recovery dives and her mapping project to finalise her dive professional training. Kristy was also a great help (and fantastic actress) in assisting a PADI Rescue Diver course this week. Congratulations to Elena for rescuing both Dan and Kristy multiple times and completing her rescue training! Congratulations are also due to William who joined Elena for the EFR course. It’s been a busy week but highly productive – it’s extremely encouraging to see so many divers taking their next step on the certification ladder to become PADI Rescue Divers – the more people who get rescue certified, the safer diving becomes for all. Did you know that the EFR course is not just related to diving? You’ll learn about drowning but also how to deal with multiple victims such as what might occur in a road traffic accident, plus spinal injuries, serious bleeding, CPR, oxygen administration, bandaging and splinting, serious illness and a wide range of other first aid tools.
Do you want to come and check out our sea cucumbers (!!) and some of the rarest and most unusual marine life in the world? There’s no better time than now – check out our Special Offers HERE, or fill in the form below and we’ll get right back to you.
