Welcome to CritterGuide!

critter noun: crit·ter \ˈkri-tər \ – a peculiar, unusual and frequently tiny marine creature of immense fascination to scuba divers

A guide to the weird and wonderful animals to be found beneath the waves at Mike’s Dauin Dive Resort.

Everyone likes to see the big and spectacular marine creatures like whales, sharks, mantas, turtles and the like. Who doesn’t? However, not every dive is blessed with a visit from one of these magnificent animals, and when you start to cast your eyes downwards to the sand, grass, rocks or corals, you may see (with the help of our excellent guides….) some pretty small, but nonetheless spectacular creatures. These are critters, and the shores of Dauin and Apo Island are literally crawling with them.

Check out these informative and entertaining articles about some of the many beautiful, not-so-beautiful, and frankly weird critters to be found just under the waves. Please enjoy, comment, like and share!

1. Octopus's Garden

Octopus's Garden An amazing variety of these 8-legged lovelies inhabit the sandy slopes of Dauin's shores. Here are just a few you may be lucky enough to encounter. Greater Blue-Ringed Octopus (Hapalochlaena lunalata) Their venom…

2. How do you find a Pygmy Seahorse?

How do you find a Pygmy Seahorse? The Pygmy Seahorse (Hippocampus bargibanti) is one of the most difficult critters to find. They are smaller than a little fingernail, live on sea fans, and from their earliest stages of life, encourage the…

3. Are Ghost Pipefish scary?

Are Ghost Pipefish scary? No, not really, unless you are an unsuspecting tiny crustacean. They are cousins of the Seahorse family, and they are very good at hiding in plain view, floating head down, and ambushing the poor little things that…

4. Feeling crabby?

Feeling crabby? Quite often overlooked on the dive in preference to flashier species, crabs are very ancient, and some of the best camouflaged creatures in the sea, and are therefore very cool.  Decorator crabs adorn themselves with bits of…

5. Shrimps are for life, not just barbecues

Shrimps are some of the tidiest critters around.  If they are not burrowing out neat networks of tunnels, they can be found tickling around the fearsome mouth of a Moray Eel cleaning its teeth or sweeping up around Sea Cucumber bottoms.  …

6. Frogfish Chorus

Frogfish are some of the most sought-after critters on the Dauin coast, with good reason. Big gaping frog-like mouths allow them to suck in fish almost the same size as themselves with a muscle reflex which is one of the fastest in the animal…

7. Do you Nudi?

Nudibranchs (pronounced noody-branks) are an underwater photographer's dream.  Bizarre shapes, fantastical colours and an inability to move particularly quickly make for very popular subjects.  But they are much more than oceanic eye-candy. …

8. Our Guests Nudi too

Here's a dosage of slug action courtesy of Jane Doherty, Shona McKenzie and David Gilchrist who together with a happy band of divers, got overwhelmed by slugs!  Thanks to them for letting me pinch these pics.  These are all members of the…

9. Cuttlefish Chameleons

Cuttlefish are very clever creatures.  Controlling 8 arms, 2 tentacles and 3 hearts takes one of the largest brain-to-body size ratios of all invertebrates.  They can they change their colours and texture in a flash, to match the seabed they…

10. Can a Fish be a Critter?

Can a fish be a Critter?  We don't see why not, especially when it's a Scorpionfish.  With a bewildering number of species in this family, the things they have in common are a love of camouflage, striking their prey quickly and defending themselves…
Varicose Wartslug

11. Slugs, Hares, Warts and all

Some of the genuinely weirdest Critters in Daiun are Sea Slugs.  Doesn't sound too exciting?  Think again!  Sea Slugs are nothing like the dull black slimy pest you may know from the garden. Sea Slugs look like they've been designed by a…
David Gilchrist - Persian Carpet Flatworm

12. Not all worms are wiggly

Critters in the sea often bear very little resemblance to their earth-bound namesakes.  Flatworms are a case in point.  They are far from the pink, wiggly sausage-like creatures found in your lawn.  Rather, they are a very ancient and basic…
Mantis Shrimp

13. The eyes have it

We still have much to understand about how Critters view their home under the waves.  Some eyeball designs suggest they see the world much as we do, whilst others suggest super-hero-like vision.  Let's focus (bad pun) on Critter Vision.  Mantis…
Painted Thecacera

14. New to Science!

Every diver has been there.  Seen a Critter that you know you've never seen before, and can't find it in the Guide Books, so you proclaim it New to Science!  Sadly, most of the time some 19th Century Naturalist got there before you and put…
Desirable Flabellina

15. Aeolids - Slugs with a sting in the tail

An old and not-often-visited site of ours, Ducomi, is sometimes crawling with specimens of a rather special kind of slug family, the AEOLIDS.  So called because their many thin lobes, or cerata, act as external lungs just like the DORIDS,…
Banded Sea Krait

16. Not all Critters are tiny

You'd be forgiven for thinking from that Critters have to be microscopic.  Well, to put the case for all those big Critters out there, take a look at this selection of chunky creatures that don't need a magnifying glass to find.... Spanish…
White Mantle Glossodoris

17. Schizophrenic Slugs

A particularly graceful genus of Nudibranch, is the Glossodoris.  Early marine biologists lumped many different slugs into this genus, but recent DNA testing is showing how some of them belong to a different genus, and should be called something…
Skeleton Shrimp

18. Small is Beautiful

They say the best things come in small packages, and this is just as true below the waves here in Dauin.  A basic magnifying glass is sometimes all you need to enter a brand new underwater world.  Here's a collection of tiny Dauin Critters. Saddleback…
Green Turtle

19. Turtle-y Amazing!

Any dive with a turtle is a great dive, no matter how many times you may encounter one. As they breathe air just like us, it's unsurprising we feel an affinity for them, but do you know your Hawksbill from your Green, or if you are looking at…
Green Turtle

20. The Two Amigos

Critters come in all shapes and sizes.  Here at Mike's we have two very unusual creatures unique to the waters of Dauin and Apo.  Together they are known as the Two Amigos, and are a charming and engaging duo.  Come and see them only at Mike’s…