Description

Probably one of the most elusive and difficult to spot Sea Horse that ever existed, here is the famed Pygmy Sea Horse, a tiny little ball of phenomenal camouflage and cuteness all rolled into one discrete package. This little guy was found in Bali, Padang Bai, an extremely underrated diving location, a hidden gem in my opinion.

We did sadly have to stop our guide from touching everything and bending the sea fans so we could see the Pygmy’s, I guess our guide was used to the idiot divers that encourage this, hopefully the practice has changed. After the guide stopped trying to move the poor little Pygmy, I went in for a photo, sadly he was buried deep into his home coral and getting any closer would have damaged it, so this was as close as I could get to him with my set-up. I actually took close to 50 photos of him, not a normal thing for me to take that many of a single subject, but as an photographer will know with Sygnathiformes, they shy from the light, you only get a few seconds if that to get your shot once your lights hit them, so it’s trial and error, move in, move away, rinse and repeat!

This is the nicest shot I got of him, full side profile with his coral home providing an amazing backdrop, showing just how fantastically well camouflaged these guys are and just how closely you’ll have to look if you want to see them for selves in real life.