APOIDES 



{Moray Eels) 



Like many other forms of life in this sea, the morays are 

 generally bigger than their Mediterranean counterparts. 

 The specimens we most often met, of the species Gymnotorax 

 undulatus, among the most common in the Red Sea, averaged 

 around eighteen pounds. There are many morays smaller 

 than this, however, belonging to other species such as the 

 Echidna geometrica, lighter in colour, with distinguishing, 

 symmetrically arranged black spots on the head. Tropical 

 morays usually live in the cracks and fissures of the madre- 

 pore, sticking their heads out and keeping their hind-quarters 

 inside. They often facilitate their own capture. When they 

 have been struck by the harpoon they writhe in a combina- 

 tion of agony and fury and demolish their coral homes with 

 their powerful tails. Then, frequently, all the underwater 

 hunter has to do is to wait patiently and draw out his prey 

 from a heap of ruins. In a last move of self-defence the moray 

 wraps itself round the arrow and bites it. The danger of 

 being wounded by a moray is not to be excluded. If it leaps 

 out of hiding and attacks its aggressor, serious trouble may 

 follow, for the poison in its salivary glands makes its bite 

 very painful. 



257 



