GB-4ij.3”®R 
we would find them somewhere else, usmlly, lying as quietly and looking 
as wild -eyed as before. 
July 17 . Friday. The water was better today, but by no means clear. 
Tom and I went to the stomtopod area, n»inly to do soh® stills. With 
old Long Snoot in for repairs there is little we can do in the way of 
ijK>tion pictures of small animals. Most of these shrimps are ur^er three 
inches in length, and not too well suited to the wide-angle caisez^. It 
was on the stomatopods that I had hoped (and still do) to use the long 
lenses to the best advantage. 
The stomatopods rarely live in the bottom out in the open, but prefer 
the small lumps of decaying coral lying about in soiae areas, in from three 
to eight feet of water. These pieces of rock are as full of holes as a 
cheese, and the shrimps take full advantage of them. They remind me of 
weasels. When a stoma tojK»d sees something It would like to have, its head 
will appear at four or five of these holes in rapid succession, while the 
animal tries to decide which hole give® it the best advantage. It scoots 
across any o;i^n area like a flash of li^t, but once it has made up its 
mind that soJi^thin^ is worth tackling it is very bold. I saw one once 
jerking on the leg of a crab timt was backed against a rock trying to ward 
off a trig^r-flsh. Alttough the crab was ten times larger than the shrimp 
and could slice him in two without half trying, the shrink H^ant to take 
full advantage of a situation that might just possibly pay off. Tlie 
mantis shrimp carries its forelegs much as a praying mantis does, and say 
strike with them or use them as liande. In this instance, after jerking 
