Tanjung Lipat Beach - Part 2 of 2

This is a follow-up post of my last blog about a mysterious animal I discovered in Tanjung Lipat Beach. It is wrong to think that we need to travel a thousand miles overseas to see something cool. Sometimes we can find something special that is so near to our home.

My blog about this animal has created a great fear among the locals. Many readers express their concern whether this animal is a man-eater and whether it is safe for their children to swim at Tanjung Lipat, etc. Ok, Ok, let’s cut the crap. There are TWO different animals live in this burrow. One is a BLIND shrimp, another one is Goby fish. They share the same burrow and play a supporting role to each other. The Goby fish is a “watch dog”. The blind shrimp always uses the antenna to sense the movement of this fish to detect danger. If the fish retreats to the hole, the shrimp will follow. In return, the Goby fish can live in the safe burrow without paying any rent.

Picture 1. The Goby fish comes up and watch around first.
Picture 2. If the fish stays outside long enough, the shrimp will come out.

I know this because Discovery Channel lists both of them as one of the Most Extreme partners. But I didn’t expect I would see them in Tanjung Lipat. At first I noticed the antenna in the hole, so I sat next to the hole and waited for it to come up. Then I was surprised to see a fish (no antenna) came up first. I found more than 5 burrows like this in Tanjung Lipat.

Picture 3. The blind shrimp always keeps an antenna on the fish body.
Picture 4. The Goby fish is very cooperative and give way to the shrimp to work.

Please click the photos below to zoom-in for larger photos. You won’t find many super-clear photos of them in other web sites. This kind of cross-species partnership is a miracle in the nature.