This GLORIOUS and beautiful blenny is Meiacanthus kamoharai, and until recently, was completely unavailable to hobbyists. Today, it is widely available as a captive bred aquacultured ornamental....and you know who’s sorta responsible for that? ME! 1/n

M. kamoharai is found only in southern Japan, where it is locally common. It’s found in coastal reefs, deeper ends of rock pools, and sometimes even harbors. They are of no commercial value locally, but internationally in the marine hobby, it was unobtainable. 2/n

In 2015 I travelled to Okayama JUST to look for this fish! Here’s an exposed rocky reef during low tide. A friend of mine who runs a fish export business, Koji, took me there. You don’t need permits to collect local fish, and M. kamoharai were not on any restricted lists. 3/n

That little exposed reef was practically entirely made up of oysters (Meiacanthus blennies love to hide in discarded oyster shells). I had cuts all over my leg (a deep one on my knee too) from swimming around trying to catch some! 4/n

But we did! This big boy was the same one you saw in the photos I posted at the start of this thread. We shipped him back to me in Singapore where he continued to live for another 5 years (blennies don’t live long and this one was already fully grown). 5/n