Reef assessment with chaetodonts

Today we moved toward the reef conservation dives, rather than the "fun dives" that were preparatory for this.  Our first dive today was on a reef that has been badly mismanaged and damaged by human activy.  The objective is to compare this damaged reef to a pristine reef by counting the number of species of Chaetodontidae that we see in each.  That's the family that includes butterflyfish and bannerfish.  In this region, there are ~30 species and the students had to memorize them in the fall class.  There's a report in a scientific journal that shows you can use this family of fish as a surrogate for all reef fish species as a means to assess reef health.  Today they saw a very unhealthy reef, tomorrow we plan to do the same activity in a healthy reef and compare the two.  Following this, we had lunch on the dive boat and then began the reef rehabilitation project.

Longtail boats are available for hire.

We take one each morning from our accommodations out to the Reef Ranger, our dive boat.

We're approaching the Reef Ranger which waits for us in deeper water.

Our sign on the side of the boat will be used for our annual underwater class photo later.

Everyone helped me to celebrate my 65th birthday today with a surprise birthday cake and song.  Yay me!

The first dive today was in Ton Sai Bay along a reef that has been terribly mismanaged.  Here, we conducted the first of two chaetodont assessments.  The other will be in a day or two in a very nice reef.  We can use the number of species of this fish family as a measure of reef health. 

AT

Hannah

There were not many nice coral heads like this in Ton Sai reef.

Mackenzie

Lyndi

Mackenzie 

 Dixie

Here are a few longfin bannerfish, but notice the coral rubble on the sea floor.

Mackenzie, Dixie, Hannah, and AT