SCUBA News 127

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SCUBA News (ISSN 1476-8011)
Issue 127 - November 2010
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk
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Welcome to SCUBA News. I hope you enjoy this newsletter, but should you wish to remove yourself from our mailing list please go to http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/news.html

SCUBA News is published by SCUBA Travel Ltd, the independent guide to diving around the world.

Contents:
- What's new at SCUBA Travel?
- Letters
- SCUBA Gift Suggestions
- Creature of the Month - Bullethead Parrotfish
- Diving News from Around the World

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What's New at SCUBA Travel?
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Diving Cambodia

Although not known as a top dive destination the waters around the Cambodian coast line are one of the world's newest diving destinations and have yet to be properly explored.
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/pacific/cambodia.html

Diving Bali

Over 33 dive operators are now listed in our Bali section at
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/indonesia/diving-bali.html

More...

For regular announcements of what's new at the SCUBA Travel site see the Diving Board at
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/viewforum.php?f=2

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Letters
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Malaysia, Indonesia or Philippines?

I wanted to make a surprise to my boyfriend and take him to Malaysia, Indonesia or Philippines for scuba diving because he's keen on that! Is 3 weeks enough for visiting and scuba diving, and which country is better and which one is cheaper?
Kristina

Post any answers on the Diving Board at I'm looking at diving in the Red Sea in March and April and would like a liveaboard. Who are you diving with, and how did you choose them? Any advice for me looking for a tour/liveaboard company?
Maureen

What do you think? Let Maureen know at I am about to take off on a trip to Belize in about a month and I was just wondering if anyone on here has any suggestions or insight specifically about the reefs in Belize. I have heard that its a great place to dive and I am hugely looking forward to it, just wanted to see if anyone else has already dove here.
Jounderw

Any comments on Belize diving? __________________________________________________________
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SCUBA Gift Suggestions
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Here are the gifts which caught the eye of the SCUBA Travel team. You may also be interested in our magazine picks at Scuba Diver Bath Plug
Never again will you lose your plug under the soap suds.Scuba Boy never swims far from the plug so you will always know where it is. Silly but we like it.

Jacques Cousteau Odyssey, The - Complete Series
Features the complete 12 episodes of the Odyssey series, spanning forty years of exploration in search of lost civilisations and underwater sanctuaries.

Diving T Shirt
Evolution To Scuba Diving T-Shirt.

Mini Scuba Tank Key Ring
Mini Scuba diving cylinder contains 10 O rings and fits on your keyring.

Scuba Diver Cufflinks
A selection of cufflinks in silver, rhodium or stainless steel.

IST Scuba Divers Handy Maintenance Tool Kit
Handy tool kit for convenient maintenance of diving equipment

World Ocean Census: A Global Survey of Maritime Life
A lovely book, packed with photos, which describes the stories behind the recently published World Ocean Census.

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Creature of the Month: Bullethead Parrotfish, Chlorurus sordidus
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This colourful parrotfish lives on coral reefs and lagoons to over 25 m. It is one of the most common parrotfish seen in the Indo-Pacific from the Red Sea to Hawaii and Australia.

Parrotfish are unusual because they sleep wedged in the coral in a mucous cocoon. Until recently this was thought to mask the scent of the parrotfish from predators. But research published this month shows that the cocoon actually works as a "mosquito net". The parrotfish are targets for external parasites which feed on their blood, much as mosquitos feast off humans. During the day the fish visit "cleaner stations" where cleaner wrass remove the parasites (gnathiids). During the night the fish spend their time building the cocoons before tucking into bed, protected from the biting gnathiids.

The Bullethead parrortfish changes colour as it gets older. Initially both male and female are a drab grey, brown or reddish colour. Some of the males, though, will change into a bright blue or green primary male. Females can also turn into males, but they will not be quite as brightly coloured. These are called secondary males.

Like other parrotfish, Bulletheads have fused teeth and need to continually graze dead coral rock otherwise their teeth will grow too long. They often appear to be eating corals, but more often they're really eating algae growing on an exposed section of the coral skeleton. This benefits the coral as the algae growing on shallow reefs would otherwise smother them.

Parrotfish create a phenomenal amount of sand - the remains of the rock they crunch. This is one reason why the visibility on reefs is generally higher in the early mornings, before parrotfish have begun their rock munching.

Further Reading
Fish mucous cocoons: the mosquito nets of the sea
Coral Reef Guide Red Sea by Ewald Lieske and Robert Myers
The Enchanted Braid by Osha Gray Davidson
The Blue Planet by Ewald Lieske and Robert Myers

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Diving News From Around the World
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If you would like to read the diving news as it happens, without waiting for this newsletter, then grab the SCUBA News feed from http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/scuba.xml. It's free and automatically updates you with the latest SCUBA news via your web site or e-mail.

Divers could breathe deep with liquid-filled lungs

Inhaling oxygen-rich liquid would allow divers to explore deeper into the ocean than ever before, and eliminate decompression sickness, according to an article in New Scientist. In a paper presented last month, Arnold Lande described a system in which the diver breathes in an oxygen-carrying liquid called perfluorocarbon, contained in a diving helmet.

Wrong Turn for Great White Sharks?

Great white sharks in the Mediterranean may have first arrived from the seas around Australia about 450,000 years ago, genetic studies have suggested. Researchers believe the arrival may have been simply a migratory "wrong turn" by a few pregnant females. It was previously assumed that the great whites in the Mediterranean were most closely related to their nearby cousins in the Atlantic Ocean.

Surveyor seals reveal secrets of Antarctic depths

Seals are helping to map the ocean floor around Antarctica. And they are proving their worth: they have already revealed new features on the sea bed that could help researchers explain the rapid melting of ice in recent years.

Grey whales took to high seas to survive the ice ages

Clues to how these ocean giants survived the last ice age may be lurking in a population of grey whales off the Canada's Pacific coast.

California's whales suffer sunburn

Whales in the Gulf of California are starting to blister in the sun, say researchers who have studied them for three years.

Row erupts over number of big fish in the sea

A blazing row has broken out between fisheries scientists over whether fishing fleets are depleting the world's oceans of their large species.

Ancient seaweed is living fossil

The two types of seaweed, which grow more than 200 m underwater, represent previously unrecognised ancient forms of algae. The algae occur in relatively deep marine waters - 210 m, which is certainly deep for a photosynthetic organism. They appear to possess special chlorophyll pigments that allow them to utilise the low intensity blue light found at depth. They belong to an incredibly ancient group of green plants which diverged from the other green plants up to one billion years ago.

French export drive threatens to crush Europe's eels

Tiny, slimy and pricey, glass eels are in trouble. A French move to maintain exports to China last week risks crippling efforts to restock migration rivers.

European eel fishing suspended for 10 years

The Andalusian Government have adopted a 10 year moratorium on fishing for the European eel (Anguilla anguilla) in order to help preserve the species, as it is in danger of extinction.

Gulf oil spill report blames industry and regulators

A sorry catalogue of technical, safety and regulatory failures all contributed to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, according to an interim independent report commissioned by the US Department of the Interior.

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