SCUBA News 143

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SCUBA News (ISSN 1476-8011)
Issue 143 - April 2012
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk
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Welcome to April's SCUBA News and congratulations to pcarrollvm, who filled in our survey at You can therefore download this issue in pdf here, and soon pdf back issues will be available from our SCUBA News Archive.

SCUBA News is published by SCUBA Travel Ltd, the independent guide to diving around the world. Please e-mail any commments on, or suggestions for, the newsletter to news@scubatravel.co.uk.

Contents:
- What's new at SCUBA Travel?
- Letters
- Top Ten Dives in the World
- Creature of the Month: Midnight Snapper
- Diving News from Around the World

What's New at SCUBA Travel?

Diving the Philippines

The Philippines is part of the "coral triangle", in which live 76% of the world's coral species, 6 of the world's 7 marine turtle species and at least 2,228 reef fish species. The central Philippines also has a particularly high number of species which are found nowhere else in the world. We've updated our whole Philippines section with many more photos, maps, articles, dive site descriptions and dive centre reviews, plus warnings on which part of the country you shouldn't visit at the moment.
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/philippines/

Diving Oman

The Sultanate of Oman is the oldest independent state in the Arab world. Tourism is on the rise, including divers. A major dive attraction is the World Heritage Site of the Daymaniyat Islands. You'll see healthy hard and soft corals, with very little damage. Lots of shoaling fish, very many moray eels, stone fish and cuttlefish. Turtles are frequently seen, and some huge ones at that. From July to September the plankton bloom also attracts whale sharks, so with a bit of luck the opportunity may arise to snorkel with one these. Our new Oman page is at
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/arabian-sea/oman-diving.html

Diving Greece

Greece's economic problems are well known and everyone there is very pleased to see visitors at the moment, although prices haven't dropped. The diving is good and we have added more dive operator recommendations to our Greece page. Note though that strikes are sometimes being called at short notice in Athens.
http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/europe/greece-diving.html

Advert: Scuba diving and PADI courses in Sardinia's
marine reserve with Blu Infinito: walls, canyons, pinnacles,
caves, wrecks. See what Italy has to offer...http://www.bluinfinito.it/

For regular announcements of what's new at the SCUBA Travel site see our Twitter feed, our Facebook page or the SCUBA Travel Google+ page.

Letters

Sharm El Sheikh

Does anyone know the name of the dive company at Partner Turquoise resort hotel (Sharm El-Sheikh) please?
Lin

Tunisia

I am off to Tunisia in the summer any hints or tips for Monastir?
Simon Read
From the Diving Board...

Any answers? E-mail news@scubatravel.co.uk or post on the Diving Board at http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/.

Top 10 Dives in the World

You've been voting for your favourite dive sites at http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/topdives.html and the latest list is as follows.

1. The Yongala, Australia
   The Yongala is a shipwreck off the coast of Queensland. Full of life you may see manta rays, sea snakes, octopuses, turtles, bull sharks, tiger sharks, clouds of fish and spectacular coral.
    
   
2. Blue Corner Wall, Palau, Micronesia
   An upwelling means this splendid wall dive is favoured by pelagics.
    
   
3. Barracuda Point, Sipadan Island
   Wall of coral where sharks come cruising by and barracuda surround you.
    
   
4. Thistlegorm, Egyptian Red Sea
   Big wreck whose cargo includes motor bikes, train carriages and trucks.
    
   
5. Shark and Yolanda Reef, Egyptian Red Sea
   Three dives in one: anemone city, shark reef with its spectacular drop off and the wreck of the Yolanda.
    
   
6. Great Blue Hole, Belize
   Very deep, wide hole outlined by coral reef and inhabited by sharks.
    
   
7. Navy Pier, Western Australia
   Extending 300 m from the shore, packed with marine life.
    
   
8. Big Brother, Egyptian Red Sea
   The Brothers, or El Akhawein, are two small islands in the middle of the Red Sea.
    
   
9. Manta Ray Night Dive, Kailua Kona, Hawaii
   Underwater lights placed on the ocean floor attract plankton, which in turn attract the huge manta rays of Kona Hawaii. Often surrounded by wild currents, the scenary makes for some wonderful dives.
    
   
10. Liberty, Bali, Indonesia
    The Liberty lies on a black sand slope, almost parallel to the beach and is only 30 m offshore. She lies in 9-30 m of water and is totally encrusted in anemone, gorgonians and corals.

How many have you done? Let us know or vote at the Top 10 Dives page.

Creature of the Month: Midnight Snapper

Bright yellow eyes distinguish this fish from related species. You find it in the Western Pacific between 3 and 50 m, from the Maldives to the Solomon Islands and Ryukyu Islands to New Caledonia.

Juveniles look very different to adults: they are black and white with blotches on their backs and stripes below. They live solitarily on protected reef slopes with feather stars, in staghorn corals or large sponges. When adult Midnight Snapper sometimes aggregate in groups and live on seaward reefs. They feed on large zooplankton at night.

In spite of the abundance of adults, the distinctive juveniles are not similarly common on coral reefs. One explanation is that the adults have a long life-span, but the survival of their larvae is seldom successful. In fact Macolor species live 40 to 50 years on the Great Barrier Reef, which would support this theory.¹

The Midnight Snapper is also known as the Black and White Snapper, which is confusing as the similar species Macolor niger is also sometimes known by this name.

Further Reading:
Froese, R. and D. Pauly. Editors. 2011. FishBase.
¹The Pelagic Larva of the Midnight Snapper, Macolor macularis (Teleostei: Lutjanidae), Amanda C. Hay and Jeffrey M. Leis Records of the Australian Museum (2011) Vol. 63: 85–88.

More photos of Midnight Snapper...

Diving News From Around the World

You can display this news, in real-time, on your web site. Just grab our news feed from http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/scuba.xml. For more details see http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/newsfeed.html. You can also read it on our Twitter page at Illegal fisherman destroy Asia's best dive sites

Coral gardens inside Komodo National Park have been transformed into desolate gray moonscapes by illegal fishermen who use explosives or cyanide to kill or stun their prey. Dive operators and conservationists say Indonesia's government is not doing enough to keep illegal fishermen out of the boundaries of the national park, a UN World Heritage site.

Fishing discard breakthrough in UK Trials

Fishing trial reduces discards from 38% for North Sea cod trawlers to just 0.2%. The UK's Catch Quota management trial counts what is caught rather than what is landed at port. The trial has operated on a voluntary basis and fishermen who join the scheme have to account for everything they take out of the sea and land everything they catch, regardless of size, with CCTV used to check that they are sticking to the rules.

Chile plans to expand marine reserves

The Chilean Government intends to expand the Salas y Gomez marine reserve and create a smaller reserve in Hanga Roa Bay, the harbour off the main town and capital of historic Easter Island.

Underwater Elephants to Provide New Reef

Life-sized elephant artworks are to be placed 10 m underwater at Koh Mak Island, Thailand to create an artificial reef.

NOAA releases new views of Earth's ocean floor

NOAA has made sea floor maps and other data on the world's coasts, continental shelves and deep ocean available for easy viewing online. Anyone with Internet access can now explore undersea features and obtain detailed depictions of the sea floor and coasts, including deep canyons, ripples, landslides and likely fish habitat.

Fish thrive around wind farm

The first Danish study into how one of the world's largest wind farms affects marine life has shown that wind turbines and fish live quite happily together, with some species of fish actually increasing in number.

Wind pushes plastics deeper into oceans, driving trash estimates up

While working on a research sailboat gliding over glassy seas in the Pacific Ocean, oceanographer Giora Proskurowski noticed something new: The water was littered with confetti-size pieces of plastic debris, until the moment the wind picked up and most of the particles disappeared. The wind was pushing the lightweight plastic particles below the surface. That meant that decades of research into how much plastic litters the ocean, conducted by skimming only the surface, may in some cases vastly underestimate the true amount of plastic debris in the oceans, Proskurowski said.

Study shows adaptive capacity of reef corals to climate change may be widespread

Many species of reef-building corals may be able to adapt to warming waters by relying on their closest aquatic partners - algae. The corals' ability to host a variety of algal types, each with different sensitivities to environmental stress, could offer a much-needed lifeline in the face of global climate change.

Viral photos show problem in 'whale shark tourism'

A photo of a woman trying to surf on top of a whale shark in the Philippines, which was posted on Facebook, has elicited expressions of concern and alarm from around the world.

Foreign Office Advises Against Travel to Southern Philippines

The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office reviewed and reissued its advice on travelling to the Philippines.

Recovery plans for endangered whales

Following the Center for Biological Diversity's notice of intent to sue, the National Marine Fisheries Service has announced that it has begun preparing a recovery plan for the endangered North Pacific right whale.

Solomon Islands Faces Dolphin Export Ban

CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species), one of the largest conservation agreements in existence, has asked the Solomon Islands to provide more data about the bottlenose dolphins in its waters or face a possible ban on all exports of these dolphins in the future.

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