Final Thoughts- Semporna Dive Trip

Now that Christmas is over I have a little more time to finish up my thoughts about my recent dive trip to the Semporna region of Sabah in Borneo. In Decenmber, a group of American, Dutch, and Malaysian scientists conducted a survey of the region and concluded that this region contains some of the highest diversity of corals and fishes found anywhere in the world (they identified 844 species of fishes)! While they noted that some of the reefs remained in excellant condition, they noted that many of the reefs were in very poor condition. I hope that the Malaysian and Sabahan governments will pay attention to this report and increase their efforts to conserve this unique ecosystem.

Cool Critters!

The reason that people are willing to travel so far and spend so much money to dive in places like Sipadan is that there are some unbelieveably cool creatures living there. Because I don't take underwater photos, I have "borrowed" a few photos from the internet to show you some of my favorites from this trip.

During my first dive in Sipadan, at Mid-reef, they dropped us on top of a giant clam (maybe 1 meter across). As we were looking at the clam a school of bumphead parrotfish swam past. In the water less than 5 minute and already seeing awesome stuff!

Giant clam


Bumphead Parrotfish


The diving conditions were quite different around Sibuan Island, so we found differt organisms. Here are some of my favorites.

Mandarinfish. These guys are the most colorful creatures on the planet. These mandarinfish were hiding among the spines of long-spined urchin (Diadema). Because they are found in very shallow water, there is still a lot of light which makes the colors dazzling!


Stonefish. Seeing the stonefish was one of my favorite parts of the trip. I always follow close behind the dive guides because most of them have "good eyes" and are able to spot the unusual creatures. I was excited when I found the stone fish and was able to point it out the guide. It was extremely well camaflaged, but it is usually possible to separate a "fish" from a "stone" because stones don't have eyes.


Sea snake. We followed a sea snake hunting among the corals at Sabankat Island.


Blast Fishing

Coral reefs around the world are at risk from a variety of factors. For more info see- http://www.eoearth.org/article/Threats_to_coral_reefs?topic=49513

In some places people collect reef fishes by "blast fishing" (sometimes known as "explosive fishing" or "dynamite fishing"). Fishermen drop some sort of a bomb (often a fertilizer bomb) onto the reef. The explosion stuns the fish which makes them easy to collect. Obviously, these explosions cuase great damage to the reef

http://www.eoearth.org/article/Coral_degradation_through_destructive_fishing_practices?topic=49513

I heard several explosions during my dive trip and one of them, on Sibuan Island, seemed very close to me (the dive guide told me that it was not too close or else it would have been much louder and felt more extreme). As we returned home from diving that day we noticed several fishermans' boats being towed back to the harbour by the Police and our boat captains said he thought that they were being arrested for blast fishing. I hope that we are able to teach the fishermen that blast fishing is not a sustainable way of collecting fish off of the reef and help them to find better ways to fish and make money for their families.