Pacific Ocean

Walking Corals

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While most of the reefs we have surveyed in the Great Barrier Reef have an emergent reef flat, one of the northern reefs we were studying was fully submerged and quite difficult to locate.  After circling around our GPS coordinates …

Best Dive

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On every mission during the Global Reef Expedition survey divers can usually point to one dive as being the highlight of the trip. It might be a dive with lots of great looking healthy coral or maybe a dive where …

Be Careful, They Don’t Travel Alone

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If you ask someone “Why do fish school?” you will likely get “to avoid predators” for an answer. After all, the more eyes you have watching the harder it is for anything to sneak up on you. Furthermore, if a …

Stories of a Fish Surveyor

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Marine parks have been introduced worldwide to preserve biodiversity and protect important underwater habitats. Protected zones serve as baselines for undisturbed, natural ecosystems that can be used to measure the effects of human activities in other areas, and thereby help …

Cool Catfish

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The Great Barrier Reef… home to thousands of marine species. Dazzling coral reefs, majestic sharks, elegant manta rays, imposing groupers and cods, ancient giant clams, and rainbow coloured reef fish such as butterflyfish, angelfish and damsels. These are some of …

Ctenophores Galore

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Brightly colored sea stars are a regular occurrence on our survey dives. We only tend to notice them when we see a new and highly decorated species or dive a site where they are highly abundant. One survey dive we …

Sharks!

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Sharks are a natural component of coral reef ecosystems, where they occupy the role of top-order predators. Reef sharks are important to the overall health of the coral reef assemblage, and their presence is generally an indication of a coral …

Surprise Encounter with an Olive Sea Snake

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Let me tell you about yesterday’s wonderful (seriously) sea snake encounter while it’s still fresh in my mind. First of all, up here in the northern Great Barrier Reef we’re getting close to saltwater crocodile territory.  They can grow to …

Threadfin Pearl Perch: A Gem of a Fish

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As we travel across the Pacific Ocean during the course of the Global Reef Expedition we encounter many species of fishes on our survey dives. Many are widespread species that we see in most of the countries we visit though …