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Heron Island
By Angus
Livingston *
Friday 12 September 2008:
Farewell from Heron
AFTER three weeks on a tropical island it is time for
the team to pack up and say goodbye.
Samples will be sent off, reports done and research
collated.
For me, coming fresh from a cold Tasmanian winter straight
to an island on the Great Barrier Reef, this has been a welcome respite
from the snow.
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I’m certain none of my
friends down south have been wearing shorts and thongs for the past couple
of weeks. But apart from the ridiculously gorgeous weather (have I
mentioned that enough?), I’ve been part of something intriguing, enjoyable
and most of all – important.
The work done here on Heron Island will increase our understanding of
reefs and the creatures that make their homes there.
When you think that the Great Barrier Reef is listed as one of the
seven wonders of the natural world, and thousands of tourists visit it
every year, it is surprising to learn that there is still so much we don’t
know about it.
Of all the science done on this expedition – and there was a lot – the
thing that struck me the most was how much we still had to learn about
soft corals.
Those beautiful structures, which make up a large part of the Great
Barrier Reef’s appeal, remain very poorly known.
Hopefully the work done on this expedition will encourage more research
in this area.
The scientists themselves proved to be among the hardest-working and
most passionate groups I’ve worked with.
A working day typically included an early dive collecting samples and
taking photographs, then another dive doing the same, before spending the
afternoon and late into the evening classifying and examining what they’ve
collected.
They know they’ve got limited time in the field, so every minute is
precious. |
Sunset at Heron Island resort.
Image: Angus Livingston
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Of course, there was still time to enjoy the fact they
were on a tropical island.
Thanks to some impromptu salsa dancing lessons and balloon
animal making sessions, the whole group can go home knowing they’ve
learned new skills on this trip.
I will go home with a new found appreciation for the small
things living on the bottom of the ocean, as well as disappointment
knowing Christos won’t be cooking my meals anymore.
In a year’s time the team will return, hopefully to a
newly rebuilt research station and a lack of early morning construction
work.
Angus Livingston
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Thursday 11 September 2008:
Researchers’ roundup
Our reporter, Angus Livingston, was keen to find out
what the Heron Island team thought of the trip. So, like all good
reporters, he did a vox pop.
What have you enjoyed, or found the most interesting, on
this trip?
" I’m amazed by the
diversity of life here. You can look anywhere – there’s just life
everywhere." Zamaria Rocio
" I saw a manta ray and
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a manta ray before. This one was really big."
Florent Angly
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"I’m learning from
everyone here. They’ve got so much knowledge about what’s down there and
they’re all so passionate about it." Michelle Vardy
" This is the eighth or ninth
scientific expedition I’ve been on, and this is the most cohesive
group I’ve ever encountered. This has been the easiest group of
people to get along with." Rick Morris
" I did get excited when we
went out to see a reef at low tide and there were sharks in the
water and heaps of turtles stranded on the reef. That would probably
be a highlight." David Vize
" The sea-whip forest was the
most interesting thing I’ve seen so far," Merrick Ekins
" I liked being able to dive in
beautiful visibility. Any visibility is great." Gavin Dally
" I thought it was good we
could help out some unexpected visitors we came across out on the
water." Shawn Smith
" My favourite part of this
trip was working with a great bunch of people. They’re a fantastic
group to work with." Steven Gregg
"I’m happy to be here, there’s a lot to shoot – just not enough
hours in the day." Gary Cranitch
" Each expedition is new in
surprising ways." Julian Caley
" I enjoyed the perfect dive in
the sea-whip forest, 28m down. There were soft corals and fans
everywhere." Monika Schlacher
" Finding the new specimen of
seaweed – the pseudocodium – in the channel, down 30m, was pretty
exciting." John Huisman |
Sunshine under the Heron Island
pier.
Image: Angus Livingston.
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" I enjoyed very much
working in Australia. The way people work here and the general atmosphere
is excellent." Laetitia Plaisance
" It was my first time
on Heron Island and I was amazed with the biodiversity, the beauty of the
coral reefs, the fact that the corals are exposed to the air at low tide,
which is something very unique, and the pristine condition of the
environment." Fred Gurgel
" I enjoyed working with
the scientists, and the excellent dive team." Trish Hendriks
" Apart from the
wonderful camaraderie of my fellow scientists, I found the sea urchins
most interesting." Ashley Miskelly
" Finding the codium in
the channel, and seeing different things down there was great. It’s a
pretty special place." Rainbo Dixon
" We’ve found a good
spread of species here. We will be adding a considerable amount of
knowledge to the fauna of this area." Phil Bock
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Wednesday 10 September 2008
Swaying in the current
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THIS
large gorgonian fan, Ctenocella pectinata, was found in the
channel just outside the entrance to Heron Island. CReefs participant
Trish Hendriks said these types of soft corals tended to grow in deep
water with strong currents, and they were fairly typically found in
channels.
"They’re fairly static, but they move about when the currents
push them," she said.
This particular gorgonian is more than one metre tall.
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Wednesday 10 September 2008:
Teacher finds an abundance of life
SAN DIEGO school teacher Zamaria Rocio has four apt words for
her research on the Great Barrier Reef.
"There’s just life everywhere," she said.
"You look at just one little part of coral and there are 10
different things."
Zamaria, a science teacher at Horace Mann Middle School in San
Diego, is on Heron Island working with the CReefs team, mainly on
Laetitia Plaisance’s coral analysis.
She came to Australia as part of the ARMADA project, which sends
10 American school teachers each year to do field work, so they can
then go back and mentor other teachers.
Zamaria said a major part of her enjoyment was witnessing the
scientists sharing their knowledge and ideas and being part of the
scientific community.
"I’m just amazed at the experience of the group," she said.
Zamaria said co-operation between scientists should be the norm
in theory, but it didn’t always work in practice.
"Here you really do see it," she said.
As part of her time on the expedition, Zamaria has had to break
up dead coral heads to examine their contents and search for
echinoderms, molluscs and crustaceans for later study.
She said the ongoing nature of scientific work was something she
wanted to communicate to her students when she got back to San
Diego.
"Science is not done. Maybe you start something and continue
working on it, but science is never finished," she said.
Zamaria has been writing an online diary for ARMADA, as well as
e-mailing photographs to her class and fellow teachers. |
A large gorgonian fan,
Ctenocella pectinata, near Heron Island. Image: John
Huisman
Zamaria Rocio enjoying some
snorkelling at Heron Island. Image: Gary Cranitch
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Although keeping up with scientific advances as much as
possible, Zamaria said the trip had made it clear just how much science
had moved forward since she was in college 30 years ago.
"DNA wasn’t big when I was in college. We’ve gone light
years from the 1970s to here," she said.
The long hours took some getting used to, Zamaria
admitted, especially with construction work on the island starting at 6am.
"Working in the field is not an 8am-5pm job. That took
some adjustment," she said.
Zamaria said the scientists had to make the most of the
time they had available out in the field, so they tended to work hard all
day and well into the evening.
When she gets back to the United States, Zamaria said she
would go to the National Science Teachers Association conference and make
a presentation about her trip to the other nine teachers who went on field
work this year.
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Tuesday 9 September 2008:
ARMS to hold sea creatures
WHEN the CReefs team returns to Heron Island in a
year’s time they will return to more than just a beautiful island.
The team’s divers are leaving behind Autonomous Reef
Monitoring Structures (ARMS), which will be pegged to the ocean floor in
nine spots around the reef.
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Dr Julian Caley, AIMS Principal Research Scientist and Principal
Investigator of the CReefs project, said creatures would colonise the ARMS
and make their home there. In a year’s time the CReefs divers will
collect the ARMS and examine their contents.
Each structure has its location and depth recorded with a GPS, so
the divers will know where to find it.
Julian said the team was developing a standardised way of
measuring the health, diversity and biological makeup of coral
reefs.
"We’re aiming at getting a standardised method that is replicable
around the globe," he said.
Julian said the idea of dropping structures in the water to study
the animals that recruit to and live on them has been around for
some time, but this was the first time an attempt has been made to
develop and apply the same method on a worldwide scale.
The ARMS have several layers, some open, others with small caves,
and another with a "pond filter", with tiny holes in it.
Julian said the ARMS might be left down for longer than a year,
with research now going on about the effect of leaving the
structures in the water for up to three years.
These structures are already being deployed around the world as
part of the international CReefs project.
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Tuesday 9 September 2008:
Just cruising
THIS group of whiptail rays was enjoying a cruise through the
shallows when photographer Gary Cranitch spotted them from the pier.
"They came in with the high tide in the afternoon," he said.
"There were probably about 50 of them."
Gary said the rays cruised around the shallows for a while,
allowing him to get a shot of them in formation.
Whiptail rays cruise past Heron Island.
Image: Gary Cranitch |
An Autonomous Reef Monitoring
Structure (ARMS), deployed at Heron Island.
Image: Julian Caley.
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Monday 8 September 2008:
BHP employees engage with the Reef
IF DAVID Vize and Michelle Vardy weren’t here on a
tropical island, they’d be back in the office at meetings.
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It’s a hard life, but someone has to do it.
Both came to Heron Island as part of the BHP Billiton Employee
Engagement Program, which sends two employees on each of the CReefs
expeditions so that they can experience scientific field-work first
hand.
BHP Billiton is the major sponsor of the CReefs Australia
expeditions.
Michelle works in Iron Ore in Perth’s head office, while David
works at the Ravensthorpe Nickel Operation in Western Australia.
David did extra diving training to make sure he was able to join
the divers on this trip, while Michelle spent a lot of time
snorkelling.
Both said the trip was "absolutely" worth going on.
"It’s exceeded my expectations," David said.
"As a volunteer I thought I might get a little bit of diving,
probably drudge work, maybe washing dishes."
Instead, both David and Michelle got stuck into the field work
and sample collection, as well as helping out in the lab.
For Michelle, who has degrees in marine science and environmental
management, the chance to do some practical work in her field of
expertise was "really inspiring".
"I’m learning from everyone here. They’ve got so much knowledge
about what’s down there and they’re all so passionate about it," she
said.
David said on the expedition he’d done "loads of diving", smashed
rocks looking for worms, done sample preparation of soft corals, and
also provided entertainment for the troops.
As well as teaching salsa dancing and ukulele playing, David’s
balloon animal lessons proved a big hit with the scientists and
assorted staff on the expedition.
"Everyone got into that in a really big way," a surprised David
said.
Both David and Michelle said they would go home with a better
understanding of what goes on underwater.
"I’ll have a completely different perspective on it [being
underwater]. It’ll change what it is I look for when I’m diving,"
David said.
Michelle said her team in Perth was very interested in the
project and was keen to find out more about the work being done.
"It’s good to know BHP is doing projects like this that are
making a difference," she said. |
David Vize doing some underwater camera work.
Image: Gary Granitch.
Michelle Vardy on Heron Island.
Image: Angus Livingston.
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Monday 8 September 2008:
Painted cray grabs attention
DAVID Vize, a scientist with BHP, saw this interesting
looking crayfish on Masthead Reef near Heron Island and swam closer
to take a picture of it.
"It had very long antennae, about a metre long, which it waved
around," he said.
"And the spectacular black-and-white striping on the legs really
stood out."
Subsequent enquiries confirmed it was a painted crayfish,
otherwise known as Panulirus versicolor. |
Panulirus versicolor, also
known as a painted crayfish. Image: David Vize
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Monday 8 September:
Bringing the Reef to life
READING about coral reefs in a book and seeing them
for yourself are two completely different things.
French PhD student Florent Angly discovered just how
different they were when he volunteered to come to Heron Island as part of
the CReefs project.
"I started learning about reefs and coral biology without
having been on a reef," he said.
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Florent, studying for his PhD in Computational Science at San Diego
State University, made contact with Dr Laetitia Plaisance, who told him
about the CReefs project and the trip to Heron Island. He travelled to
Australia to volunteer on the Island and help Laetitia with her study of
the number and type of crustaceans, molluscs and echinoderms on the reefs.
Florent has been out diving and snorkelling with the rest of the
team, collecting samples to examine back in the lab and enjoying the
beautiful sights underwater.
He said the physical experience of being out in the water helped
him tremendously in understanding what he had learned from books.
"I think it is very useful to go and dive and see what is there,"
he said.
"I realise that now I can recognise coral much better and
appreciate which sites are good and which are not." |
PhD student Florent Angly on Heron
Island as part of the CReefs expedition.
Image: Angus Livingston
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As part of his time on the island, Florent broke up dead
coral heads to check for organisms, and found out there was more living in
the coral than he ever expected.
"I had the notion that some organisms would grow in and on
the coral skeletons, but I didn’t really know what it would be like. It’s
a mess, with lots of species and individuals inhabiting a single coral
head!" he said.
Florent’s PhD is in computational science, but he is
interested in biology and would like to use his doctorate to work in that
field.
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Friday 5 September 2008:
Advancing knowledge of soft corals
EVERY time the CReefs soft coral team learns
something new about soft corals they make a significant step forward in
our knowledge of the organisms.
Because so little work has been done on soft corals, any
gain they make represents a "huge leap".
Patricia Hendriks, a research scientist at the Queensland
Museum, said the chance to work on something new was part of what drew her
to the beautiful organisms that wave from the sea bed.
"There are very few people in the world working on soft
corals at the moment, so this chance to build collections and further our
knowledge of these animals is a rare opportunity," she said.
Despite being a large part of what makes coral reefs so
beautiful, soft corals are understudied and there is barely any accessible
literature about them.
One book written by Katharina Fabricius and Phil
Alderslade was published in 2001 by AIMS, and is the first major guide to
soft corals, also known as octocorals.
Trish said her aim was to increase the information
available for people working in the area.
"There’s very little literature for people to use in
making solid taxonomical identifications," she said.
To help with furthering our knowledge of soft corals,
Trish and two other researchers from the Queensland Museum, Dr Monika
Schlacher and Dr Merrick Ekins, are working on Heron Island as part of the
CReefs project.
The trio make up one of the few groups of scientists
working on soft corals in Australia.
Trish said the group is:
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Collecting specimens
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Preparing permanent sclerite preparations. Sclerites are
the hardened body parts of the soft coral, and is all that remains after
the soft tissue has been bleached away. Scientists use this to better
identify their specimens.
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Taking DNA samples
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Taking underwater photographs
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Taking photographs of these animals in the laboratory
Once the three-week CReefs trip is over, the group will go
back to their regular tasks at the Museum, leaving the soft corals
unstudied until projects are developed for further research.
Trish said the samples taken from Heron Island will become
part of a permanent collection that can be used for future studies.
Trish Hendricks and Monika
Schlacher photographing soft coral.
Image: Gary Cranitch
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Trish Hendricks photographing a sample in the lab. Image:
Gary Cranitch
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Thursday 4 September 2008:
Platoma among the corals
THIS beautiful piece of red seaweed is a species of
Platoma.
Dr John Huisman, from Murdoch University in WA and the WA State
Herbarium, found it nestled among some coral at Sykes Reef.
"It usually comes up in springtime, so it seems to be a bit
early," he said.
John said Platoma sits down among the coral to protect
itself.
"They’re very pretty," he said.
John took this underwater picture for his field guide to seaweeds
of the Great Barrier Reef, which he is currently writing. |
This beautiful example of a species of Platoma was found on
Sykes Reef near Heron Island. Image: John Huisman
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Wednesday 3 September 2008:
Video witness to the wonders of the sea
WHEN Rick Morris decided he wanted to give something
back to the environment, he had a choice.
Give what little money he had, or try to make a difference
in other ways.
After a long career as a cameraman in commercial and
public television in the United States, he had a significant amount of
experience behind the lens.
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He was also an accomplished diver with considerable time spent
underwater over the past couple of decades. So when Rick had a
life change in 2001 and decided to do something for the environment,
the choice was made.
"I didn’t have any money to give away, but I had these
abilities," he said.
Rick took a class to learn how to combine his experience behind
the camera and in the water to become an underwater film maker.
His first expedition was with a neuro-biologist from Los Angeles
to Lizard Island in 2001, where he produced a film for PBS and
another one for National Geographic.
"I got hooked. I really loved doing it," he said. |
Videographer Rick Morris at work underwater. Image: Gary
Cranitch
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Over the next few years Rick found more and more work as
an underwater cameraman, including a stint in Indonesia he rates as "hands
down" the best spot for his sort of work.
"Twenty-five per cent of all known marine species that
exist are represented in the coral triangle in Indonesia," he said.
"It’s just unbelievable. It leaves me speechless."
Earlier this year Rick did a short film for the Global
Census of Marine Life, funded by the Sloan Foundation.
He offered to make a documentary about the rest of the
Census, which runs until 2010, and was given a grant to cover the Census’
projects and conferences until it finishes.
Now he travels all over the world covering conferences,
symposiums, and expeditions like this one on Heron Island.
Rick said Heron Island was a good place for some of the
organisms he’s interested in – mainly invertebrates.
"I’m looking for critters. Small invertebrates," he said.
When Rick’s work is done, he edits the video together and
makes it available for scientists to use free-of-charge.
To see more of Rick’s work, visit
http://www.dailymotion.com/envirodiver or
http://www.divefilm.com/dive_films/indexkd12.html
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Tuesday 2 September 2008:
SEEING
the wreck of the ancient boat jutting out of the water on arrival at Heron
Island, you could easily assume it ran afoul of one of the reefs circling
the island.
Or perhaps it was the vessel of some travellers who
happened upon the island and just decided to stay.
In fact, the ship – the HMAS Protector – has a
proud and significant part in Australian history, starting when it was
commissioned back in 1884.
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Built in Newcastle, England, the light cruiser was outfitted as a
gunboat and was stationed in South Australia for 15 largely
uneventful years. However in 1900 South Australia offered
Protector to the Eight Nation Alliance to help in putting down
the Boxer Rebellion in China.
Protector spent a couple of months in China doing despatch
work before being sent home in time to be part of the celebrations
of the newly federated Commonwealth of Australia.
It was cheered out of Sydney Harbour on 2 January 1901 and took
up patrolling positions around the country for the next decade.
When World War I broke out, Protector was used to guard
Australian ports, survey the wreckage of a German ship and do
minesweeping duties off the Victorian coast. |
The wreck of HMAS Protector.
Image: Gary Cranitch
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After the war it went through name and job changes,
eventually being sold off and used as a transport vessel.
During World War II the Americans requisitioned it for use
in the Pacific, however a collision with a tug while on the way to New
Guinea spelt the end for the ship.
It was towed to Heron Island and used as a breakwater on
the edge of the channel, as well as providing an area for diving and
snorkelling.
That’s where the wreck has stayed since 1943 – an imposing
welcome to the island.
Diving is now forbidden within the ship, which thrusts
completely out of the water at low tide.
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Taking apart a coral head, step-by-step
CReefs field work isn’t
all diving, eating and enjoying tropical sunsets. Mostly it is hard work
and long hours.
Today volunteers Zamaria Rocio, part of the ARMADA
program*, and Florent Angly, a PhD student from San Diego State
University, spent several hours taking apart a dead coral head, brought
back yesterday, to examine its contents.
Their work is part of Dr Laetitia Plaisance’s study of the
number and type of crustaceans, molluscs and echinoderms on these reefs.
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Dr Plaisance, a researcher from the Smithsonian Institution based in
Washington, said her study was part of the global Census of Marine
Life. "My work is being done to develop a standardised technique
for assessing the biodiversity of reef invertebrates," she said.
That means Laetitia and her assistants are recording all types of
invertebrates they find, rather than just trying to discover new
ones.
To help everyone understand what goes into finding these
organisms, Ms Rocio and Mr Angly have set out a step-by-step guide
to what their work entails.
- Step one:
Fill a bucket of water about two-thirds of the
way up and make a mark of the water level.
- Step two:
Remove the coral head from its tank and
photograph it.
- Step three:
Put it in the bucket and measure the increase
in water level to determine the volume of the coral head. It may
be necessary to break the head up a little bit to make sure it is
submerged.
- Step four:
Record the information.
- Step five:
Prepare a series of small water containers to
hold what’s found in the coral.
- Step six:
Start breaking the coral into small pieces and
begin looking for organisms living within the skeleton. In this
case, Ms Rocio and Mr Angly look for crustaceans, molluscs and
echinoderms over five mm in size.
- Step seven:
Use tweezers and plastic spoons to remove the
organisms, while hammers and chisels are used to break the coral
apart. Sometimes the tweezers are necessary to remove algae on the
coral that is making it difficult to see what’s underneath.
- Step eight:
When something is found, it is placed in one
of the water containers to be examined later.
- Step nine:
When they’re finished with a piece of coral,
the researchers put it in another bucket of water to be examined
by other scientists looking for other organisms.
- Step 10:
Once the coral has all been picked through, the
animals that have been extracted are taken to the laboratory for
Laetitia to look through and take tissue samples for DNA analysis
and classify them into species.
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Florent with a coral head to be
broken up.
Image: Angus
Livingston
An organism found in a coral head.
Image: Angus
Livingston
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After the process is complete Mr Angly and Ms Rocio return
to the laboratory to help Laetitia classify and tag the organisms.
*The ARMADA program provides American teachers with the
chance to do field work in locations around the world. Ms Rocio is one of
10 teachers selected this year to go away.
PhD student Florent Angly examining
a piece of coral. Image: Angus Livingston
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Expedition volunteer Zamaria Rocio
examines some coral.
Image: Angus
Livingston
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Monday 1 September 2008:
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FINDING out the name of a plant or animal is generally fairly easy.
You can look it up online or in a thousand books published over the past
few hundred years.
Start looking underwater, however, and you’ll find a different story.
There is so much still undiscovered, let alone uncatalogued.
For Dr Julian Caley, senior AIMS scientist and principal investigator
of the CReefs project, the oceans are where the next important ecological
discoveries will be found.
Dr Caley said the CReefs project would provide valuable information to
scientists about plants and organisms that might have never been seen
before.
"[We’re here] to fill in our knowledge in the biodiversity of coral
reefs," he said.
To achieve that, the CReefs team has visited two Australian locations –
Lizard Island and Ningaloo – and is now on its third and final field trip
for the year, to Heron Island, 72km from Gladstone in Central Queensland.
Dr Caley said in setting up the expeditions he had to make a choice
about the best locations to get diverse coverage of the island continent’s
reefs.
"If you can’t do everything, the best thing is to include as much
variety as possible," he said.
With that in mind, Heron Island was chosen as the base for the team’s
third expedition for 2008.
Researchers visiting the University of Queensland research station have
been collecting samples from the area since the 1950s, and the station is
one of the leading coral reef field sites in the world.
Dr Caley said that strong base of knowledge would help the CReefs
project team find out how much is known about the various species in the
area.
"We’ll be collecting where people have already collected quite a lot,"
he said.
Dr Caley said if the group found a significant number of new species or
organisms, they would have a better idea of how much we don’t know
about what was living on Australia’s reefs.
"We would start to understand how much sampling is required," he said.
The field work started on 23 August and concludes on 14 September.
Reports on the discoveries, scientists and news from the expedition
will be available daily on this website.
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Heron Island, Central Queensland.
Image: Gary Cranitch.
Gavin Dally from the Museum and Art
Galleries of the Northern Territory examines coral near Heron
Island, as part of the third Australian CReefs expedition.
Image: Gary Cranitch
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* Angus Livingston, CReefs journalist on Heron Island
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Hobart-based Angus Livingston has BA from the University of
Tasmania with majors in Journalism and History.
He
has worked as a reporter for the Advocate for three and a
half years, covering primarily sport and politics.
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Field Program
