Today we returned to the sea with Kanawa Island Diving. All four of us interns went to Manta Point, with the goal of collecting 10 manta ID photos. That means no classroom today, and I was so happy to dive again!
We set off from Labuan Bajo at 7am onboard Dive Komodo’s speedboat for the 30 minute crossing to Kanawa Island, a beautiful tourist resort island just on the edge of Komodo National Park. There we transferred to Kanawa Island Diving’s boat for the trip out to Manta Point.
Captain and me
Even though we were not in the classroom today, on the way we had a long discussion with our mentor Andy about the materials on our reading list. We talked about sustainable fisheries management, maximum sustainable yield and maximum economic yield, and we learned a formula to calculate the total manta population from our ID photos. We talked about how these relate to manta ray management and conservation, and the manta hunters in Lamakera. I enjoyed the discussion, and suddenly we had arrived at Manta Point and it was time to prepare for our first manta survey.
Our first dive we met strong current and a flat sea floor. We split into two groups. The first group was me with Elitza, Satria and Ichsan. The second group was Andy, Riza, Ranny, and one of Kanawa Island Diving’s crew, Doli. We didn’t meet any mantas, but did find sharks, turtles and an eagle ray. After a long search, our diminishing air stopped us and we headed back to the surface. The other group also did not find any mantas. But something interesting, we found many boats on the surface and we met several divers underwater. These tourists are all coming to Labuan Bajo to meet manta rays. Unfortunately the manta rays were absent today.
Satria finds a shark!
Next dive we found turtles, sharks, and divers. We found a shallow reef with beautiful corals, where we met several bumphead parrotfish. No mantas again, but they are temporarily replaced by other beautiful fishes. The third dive we still hoped manta rays could visit us, even just swimming. But the third dive had same result, we’re happy to see some ecotourism activity at the surface.
So after three dives on Manta Point, we didn’t meet a single manta. But as Andy says, zero data is still good data–this absence helps us understand the environmental factors that influence manta rays. Our hypothesis is that the falling tide and the strong winds and waves are keeping the mantas away. Maybe I can test this for my thesis!
I hope we will see more manta rays tomorrow, I’m a long way from my goal of 10,000 manta ray photo IDs this month!
Getting ready on Kanawa Island Diving’s boat
