18 – 22 April 2010 Dimakya Island, Club Paradise Many snorkelers and divers quickly swim past seagrass beds without stopping to check out the interesting marine life that live there. Seagrass beds are very important marine habitats and ecosystems. With their root like stems, which can extend horizontally under the sand, seagrass beds serve as binders [...]
25 January 2010 Yellu Island What originally started as a 200 square kilometer no-take zone has now been increased to 425 sq. km. Misool Eco Resort MER take their conservation work very seriously. They have set up a UK charity called the Misool Conservation Centre to raise funds for the all important work of taking care of these waters. [...]
19 - 20 January 2010 Sometime early November last year, we got an email from Dr. Lida Pet-Soede, WWF Coral Triangle Programme Leader to discuss an idea of having a photo exhibition of our expedition in Manila during the first WWF Coral Triangle Business Summit in January 2010. We knew this was going to be [...]
2 - 12 November 2009 The hour we arrived in Wanci, we immediately had a meeting with WWF Indonesia Wakatobi Project Leader Veda Santiadji in their Wangi Wangi office. He offered us different travel scenarios and we got really excited when the first option was to do initial diving on 2 snapper Spawning Aggregation Sites (Spags) then proceed to [...]
6 - 24 August 2009 It is very interesting that mangroves and seagrass beds do not hold as much tourist attraction as flamboyant coral reefs. Fair enough as coral reefs are magical and full of variety of shapes and animals. But there is beauty in each ecosystem - so much so that we have this [...]
24 - 29 July 2009 Our Warmamedi tent beside the WWF turtle hatchery For the next four nights, we consistently saw two leatherback turtles laying eggs. We didn’t have as many companions now as the first night, and we developed some sort of nightly ritual. A long boat (dugout canoe with outriggers) would [...]
23 July 2009 We arrived in Batu Rumah sometime 3 pm of July 23. Immediately our WWF leaders Mr. Bas and Franki called for a meeting with all the site monitoring staff and some local Papuan patrol volunteers. WWF Sorong staff photo in Warmamedi. They loved our flag! Our presence and intentions were [...]
By Alya B. Honsasan Trawler catch being sorted into baskets in Kudat Bay In the Kudat-Banggi Priority Conservation Area (PCA) in Sabah, Malaysia, fish is a big deal. You see it everywhere, from the fish cages outside settlements like Tampakan and Sibogo, to the dozens of trawlers and purse seiners docked at the harbor, equipped with [...]
25 – 30 June Kudat Harbour Pulau Banggi The efficient WWF Malaysia machinery was immediately felt when I started getting a series of text messages regarding transport, hotel accommodations and our overall visit to Kudat from Betty of the WWF KK office. Then Sofia Johari, the CEPA or Community Education, Protection, and Awareness Officer of Kudat-Banggi PCA left me [...]
16 - 25 June 2009 Sipadan Mabul Resort- SMART Yogi nagged and nagged me about Sipadan. “I need time underwater!” he says. “Don't cut short my diving time!” He needed to nag because I have a habit of prioritizing land shoots. Listening to the demanding husband, I booked us 10 days and 9 [...]
