FathomOz

White blotches on plate coral are curious and alarming.   This picture is from the last roll of underwater film exposed by this late famous charter boat skipper and owner of Coralita.   It was discovered in his motor drive Nikon camera still in it’s marine housing.

Coralita was returning to her home port at Cairns after a successful 10 day dive trip.  There was just time for one last dive.  It was either a gamble or a mistake by our captain.  He was shocked that he’d dropped us on such a poor (dead) reef.

My notes, just found, record the location as Irene Reef, near Ribbon Reef No.2 which is north of Cairns, Queensland.

A bit of confusion here, the skipper’s wife is also called ‘Irene’.  Therefore the official name today may be something else.

To my eyes this is an example of silt smothering a reef.

Maybe it was attacked by CoT starfish beforehand?

The point of publishing these pictures is twofold.

Firstly it’s a record of a reef in trouble – 1991.

Point Two, it’s an example  not normally seen published in diver or travel magazine.  In other words,  an education to help the reader appreciate a good coral reef when they see one.

Not every Great Barrier Reef is as poor as this one, but some are and some are worse.

Game fishing skipper Peter Bristow knows this region well:

“Irene is directly inside Lena, the small reef south of #1 Ribbon.  Irene and Lena are on the north side of Cruiser pass. Lena is on the edge and forms the outside northern corner of the pass.  The water there is always dirty for some reason.  Directly inshore you have the Bloomfield River and Cape Tribulation to the south.  This is a high rainfall area and I think the dirty water and river silt would contribute to the state of the reef you are referring to.  The push from the SE trade keeps the dirty water to the north side of the pass.  Cruiser Pass is the best ‘Red’ fishing I know of right there close to Irene.  They most likely prefer the dirty water”.

See the Crown of Thorns story in Fathom 5

From last roll of film in one of (the late)  Albie Ziebell’s  camera’s

We’ve circled a section of coral and then made enlargements.  In truth the whole piece of platform coral was in trouble.  It requires a trained-eye to ID dead coral in a situation like this.  Is the culprit crown-of-thorns starfish?  Probably not.   Coral bleaching?  Perhaps.   A photo really requires an eye-witness report to be sure.

Location is thought to be on the top of one of the ten Ribbon Reefs, north of Cairns, Queensland.

Albie Ziebel was the 2nd owner and captain of Coralita, after Wally Muller.  Albie passed away soon after this final roll of film was exposed.

We found it unprocessed and inside one of his fine underwater camera’s.