Galapagos - Ecuadorean Presidential Decree

[Mossman]

Mossman, it sounds like the housecleaning left a lot to be desired, but I thought that the majority of boats - anywhere - ask you to put your used toilet paper in the trash can, not down the head (though it's also been my experience that they then clean out your trash cans at LEAST once a day! ick!)

Certainly not the majority of liveaboard boats I've been on, which includes 4 different Aggressors, the Truk Odyssey, the Kararu Voyager, the Anggun, and the Horizon out of San Diego, nor the many mini-liveaboard boats I've dove in SoCal. Out of all of these, only the Okeanos Aggressor wanted TP in the trash. Normally, passengers are instructed to refrain from throwing anything in the head that hasn't passed through the body, with the exception of TP in small amounts. In fact, that's exactly what was stated in the boat guide that was left in the cabin and on the sign in the bathroom, but the captain made it clear during the briefing that he expected all TP to go in the trash.

They also do the same on land in many of those 3rd world countries, since their sewer systems aren't on a par with more developed countries. So they all do that at their homes, too, and don't get why we think it's disgusting. I'm always glad to get home again where I can just flush the TP! But I'm disgusted that they weren't scrupulous in cleaning up... and you said that was Peter Hughes' Sky Dancer? (ulp... that's the boat my hubby works on. uhhh.... afraid to ask if he was on your trip and whether you liked or disliked him! ;-) )

Sure, I've been in such third-world countries before and always notice the smelly trash can by the toilet. But this wasn't a third-world country sewer/septic system, it was a luxury liveaboard with its own internal plumbing. I'd expect PH, with all the money it charges, to be able to afford a marine system capable of digesting a little TP, just like all the other expensive luxury liveaboards.

Furthermore, the same boat guide that said that small amounts of TP were OK in the head also said that the trash would be emptied daily. There's no excuse for not emptying the trash.

Who is your hubby? We had three guides: Jimmy and Greg for diving, and Jaime (on loan from Aggressor) for land - Jaime also dove with us and Greg did the land videotaping. Jaime was an older fellow, very experienced and knowledgeable and more serious than the other guys. Jimmy and Greg were capable and friendly, yet I noticed they were much more tolerant of female divers getting away with straying from the group and even allowed one particularly well-shaped female diver to touch every whale shark she could get her hands on. I have to admit it annoyed me that they let her get some alone time (the best way to get multiple sharks to come in close for video), but whenever I tried to hang back a bit, one guide would come back to harrass me to stay caught up with the group. If only I had a pair of knockers . . .

And as Mossman said, as to what you see - it always varies, you can never predict it, even if the previous week they saw something fantastic, it may not be there for you. It's nature. it moves around! ;-) I understand there were 2 orcas, and a humbback whale mother and calf in the last 3 weeks up there, along with a fairly regular amount of whale sharks.

We heard about the orcas from the trip before. I believe they were really "false orcas", not that it makes much of a difference to any diver lucky enough to see them underwater.

As for the humpback mother and calf, they came by as we were heading back from a dive at Darwin. The other skiff got lucky enough to jump in the water close enough to them for uw pics/video. Our skiff chased them around for a bit, got a couple nice surface sightings, but never managed to get near enough to jump in.

 

[Mossman]

Thanks for the advice suzbo. We can't wait and are excited that our trip will continue. Hope the authorities will come to reason for 2008 and confirm that it is not the diving industry (liveaboards) that cause much negative impact on the environment.

But they certainly do impact the environment. Even when we were the only boat at Darwin, we'd put 19 people in the water on one site (16 passengers plus three guides). How exactly all those bubbles created by 19 scuba tanks, four times a day, are impacting the wildlife may never be known, but just because we don't understand the effect doesn't mean there isn't one.

In addition to the bubbles, there's the damage to the reef: plenty of broken barnacles and even damaged coral where it exists. Divers in our group were chasing and even touching the whale sharks, presumably altering the sharks' behavior. Hammerheads' behavior are obviously altered by the divers' bubbles. Mexican hogfish were aggressive seeking out the tidbits left by broken barnacles to the point where I was nipped a couple times if I didn't get my fingers out of the way in time.

On the land excursions, people aren't breaking things. They're not chasing the animals. They're not even allowed to take flash photos, as divers do with multiple huge strobes. And land tourists are kept to particular pathways, not allowed to roam freely over a site like divers do.

 

[LouUK]

Divers in our group were chasing and even touching the whale sharks, presumably altering the sharks' behavior. .

Frankly, that behaviour is utterly appalling and if the dive guides let this occur more than once they don't deserve any accolade, or be allowed to keep a post in the Galapagos, given the rules that you rightly point out apply landside. It stuns me every time that divers believe that this is ever acceptable behaviour. I "had words" with an operator in the Red Sea over one of their guides "wrangling" a baby white tip in an attempt to impress the customers - any guide who didn't put his foot down over these actions would get equally short shrift, I'm afraid.

One is there to look at the wildlife, not thrust oneself upon it!

 

[Mossman]

Frankly, that behaviour is utterly appalling and if the dive guides let this occur more than once they don't deserve any accolade, or be allowed to keep a post in the Galapagos, given the rules that you rightly point out apply landside. It stuns me every time that divers believe that this is ever acceptable behaviour. I "had words" with an operator in the Red Sea over one of their guides "wrangling" a baby white tip in an attempt to impress the customers - any guide who didn't put his foot down over these actions would get equally short shrift, I'm afraid.

One is there to look at the wildlife, not thrust oneself upon it!

In the special case of whale sharks, due to their size and tough shark skin I really doubt the shark cares very much. It's not like they have a delicate mucus coating that might rub off, or that they're sensitive to oils in human skin, or that they're worried about picking up a foreign scent and being rejected by their clan. I doubt they feel any more hassled by being "thrust" upon in this way than we do when a fly or mosquito thrusts itself upon us when they land on our skin. They're used to remoras and probably figure we're just a larger bubble-blowing uncoordinated sucker species. A very minor nuisance at most.

But it's not right to impose a well-intended "don't touch" rule and then look the other way when people break it. Arbitrary rule-making is one thing, arbitrary enforcement quite another. In this case, the guides actually made one diver stop carrying his pony down until he promised to stay with the group and hassled me to no end when I intentionally lagged a bit behind, yet said not a word when those with Ts and As were molesting the sharks and doing much of their dives solo and loudly bragging about it back on the panga. In the Red Sea it might be different. If an unveiled woman touches a whale shark there, they cut her hand off. It a man does it, he merely has to marry it.

 

[onderwaterfoto]

@Mossman:
I'v been on several Liveaboards as well. Mostly in the Red Sea. In the Red Sea it is not allowed on any boat to throw TP in the head. Just to let you know.

What I meant by that divers do not impact the environment, I meant it more global. In my opinion most divers are very carefull with the environment. That's what we teach at our divecenter in the Netherlands. There are always people who find themselves so important to touch a whaleshark or bring home some coral (even DM's or Instructors). There is no excuse for this behavior. But if a Cruise Ship lands on Galapagos, suddenly 500 people are on an island and they have to eat, ***** and more... That's what I meant by more impact and that's also what is in the latest UNESCO report.

Example: We were in Mexico in May and went to Holbox. Swam with the Whalesharks and I noticed that mostly American people were touching the sharks. I had the same experience in Cozumel with some people trying to hold a turtle. In Australia I witnessed an almost fight between an American lady and an Australian DM about touching corals, sea cucumbers and other stuff.

I agree with you that if you submerge underwater and take 2 big strobes and flash it at underwater marine life you won't be getting natural behaviour. It's the same with blowing bubbles. But does that mean you can't dive anymore?

 

[LouUK]

In the special case of whale sharks, due to their size and tough shark skin I really doubt the shark cares very much. It's not like they have a delicate mucus coating that might rub off, or that they're sensitive to oils in human skin, or that they're worried about picking up a foreign scent and being rejected by their clan. I doubt they feel any more hassled by being "thrust" upon in this way than we do when a fly or mosquito thrusts itself upon us when they land on our skin. They're used to remoras and probably figure we're just a larger bubble-blowing uncoordinated sucker species. A very minor nuisance at most.
.

It is a question of harassement. To touch you have to get very close. The general, imposed rules, endorsed by all the marine conservation agencies I have seen issue guidelines, recommend at least a few metres of space, to avoid, as far as possible, altering the shark's path or behaviour to a gross degree.

There was recently some footage on UK tv showing a boatload of snorkellers descending upon a juvenile whale shark in shallow water and touching it. This ended up with an obviously distressed whale shark attampting to escape.

 

[suzbo]

Mossman, Jaime was probably my hubby, though there could be other Jaimes out there! Mid-50s, little guy? Right now, because of all of the GNP rule changes, he's been told that he doesn't have the right training to be a dive guide, but he DOES have the right training to do the land tours. Still, he's been diving in Galapagos for 14 years and in fact trained many of the other dive guides out there, and I know he was happy to get back in the water. He works primarily for PH these days, but picks up jobs on a number of other boats.... he worked for Aggressor for 9 years so I guess they happily took him back as a fill-in during all of this weirdness with GNP rules.

I haven't been on the PH boat myslef, and I'm just appalled at your description of their cleanliness (or lack thereof, I mean).

As to the touching whale sharks, I just never get why people want to touch stuff underwater. It's WILDlife, and I want it to remain wild.... I don't want it to be my pet, I want to be awestruck by its very wildness. But it seems people, and I agree, Americans in particular, cannot seem to keep their hands off. annoys the heck out of me. As Lou said, it's harassment, which has consequences for any wild animal, generally after we have left, and we don't see the result. It's subtle, behavioral changes, likely with cumulative impact. And yes, if they strictly enforce a "do not touch" rule on land in the Galapagos, why not underwater? Well, that's part of what's going on right now with the GNP rules... they really have never developed guidelines for the Marine Reserve, and don't strictly enforce the few that they have. Part of what they are telling the Dive Guides now is that they all must get new, special training for the Marine Reserve (though they also won't say when they're going to offer that training.). Perhaps once they've done that, we'll see the same kind of rules enforcement by the dive guides that we see by the land guides. (one can hope!)

 

[Mossman]

@Mossman:
I'v been on several Liveaboards as well. Mostly in the Red Sea. In the Red Sea it is not allowed on any boat to throw TP in the head. Just to let you know.

That's good to know. I'll add that to my Top Ten List of Reasons Never to Do a Liveaboard in the Red Sea, somewhere around #4 or #5. Do they still burn all the used TP on deck like the old days, good for an aromatic BBQ over which to cook lamb?

What I meant by that divers do not impact the environment, I meant it more global. In my opinion most divers are very carefull with the environment. That's what we teach at our divecenter in the Netherlands. There are always people who find themselves so important to touch a whaleshark or bring home some coral (even DM's or Instructors). There is no excuse for this behavior. But if a Cruise Ship lands on Galapagos, suddenly 500 people are on an island and they have to eat, ***** and more... That's what I meant by more impact and that's also what is in the latest UNESCO report.

Overall, I'd tend to agree with you. But there are exceptions where a great influx of divers have caused a flourishing of resort facilities and the resultant impact of sewage, wastewater, and elimination of natural habitat to erect buildings and docks. Take Sipadan for an example. But in the scheme of things, divers are but a minor blip on the radar. We'll never make a footprint like golfers or time-share owners or man's equivalent to the behemoth whale shark: the mega cruise ship.

Example: We were in Mexico in May and went to Holbox. Swam with the Whalesharks and I noticed that mostly American people were touching the sharks. I had the same experience in Cozumel with some people trying to hold a turtle. In Australia I witnessed an almost fight between an American lady and an Australian DM about touching corals, sea cucumbers and other stuff.

Hmmm. I don't know that it's just Americans that are at fault. Cozumel and Holbox just happen to be a lot closer to the U.S. than Europe or Australia, so naturally you'd see more Americans there, probably a large number of them from Texas and the Southern States where we've quarantined our mentally infirm. While perhaps not as enlightened as most Europeans over touching stuff, at least we're not trying to eat all the creatures like inhabitants of many countries in Asia!

I agree with you that if you submerge underwater and take 2 big strobes and flash it at underwater marine life you won't be getting natural behaviour. It's the same with blowing bubbles. But does that mean you can't dive anymore?

Without my camera? Never!

 

[Mossman]

It is a question of harassement. To touch you have to get very close. The general, imposed rules, endorsed by all the marine conservation agencies I have seen issue guidelines, recommend at least a few metres of space, to avoid, as far as possible, altering the shark's path or behaviour to a gross degree.

Yikes. The general imposed rules, endorsed by all the underwater photography lessons I have taken, recommend no more than 2 meters (metres to you) of space, to avoid, as far as possible, poor illumination of the subject. What's the use of taking my two huge strobes if I can't get close enough to blind my victim, I mean subject?

 

[LouUK]

Yikes. The general imposed rules, endorsed by all the underwater photography lessons I have taken, recommend no more than 2 meters (metres to you) of space, to avoid, as far as possible, poor illumination of the subject. What's the use of taking my two huge strobes if I can't get close enough to blind my victim, I mean subject?

LOL. Blimey - you must have some wide angle lens to get that shot of a whale shark from two metres (a meter is something you measure with )!

The distance for swimming with basking sharks here is recommended to be 4m under the Code of Conduct from the Marine Conservation Society.