Malapascua: Volunteering for the Thresher Shark Research Project

[lemon]

Check out this video if you want to see flagrant use of anchors at Monad. I can't believe this guy Jonathan Bird gets paid for what he does - he is such a nitwit. He makes it seem like Monad is the wild west and that you can't just motor 20 metres away and pick up a buoy. YouTube - Jonathan Bird's Blue World #6: Thresher Sharks. Its people like this who give diving and underwater photography / cinematography a bad name.

I love how he's "THE FIRST" to get close to a thresher, lol.

 

[pakman]

I love how he's "THE FIRST" to get close to a thresher, lol.

I'm laughing too hard watching the part where he carries the tank to the dinghy...

AndyT, I agree with WWD on the lens recommendations. I use a 18-50mm f2.8 whenever I dive Monad. Most of my thresher shots were at the long end plus some cropping, but a few times you'll get lucky and get one up close. The top of the shoal is approx 24-26m. Viz can be hit or miss but most likely not that good.

 

[xariatay]

There are, as you know, a number of mooring buoys at Monad but boats have still been known to use anchors - but there are plenty of times where there are more boats at the location than there are buoys...

In the case that I watched, though, the anchors were being used IN ADDITION to a mooring buoy as a way to stabilize the movement of the boat in big swell. I don't know if the anchors were even touching the substrate - either way its bad for divers who are in the water as the anchors are being dropped and then of course bad for the substrate if the anchors touch it at any point.

Check out this video if you want to see flagrant use of anchors at Monad. I can't believe this guy Jonathan Bird gets paid for what he does - he is such a nitwit. He makes it seem like Monad is the wild west and that you can't just motor 20 metres away and pick up a buoy. YouTube - Jonathan Bird's Blue World #6: Thresher Sharks. Its people like this who give diving and underwater photography / cinematography a bad name.

Thanks for the info!
:doh2: I don't like Mr Bird calling the thresher shark "strange"...

 

[rramaley]

Thanks for this information. Though I have never experienced this, I can understand why manta (or any animal) visiting a cleaning station would be upset if a diver hindered them.

Regarding anchors, I thought that boat times were being staggered now? How many buoy's are there vs banca at the moment? I know that Fun and Sun are fairly new there, but have nos. of banca increased since last year?

When we were there, bancas tended to moor to each other (stern lines) rather than drop anchor.

I've heard that the dive times are now staggered but I didn't see a whole lot of staggering when I was there - maybe as Chinese New Year got up to full throttle they started doing it more. I don't know full count of buoys at Monad - hazarding a guess I'd say maybe there are now 7 - though a couple buoys are a lot further away from the prime spots which is a challenge for divers when there is current (so do you count those if they aren't really used?).

Most days that we were out there, at around 7-7:30 am all buoys were taken and there were maybe 2 boats tied up to other boats. In the afternoon at about 2:30 this also became the case once the Chinese New Year started up.

I'm trying to remember all the operators: Exotic has 3 boats (I've seen 2 out at Monad at one time), TSD has 3 boats (I've seen also 2 out at one time), Fun and Sun has 1 boat (or is 2?), Dan's Dives - 1 boat, Sea Explorers - I think they have 2 boats?, Divelink has 2 boats but usually use only 1 at Monad, Bantigue has a boat (but you don't see them as much), Beach Divers is a new operator but I have only seen them out a few times. And every now and then there is a random liveaboard or a boat from Cebu. Plus the TSRCP project boat. Lots of boats....

In any case, I never personally saw boats anchoring except for the one time I mentioned where anchors were used (irresponsibly) in heavy seas - for stability not for mooring purposes. But you can see the anchor damage on the shoal substrate itself and there are some very recent "scars". It's anyone's guess who the culprit is but most likely the damage is done by dive boats due to the location of the damage. But it could either be somebody local or a visiting dive boat.