Paradise Watersports will be conducting REEF fish surveys during the week leading up to Earth DAy, April 15 thru 22, 2006. These surveys will be entered into the REEF database where they are available for scientists,
resource managers and governments.
WE ARE BACK FROM TRIP TO GALAPAGOS!
Maritha and I chartered Lammer Law in the Galapagos for fourteen days from 4 June 2006 to 18 June 2006. Read about our trip by taking the link below.
2006 Galapagos Trip Report
Interested scuba divers in future trips should me contact via EMAIL.
Read about one of our other Galapagos trip here.
Fall 2005 News
We are in our forth full season of operation and I guess change was inevitable. Ben is leaving us to teach and study mixed gas and extended range diving in Thailand; Tracy has left to help with the family business in West Virginia. The new instructors are Chris Colquitt from Houston, Texas and Wayne Palmer from British Columbia in Canada. Chris has worked in the Cayman Islands and his pet peeve is divers who whine about the weather. This is Wayne's first job in the industry.
Motor vessel Apache now has a new engine! The changeover was done by Tim Dabbs of Marine Maintenance Services and the new Cummings Bobtail’s 315 horsepower moves the boat much more efficiently.
New Sea Star
While diving with Paradise Watersports on Rhone Reef off Salt Island
in the British Virgin Islands Odile Scheiner poked her head into a small
sky-lit cave and saw a strange sea star crawling along the wall.
She recalled at the time that it looked very Pacific and not at all like
the ones normally seen in the BVI. Odile and her husband Jim are
the owner-operators of Rainbow Visions on Tortola and together have made
thousands of dives in the BVI.
Jim took a digital photograph and compared it to the Studded Sea Star
in Paul Humann’s Reef Creature book. The book described it as a rare
and possibly “undescribed” species! There was a notation in the book
that anyone who found this sea star should contact the Reef Environmental
Educational Foundation. An email was sent off to REEF and the reply
indicated that it may indeed be a new species.
Jim and Odile can be contacted through www.RainbowVisionBVI.com and
Paradise Watersports at www.bviwatersports.com. Paradise Watersports is
a REEF Field Station and specializes in guided underwater tours with the
instructors using slates and pencils to identify marine life during the
dive. They are located at the Peter Island Resort which is central
to some of the best sites in the BVI. Tours are limited to a max
of ten divers and accompanied by two instructors.
A “Century” of Diving/Fishwatching
The Reef Environmental Educational Foundation recently sent out an email containing a snippet of information about a Hawaiian member who recorded one hundred different species of fish on a single dive. This really got me thinking. Hawaii has about 1000 species of fish the Caribbean about 600. As a single fishwatcher I’ve gotten 100 species over two dives on the wreck of the Rhone but could we do it on one 50 minute dive?
As a Field Station for REEF with three ardent fish surveyors on staff,
Paradise Watersports has decided to take up the challenge. Using the REEF
survey protocol, Paradise Watersports staff members began surveys of local
reefs in an effort to record 100 species at a single site during a single
50 minute dive. Our first try was on a site known as Rainbow Canyons and
resulted in 104 different species and a hawksbill turtle. Stay tuned for
more results.
