February 2012 Expedition - Day 3 - Manta rays

Today we worked on the reefs on the northeast and north sectors of Diego Garcia, at depths ranging from 25m up to 5m.  Conditions were a little lumpy on the surface but underwater was wonderful as usual.  This photo shows  the manta ray that swam by today, so close it almost swam into one of us,  it was startled when at about a metre away it noticed the diver.  One of the problems with scientific diving is that your head is usually down, carefully observing the half metre quadrat or perhaps a tape in front of you and so you often miss much of the spectacular wildlife that swims by.  A favourite way of winding up colleagues is to ask them if they noticed the shark/dolphin/manta/or some other exotic swimming over their head.  In fact today Heather and Catherine didn’t see this manta as it swam over them, much to their disappointment.

Huge schools of Jacks, Snappers, Fusiliers and Parrotfish continue to thrive here as they did before. As we dropped ornithologist Pete Carr off on one of the small islands which is packed with birds,  it was nice to see a family of nurse sharks in the shallows.