World Wildlife Fund

Dewi Satriani, WWF-Indonesia
© WWF

Join WWF’s Dewi Satriani, as she reports directly from the field on the preliminary assessment conducted in April-May 2008 on the potential for marine conservation and tourism investments in the Halmahera area and its surrounding islands.

The expedition team

• Asril Djunaidi, on behalf of WWF, Center for Coastal Community Studies, Ternate, expert on turtles and Malukan coastal communities 
• Dr. Mark Erdmann, team leader from CI, expert on stomatopods and marine tourism development
• Dr. Alison Green, team leader from TNC, expert on reef fishes
• Dr. Rodney Salm, TNC, expert on reef resilience 
• Dr. Kent Carpenter, Global Marine Species Assessment-CI
• Dr. ©, expert on reef fish conservation
• Dr. Emre Turak, expert on hard coral conservation 
• Dr. Lyndon Devantier, expert on soft coral and sponge conservation
• Dr. Joanne Wilson, TNC, reef resilience and coral reproduction
• Anwar Ibrahim, representative of Maluku Conservation Office (BKSDA)
• Indra Bayu Vimono, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), echinoderm specialist
• Ucu Yanuarbi, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), crustacean specialist
• Erick Zulhikman, Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries representative
• Nurhalis Wahidin, SPi, MSc, Universitas Khairun, expert on coral reef monitoring
• Imran Taeran, SPi, MSc, Universitas Khairun, expert on coastal village socio-economics and fisheries
• Muhammad Erdi Lazuardi, CI, coral reef benthic monitoring
• Andreas Muljadi, TNC, coral reef fish monitoring
• Sterling Zumbrunn, CI, videographer

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Part 1: The Expedition Begins| Part 2: Doi Island and Beyond| Part 3: Coral Colonies and Turtles | Part 4: Buli Bay | Part 5: Teluk Buli (Buli Bay)|

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Part 1: The expedition begins

The team tucked under the lee of the island of Tanjung Bobo – happy for the respite from rolling in the swells – and the Marine Ecological Assessment started in earnest. The socioeconomic/resource use team headed off to two villages that occupied them for the day. The monitoring team set off to do their counts of benthic cover and fish indicators of resilience. The biodiversity team dived straight into counts of fish and coral species and recording reef resilience. Energy levels were high and most managed four to five hours underwater.

© WWF

It is fitting that the team was greeted by thickets of the fine-branching and most elegant stagshorn coral, first found and described here in Halmahera. They have learned that this is the nesting season for the Olive Ridley turtle and that one came ashore two nights ago. Three turtles were seen underwater and divers now have been briefed on turtle identification and encouraged to report the species seen.

Something impacted the reefs here about 10 years ago. It could have been linked to the 1998 worldwide bleaching event or an outbreak of the crown-of-thorns starfish, a voracious coral predator. However, every impact has a trade-off and the rubble banks are home to numbers of exquisitely colored nudibranchs (shell-less snails with exposed gills). These beautiful creatures, called sea slugs by the irreverent, find good food and shelter on these recovering areas of dead coral.

The coral and fish diversity lists are started and we already into the low 200s for both fishes and corals.

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