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11/11/2005: "GRAPE WEED STUDY REQUIRED"

At Osprey Reef in The Coral Sea. In the lagoon of the reef are coral bommies. (Mounds of coral formations which often touch the surface during very low tides).

Dive charter captain (the late) Alby Ziebell began noticing a vast area of numerous bommies was turning green in color. This was during his regular visits with groups of scuba divers oboard his vessel TSMV Coralita out of Cairns.

He discovered the bommies were covered with grape weed to an extent that was definately not normal.

Regarding the 'infestation' as unusual he made a note and passed the information to me during my last visit to this spectacular reef surrounded by crystal clear warm ocean waters.

This information later alarmed my friend (the late) Dr Robert Endean (Reader in Zoology, University of Queensland, Brisbane), who said "this was not only unusual but definately of serious concern and should be studied further."

In the time since this picture was taken with underwater model Christine Danaher, both these friends have passed away and the charter boat accidently blown up.

With this picture filed in my archives, the original news story was then neglected due to personal distractions.

All this preceded the first coral bleaching reports.

Osprey Reef is mainly visited today as an adventure and shark-dive location.

Any study of coral bommie ecology in the lagoon would therefore have low priority and may have not been monitored since.

A possible project for the right person to follow up! Discoveries are still waiting to happen.

......to be continued