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Chagos News Issue tssN1355-6746 Chugos|Yews ThePeriodical Newsletterof the Friends of the No.5 August 1995 EDITORIAL The Friends We giveto a Charity,willingly. Some we want a quality group of long term givemoney, some give time, some supportersinformed about the Chagos give expertise.Some give all ofthe and dedicatedto the successfulfuture above.When we startedwe madethe of thoseislands? Quality ratherthan subscriptionthe minimumpossible so quantitywith a contingencyplan to that no one who felt the Chagosare expandwhen Chagoscomes under worthprotecting would be excluded. threat?All of the above? What do we just two think? Pleasesend views on paper, The subscription covers 'phone Newslettersa year.It is a bare and/orcome to the AGM to minimum. Forhrnatelymany Friends discussover a pint ofbeer. gaveand give much more than f,5 a year.One Committee member put in Contents about!1,000 to getus off the ground. We haveseveral articles of interestin ThreeAmericans gave $500 between this issue.Andrew Emmondsof them.The BIOT Administrationgave MRAG has written us another us f300. SeveralFriends have chipped excellentarticle on fishingin the BIOT in with chequesfor f,25or moreand area.this time aboutthe Inshore morethan once. Several people give Fisheries.Alan Baldwin writesfrom more than the subscriptionevery year. New Zealandabout his Chagos This is ali excellentnews. Whatis bad experiences.We start a shorthistory news is that we spendfar too much which will be continued. Firstly, time andmoney reminding members of however,we haveajust received the annualsubscription. Please help by article from Nick Wraith the retirine sendingin Decemberarurual Britrepin DiegoGarcia. subscriptionsfor thefollowing year. The Way Ahead. Finally... One of our Committee,a former Thenext News will be aboutthe 1996 CommissionerBIOT, has been looking ChagosExpedition which starts5 at futule strategy. Do we want to have Februarybut beforethen we hopeto a large membership of mildly and seeas many as possibleat the AGM on temporarily interestedpeople? Do we 3 October1995. want to be an old boys club whose numbersdiminish fast with age? Do John Topp OF BALLSAND BOOBIES.... By CommanderN J P Wraith JP Royal Navy British RepresentativeDiego Garcia No, not a newguide to DiegoGarcia (DG) but theclosing remarks of the outgoingCommanding Officer, Naly Computerand Telecommunications Station DiegoGarcia. Commander Robin BABB USN gaveher leaving speech and, as only a femalein today'sgender free world coulddo, told the audiencethat shehad been very waryofthe "King of the Isiand"(BRITREP !) becausehe kept asking her to seehis ballsand boobies. I can report from the Islandthat everythingis in good shape.The natives remain friendly andthe environmentis improving ratherthan deteriorating. The past yearhas seen a processionof conservationists,environmentalists, animal lovers, cat andrat hatersand 'ologists too manyto enumerate.It is pieasingto notethat they all (includingJohn Topp !) left with goodwords for theway ourtropical paradise is beingmaintained. My yearhas been varied to saythe least,interesting to put it mildiy and challengingto getto thepoint! JohnTopp gave me a brief beforeI left andat the end passedme a pieceof papercontaining some rather obscure questions. Most seemed outlandish,could neverhappen during my tenureand anywaythey would be recorded somewherein the dustyfiles thatthe Servicesand the Civil Serviceare always reluctantto destroy.Not so! An exampleof the "out of the ordinary"was the MV LIA P in late August 1994,a Greekregistered vessel on herway from Brazilto Sri Lankawith a cargoof sugar.She was holed in the forepeak- theplates had just spiit apartdue to ageand poor maintenance- and was taking in water. For the next 6 weeksI had a view from my office windowof a very rusty,sugar leaking ship as we ( our US cousins,sorry) flew Greekdivers, engineers etc. to DG. Thecrew were on theverge of mutiny(they werenot 1etashore), the officershated the Captain,nobody had been paid for 3 monthsand the Captainwanted to fly home. Eventuallythe repair was completebut the Captainrefused to sail without a Surveyorscertificate. So we flew in a Surveyor- andsti1l the Captainrefused to sail. Tragically at this stagethe GreekPort Captainwho had flown to DG to supervisethe repair had a coronaryand died. Thefamily wished to havethe body repatriatedfor burial in Greecebut it was quickly establishedthat Singaporewould not let the body tlrough without embalming. So we arrangedto fly two embalmers "embalming from Singaporeand were in thethroes of producinga makeshift table" when my ExecutiveOfficer rememberedthat therewere full mortuaryfacilities in the Contractorsphoto lab. Thejob complete,body, embalmers, Greek engineers, diver and Surveyordeparted DG andthree dayslater, witnessedby the incoming and outgoingBIOT Administratorswho werevisiting, the LIA P disappearedover the horizon. Lots of lessonsleamt (and recorded !) andwe continueto catchrather sweet tastingfish! TheRestricted Area (Plantation) is onceagain chained off. Until earlyJune we hadallowed unlimited access so longas people purchased a onedollar day pass. Howeverthe areawas becominglittered, peoplewere lighting fires and chopping downtrees! Thearea is now openweekends and Public Holidays only andwe have seena markedimprovement in the way the areais treated. During JohnTopp's visit in Januaryand February he had a work force clear the treesto the rearof the PlantationManager's House. This areanow looksmuch like it must havedone when the Plantationwas up andrunning. Two months ago,after a wait of four years,the Contractorfitted new windows to the PlantationChapel. These arethe samedesign as the originals.Subsequently the Mauritianand Filipino community,led by thethree Chaplains, have spent four Sundayswater blasting and spraypainting both the insideand outside of the chapel. Thefloor hasbeen reskimmed,tiles laid,the altararea refurbished and the surroundingarea landscaped. A re-constructionservice is dueto beheld on 16July. The indigenouswildlife continuesto flourishunder the protection of numerousBIOT Ordinance- f500 fine for killing a CoconutCrab deters all but the stupid! Theregeneration ofthe CoconutCrab seems to havebeen very successful. Theycan now be foundon both sidesofthe islandand are especially numerous within the RestrictedArea. Boththe Greenand Hawksbill turtles continue to neston the oceanside of the island. TheHawksbill from my amateur"turtle watching', appears to nestseasonally between October to March,whilst the Greenturtle nests all year round. At TurtleCove anlthing up to 30 youngturtles can be seengrazing in the shallowwaters. Anothersuccess story is theRed Footed Booby. JohnTopp tells me thatonly a few werenesting on the far tip, BartonPoint, during his tenure.They now nestas far downas Minni Minni on boththe lagoonand ocean sides and the population is in the thousands. I hopethe foregoing gives you a flavourof life on DiegoGarcia, 1995 style. I leavein a few daystime havingbeen relieved by CommanderPaul Baker. I look forward to gettingto know my wife againbut wiil miss the manyfriends I havemade andthe beautyof DG. Oh yes! Theballs were glass fishing floats found on thebeach - a greatrarity andthe Boobiesare the feathered tl'rre ! The InshoreFisheries The inshorefisheries of the BritishIndian Ocean Territory (BIOT), have been administeredby the MarineResources Assessment Group, on behalfof the BIOT Administrationof the Foreignand CommonwealthOffice, from the time of the declarationof the FisheriesConservation and Management Zone in October1991. BIOT encompassesthe Chagos Archipelago,centred at 6"5 72'E, on the southernmostpart of the Chagos-LaccadiveRidge. The Archipelago consists of five atollsand a numberof submergedbanks, the largestof whichis the GreatChagos Bank and all of whichare activelygrowing reefs. The islandsof PerosBanhos, Salomonsand DiegoGarcia were originally inhabited and were minor producers of saltfish, mainly from the demersalfishery (bottom dwelling species), although some handliningfor sharkand predatoryfish alsooccurred. In the early1970's the atolls wereevacuated, with the exception of DiegoGarcia which is nowa US.naval facility. Theseunpopulated islands and reefsare largelyundisturbed, and up to the time theyleft the localpeople had imposed a minimalimpact on the marineresources. Theclimate is affectedby the prevailingwinds: from December to March,the wettest months,moderate winds are experiencedfrom the north-west,while from Juneto Septemberstrong south-east trade winds blow. The transitional periods of April-May and October-Novemberare periodsof lightvariable winds and frequent calms. The areais subjectto the SouthEquatorial Current, which flows westward during both of the majorwind seasons. BIOTcontains the largestexpanse of undisturbedreefs in the IndianOcean, as well as some of the richest. About 200 sDeciesof scleractinancorals have been recorded. For corals,and molluscs,diversity may be higherthan any otheratoll groupin the IndianOcean. Despitethe remotenessof this atollgroup, diversity is not partrcularlyhigh for algae(115 taxonomic groups) and fish (702species). This lackof diversityin fish speciesis partlya resultof the limitedflat areaof the BIOT reefs,their remoteoceanic location and lack of obviousbottom sources of nutrients to drive primaryproductivity. This implies that the open oceanmust contribute significantlyto the productivityof the reef fish, and the oceanicwaters of BIOT appearto be similarlylow in primaryproductivity to othertropical open-ocean areas. Similarlyfor
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