Southern Leyte Coral Reef Conservation Project (SLCRCP) Monthly Project Update August 2012 Location: Napantao Dive Resort, Napantao, San Francisco, Southern Leyte Project Scientist: Bernie Burczak SLRCP Project Aim Contents Latest news The Southern Leyte Coral Reef Conservation Project (SLCRCP) is a collaborative project to survey the coral reefs of Sogod Bay. The Story of the Month programme provides training and conservation education opportunities for local Filipinos, as part of an integrated Community Work programme to develop local capacity and ensure the long-term Survey Update protection and sustainable use of marine resources throughout the region. Coral Cay Conservation (CCC) provides the resources Marine Creature of the to help sustain livelihoods and alleviate poverty through the protection restoration and management of local coral reefs and month tropical forests. “This is our life, this is our coral and we need to protect it!” Honourable Board Member Daisy Gamale Latest News This month CCC is happy to welcome a new member to our team, Education Officer Kurtis Hayne shown on the right. Despite growing up in landlocked Alberta in Canada, Kurtis has a deep passion for the ocean and its inhabitants. Escaping the prairies, in 2011 he completed a Masters degree in marine biology where he studied sea stars on the west coast of Canada. He has travelled throughout Southeast Asia, volunteered at Streetlight, a shelter for street children in the Philippines and has worked as a river guide and educator. Kurtis is excited to combine his love of the ocean, research, teaching and the Philippines as the Education Officer at CCC. Southern Leyte Reef Conservation Project Philippines, August, 2012 Story of the Month “Uniting the Country: Uniting the Reefs Conference” CCC is very happy and proud to announce that our Community Liaison officer, Dag Navarrete, has completed his RARE fellowship after two years of hard work. Dag has been developing his RARE social marketing campaign within the Barangay of Punta. In 2003 a devastating landslide hit Punta killing hundreds of people and decimating their Marine Protected Area (MPA), destroying the livelihoods of those who survived. Now, after a lot of hard work, the community of Punta have a successful and highly effective MPA with coral cover doubling and fish abundance tripling in the two years since the RARE Community Liaison Officer Dag Navarrete and Freddo the campaign began. Dag focused fish alongside his RARE supervisor Divina and CCC Project his attention on generating a Scientist Bernie Burczak sense of ownership and pride for the MPA in Punta’s fisherman and community and has turned the new MPA into a memorial to remember those lost in the landslide. Sogod Bay Sustainable Maine Management Alliance This month Coral Cay Project Scientist Bernadette Burczak and Community Liaison Officer Dag Navarrete attended the Sogod Bay Sustainable Marine Management Alliance (SBSMMA) meeting in Sogod. The SBSMMA comprises of representatives from each of the eleven municipalities surrounding Sogod Bay, who all come together once a month to discuss the governance of their municipal waters. Currently the SBSMMA are working hard to create one uniform set of laws to govern the waters of the Bay. The aim is to make enforcement and regulation of fisheries activities more effective thereby protecting Sogod Bay’s valuable marine resources including fisheries, coral reefs, mangroves and seagrass beds. Their plans include the establishment of a boat registration and identification scheme as well as licensing of fishing gear and strict regulation of unsustainable fishing methods while encouraging more sustainable techniques. Southern Leyte Reef Conservation Project Philippines, August, 2012 Community Work “Save Sogod Bay Reef Project” The continuation of the Crown of Thorns (CoTs) starfish boom has been devastating many of the coral reefs in Sogod Bay. The CoTs eat live coral tissue leaving behind nothing but a barren field of dead white coral skeletons. The Representative Mayors from the municipalities participating in the Save Sogod Bay Project receiving launching of the “Save Sogod Bay a CoTs gun from Honourable Board Member Daisy Reef Project” was held in Padre Gamale on behalf of the provincial government Burgos and was attended by CCC. At the launch CoTs guns were given to the Mayors of each municipality with the intention of helping to control the CoTs and dissipate some of the damage being done to the coral reefs. The guns allow divers to inject the CoTs with Sodium Bisulphate, a poison that kills the CoTs but dissolves in the natural environment, causing no further harm to the coral reef ecosystem. This campaign involved cooperation between the public and private sectors including local dive resorts and members of the community working together to protect their valuable resources. The aim of this project was to start and sustain a wide ranging clean up of the CoTs in the affected area, involving the implementation of a cash for CoTs scheme to help support locals participating in collections rather than fishing. This campaign also involved delivering an education, communication and conservation programme to local communities to raise awareness on the issues facing coral reefs as well as how this may affect them in the future. Survey Update Survey background: Our baseline-surveying programme is designed to gather data about the biological and morphological standing of Sogod Bay. This data is combined with information on human and natural impacts on the reefs, along with oceanographic data, to ultimately produce a Geographical Information System ‘map’ of the various habitats of the bay. It is like a ‘stock-take’ of the current marine resources, which is being produced to provide policymakers and concerned institutions with information necessary to effectively manage those resources. To date the northern end of Sogod Bay has been surveyed and the remainder of the project will concentrate on the south including Panaon Island and Limasawa Island. If you would like more information on our surveying please contact our Project Scientist, Bernadette Burczak. So far, in 2012, CCC volunteers have been conducting surveys of the reefs throughout the municipalities of Pintuyan, Liloan and Limasawa on the eastern coastline of Sogod Bay. The work has focused around the monitoring of existing no-take MPAs inside and outside the protected zone in order to assess their effectiveness in terms of protecting Southern Leyte Reef Conservation Project Philippines, August, 2012 reefs as well as replenishment of fish stocks. Baseline surveys are also conducted to provide the data necessary to initiate legislation for further protection of the delicate reef ecosystem. The efforts of this month’s volunteers have been focused on carrying out baseline surveys on the Pacific side of Panaon Island, just south of the Barangay of Anilao. Volunteers and science staff were able to complete an entire baseline section in just two days, carrying out intensive surveying from a depth of 24 to 0.5 metres. Marine Creature of the Month! This month’s marine creature of the month is Hapalochlaena lunulata the Greater Blue-Ringed Octopus. Although these creatures only grow to approximately seven cm they have the reputation of being incredibly dangerous as they are able to inject a deadly poison when they bite their prey. Apart from their highly poisonous venom as their name suggests they have very vivid blue rings which they are able to flash as a warning for those who get too close. While dangerous if provoked, these shy creatures are not a threat to divers who treat them with respect. Learn More! To learn more about the CCC Philippines project, to join the expedition, or to find out about local Marine Scholarships, visit www.coralcay.org. .