Christmas Gifts & Holiday Shopping for Divers Discover Solomon Islands Medical Diving with GLOBAL EDITION Dec :: Jan Diabetes 2006-07 Number 14 Portfolio David Pilosof Deep Diving Do It Right Ecology Stingrays Travel Tips AWESOME For Mermaids TIGERAustralia SHARKS BYRON BAY BONDI BEACH Going it Alone NINGALOO REEF TASMANIA KENT GROUP A co-production with Underwater AustralAsia — underwater.com.au COVER PHOTO BY PETER PINNOCK 1 X-RAY MAG : 14 : 2006 DIRECTORY X-RAY MAG is published by AquaScope Underwater Photography ‘Tis the Season to Give Gifts: Copenhagen, Denmark - www.aquascope.biz www.xray-mag.com Holiday Shopping for Divers... See page 75 14K GOLD SEA TURTLE PENDANT DESIGNED BY EVAN LLOYD PRICED AT US$281.25 WWW.LLOYDSLIMITED.COM PUBLISHER CO- EDITORS (continued) Manta Ray. Photos by Wags & Kelly & EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Millis Keegan Peter Symes - Opinions and ‘DiveGuru.net’ [email protected] Michael Arvedlund - Ecology MANAGING EDITOR Jason Heller - Photography contents & CREATIVE DIRECTOR Dan Beecham - Videography Gunild Pak Symes Michel Tagliati - Medicine [email protected] Leigh Cunningham ADVERTISING - Technical Diving Americas & United Kingdom: Edwin Marcow Kevin Brennan - Sharks, Adventures [email protected] Willy Volk, Catherine GS Lim International Sales Manager: - News Arnold Weisz Michael Portelly [email protected] Arnold Weisz South East Asia Rep: Catherine GS Lim, Singapore CONTRIBUTORS THIS ISSUE [email protected] Michael Arvedlund, PhD Marketing Manager: Dan Beecham Yann Saint-Yves Andrey Bizyukin, PhD [email protected] Thea Brolund SENIOR EDITOR Eric Cheng Michael Symes Leigh Cunningham [email protected] George Evatt Richard Fitzpatrick TECHNICAL MANAGER Karen Gowlett-Holmes Søren Reinke [email protected] Jason Heller Thyge Dahl Hermansen CORRESPONDENTS Tim & Wandy Hochgrebe Scott Bennett - Canada/SE Asia Millis & Brian Keegan Enrico Cappeletti - Italy Catherine GS Lim Jordi Chias - Spain Carly Maple John Collins - Ireland Edwin Marcow 28 31 34 40 Jeff Dudas - CA, USA 42 plus... Gary Myors AUSTRALIAN CATCH A TIGER BY THE TAIL BYRON BAY CHILLIN’ IN BONDI BEACH KENT GROUP MARINE EDITORIAL 3 Tim Hochgrebe - Australia ADVENTURE TAGGING TIGERSHARKS QUEENSLAND -- BY TIM SYDNEY HARBOR RESERVE, TASMANIA Tomas Knutsson - Iceland Peter Pinnock NEWS - DEMA 5 BY TIM HOCHGREBE BY RICHARD FITZPATRICK & WANDY HOCHGREBE BY RICHARD VEVERS BY GARY MYORS Marcelo Mammana - Argentina Cindy Ross MERMAID MATTERS 57 Yonatan Nir - Israel Gunild Pak Symes DIVE GURUS 62 Svetlana Murashkina - Russia Peter Symes WHALES & DOLPHINS 66 Gary Myors - Tasmania Anders Tychsen 46 57 68 71 88 SEA TURTLE NEWS 68 Barb Roy - WA & AK, USA Richard Vevers NINGALOO REEF COLOGY TOP THE ILLING MEDICINE: DISCOVER E : S K BOOKS & MEDIA 79 Nonoy Tan - Philippines Paul & Kelly Wags WESTERN AUSTRALIA STINGRAYS TURTLES ON BALI DIVING WITH DIABETES THE SOLOMON ISLANDS BUSINESS DIRECTORY 94 Yann Saint-Yves - France Karen Wilshaw BY WAGS & KELLY BY MICHAEL ARVELUND BY KURT AMSLER BY THEA BROLUND BY PETER PINNOCK & ANDERS TYCHSEN CO- EDITORS Andrey Bizyukin See our Contacts page for more - Caving, Equipment, Medicine information at: xray-mag.com columns... Not yet subscribed to SUBSCRIPTION X-RAY MAG? Sign up now! X-RAY MAG International Edition in English is FREE. 74 77 80 83 99 It’s FREE! QUICK! EASY! To subscribe, go to: www.xray-mag.com HOLIDAY SHOPPING: TECHNICAL: SHARK TALES: PHOTOGRAPHY: PORTFOLIO: click here... COVER PHOTO GREAT STOCKING STUFFERS DEEP DIVE WISDOM BITS & BITES SCUBA ZOO DAVID PILOSOF Diver with Big Eye Jacks, by Peter Pinnock EDITED BY GUNILD SYMES BY LEIGH CUNNINGHAM EDITED BY EDWIN MARCOW BY DAN BEECHAM EDITED BY GUNILD SYMES (CONTINUED ON PAGE 4) 2 X-RAY MAG : 14 : 2006 Amsterdam Barcelona Cape Town Chicago Copenhagen London Moscow Okinawa Oslo Paris Ravenna Reykjavik San Francisco Sharm El Shiekh Warsaw and There are “Only 50 years left’ for sea fish”, “UN considers deep sea editorial trawling ban”, “Seafood stocks are under siege, scientists say” and “Collapse of All Wild Fisheries Running Out of Fish Predicted in 45 Years”. Well, these were some random Are We Now? pickings from another bunch of These findings which imply thatfish- joyful headlines from the past ing can contribute to a boom or month or so. Almost makes you bust swing in the supplies of the and shaking can it take before it want to cancel the paper, no? targeted fish stock surprised some comes tumbling down in ruins and Of course most of the press scientists, who alledgedly thought becomes something else? corps goes right over the top as that fishing just caused predict- usual blowing things totally out able depletion. But it turned out Put simply of proportion losing track of both that sometimes it can cause an Now, to make a very long-winded facts and common sense. and technical explanation very Then, just as predictable, in The bottom line is, short, suffice it to say that a knee-jerk reaction, some quite simply, that we don’t need com- once systems get a just a short-sighted fishermen tries to teeny-weeny bit complex, rubbish the scientists’ findings plicated science to tell us that the way their future behaviour can’t right away in a desperate we effect, interact with and depend on be predicted accurately. You attempt to protect their liveli- have to resort to modellin—for hoods, as if it were the scien- the global ecosystem will be sending the example in computers—where tists who had invented the whole planet and humanity down the you simulate possible out- depletion of fish stocks. And comes. so, the pendulum swings and tubes, if we don’t change course Just consider a simple pen- debate goes on in the same dramatically and soon. dulum. The motion of this can predictable grooves with little be very accurately calculated. real action taken. increase. That makes predicting It was even used in clocks once, the amount of fish stock hard and right? But suspend one pendulum “Impact of Fishing on can lead to the collapse of fish- beneath another and the whole Species Found to be ing stocks when a bust follows a system—even as simple as this and Unpredictable” boom. even if the motion of the individual pendulums can be The longstanding debate on the Do’h! described accurate- impact of fishing on the variabil- I don’t know where the surprise ity of fishing stock in the world’s comes in, and which serious oceans then just got a tad bit researchers were actually sur- more complicated as research prised. I was dumbfounded. There published in Nature this past is nothing new or mysterious in October pointed out that the these‘news’. impact of fishing on the popula- You see, in my other previous tions of fish varies too much to be life, I used to be a researcher predictable. That led the research- myself working with ecological ers to conclude that its impos- modelling, and my special area of ERIC WEISSTEIN’S WORLD OF SCIENCE sible to predict whether specific interest was looking into the pro- fish populations will collapse or gression of ecosystems over time rebound. and defining the limits of ecosys- tems’ structural integrity and which changes are likely if these limits were overstepped, i.e. by exter- nal disturbances. In other words, if we compare an ecosystem to a building, how much perturbation Click here to see it in motion 3 X-RAY MAG : 14 : 2006 EDITORIAL FEATURES TRAVEL NEWS EQUIPMENT BOOKS SCIENCE & ECOLOGY EDUCATION PROFILES PORTFOLIO CLASSIFIED ly—soon exhibits chaotic behaviour. Ecosystems are also systems of inter- linked subsystems, but way more com- plex, in what is popularly called the food web. Can we, from looking at the compo- nents, predict where it is all going? No! The unpredictability of complex systems was already established in the 1930’s, so where does the surprise come in again? Can we, from the whole ecosystem’s KURT AMSLER / SOS SEATURTLES apparent behaviour and trend and infer- ences from past experiences and exam- Support SOS-SeaTurtles ples, make any reasonable guess-timates as to where we are heading? Did we Sign the petition online, click here ☼ learn anything from almost wiping out the North American bison, the pacific salmon, Thousands of sea turtles are being slaughtered often suffering the rhino, the tiger? Hopefully, yes! an ugly painful death by being skinned alive. Click here to send an email with a “Letter of Protest” to the Governor of Bali A final note and copies sent to other important officials The bottom line is, quite simply, that we don’t need complicated science to tell Click here to visit SOS Sea Turtle’s webpage ☼ us that the way we effect, interact with and depend on the global ecosystem will Want to know why? Turn to page 68 and read on be sending the whole planet and human- ity down the tubes, if we don’t change course dramatically and soon. We just need to open our eyes. The The “Awesome Australia” travel section in this issue fishes are all gone in some places, and was brought to you thanks to our associates from steadily declining elsewhere. The progres- underwaterwater.com.au: sion of this development doesn’t take a scientist to figure out (says this under- signed scientist). You can start by shopping responsibly next time you go to the supermarket! ■ We remember when he was just a minnow. 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