My nephew Jacob excitedly called me over, with the impatience only an 11-year-old can muster. “You have to check this out,” he exclaimed.

He wasn’t urging us to view a new app on his iPad. He wanted us to see his latest find along a river: a set of raccoon tracks. And, as Jacob enthusiastically pointed out, these tracks seemed to be made not by your ordinary, run-of-the-mill raccoon. This thing must have been enormous. A big old boar coon, to be precise.

Looking for a new activity to get kids outside? Tracking may be close to the perfect activity.

Jacob and his brother Jack had actually initiated this day’s fun: They asked my wife and me to walk with them on the inch of snow, freshly fallen in northeastern Iowa.

Immediately we began seeing tracks: cottontail rabbits, white-tailed deer, red fox, fox squirrel.

Wild animals can be difficult to see. But in the snow or mud, they leave signs of their passing. A seemingly empty woods suddenly becomes a treasure hunt for what animals had passed in the night.

There’s an element of mystery: What was the animal doing? Why did it stop there? Where is it now?

Tracks Outside

I’m well familiar with the oft-heard refrain: Kids aren’t going outside anymore.

Conservationists’ solution to this is usually environmental education or highly-structured outdoor “learning” activities.

These are important. But sometimes it’s nice just to get outside and explore, without plans or goals. I know there is the fear that kids will get bored left to their own devices in the outdoors. I don’t think we give them enough credit.

My nephews found no trouble staying entertained. Here: a rabbit jumped between bushes, its distinctive and large back feet making striking indents. There: a coyote paused to survey the river bottom, perhaps looking for the escaping rabbit.

With each new track, they’d bend down and construct their own story as to what was going on.

It helps that Jacob and Jack have parents who spend a lot of time with them outdoors, fishing and hunting and camping. They’re also blessed to have great places to explore, like the wooded bluffs on their grandparents’ farm where we searched for tracks.

Ensuring that youth have their own places to explore—whether they live in a city, a rural community, or the edge of the wilderness—should be among the highest priorities for conservationists.

Want to go tracking? It’s really quite easy.

The great thing about looking for tracks is you don’t need any specialized equipment. Any slightly wild place—the edge of a suburb, a city park, abandoned lots—likely have various critters passing through.

Waterways like creeks, ponds and rivers are highways for all kinds of wild animals, and they often leave signs of their movements in the mud.

A good field guide helps, especially if you aren’t familiar with tracks. My old standby—which I wore out when I was a kid looking for my own tracks—is the Peterson Field Guide to Animal Tracks by Olaus J. Murie. It includes not only tracks of every animal you’re likely to encounter, but also their scat and other signs they leave behind.

As we stared at the raccoon tracks, ice floated down the river, softly tinkling as it rubbed against rocks. An occasional eagle soared overhead. We stopped for a moment on this crisp holiday morning and Jacob pronounced it “a perfect day.” No argument here.

My nieces and nephews have a future with nearly unimaginable (to me, at least) technology and modes of communication. I hope they embrace it all and use it to their advantage.

I also hope they continue to have the time and interest in the wild things and wild places around them. I hope that their paths continue to cross, quite literally, with those of the deer and rabbit and the big old raccoon.

(Image: Raccoon tracks along a river in northeastern Iowa. Image credit: Jennifer Miller)

Pandas are vegetarians, right? Well, new findings by Conservancy scientists suggest the issue isn’t as black and white (or, er, as green and blood red) as once thought.

Motion sensor cameras were set up this summer in the soon-to-be established Motianling County Land Trust Reserve in northern Sichuan by The Nature Conservancy, Peking University and local government partners. In November they captured images of a giant panda consuming the carcass of a takin, a Himalayan goat-antelope. These photos provide visual confirmation that pandas at least occasionally eat meat in addition to their customary staple of bamboo leaves. (See the amazing images captured by remote camera.)

While this isn’t news to scientists — evidence in feces has shown that pandas do sometimes eat meat — very few photos exist of a panda actually consuming it.

But the panda’s no killer; scientists confirmed that the takin had died of natural causes several days before it was discovered by the panda. “These images show that there is still so much we don’t know about their behavior,” says Zhao Peng, the Motianling project lead for the Conservancy. “They really are an incredible species.”

But the question remains: Is the panda portrayed in Kung Fu Panda closer to real life than the cuddly ball of fur we all love and adore? To get to the bottom of this question we reached out to Matt Durnin, the Conservancy’s Asia-Pacific Conservation Science Director. Matt has been studying pandas for more than a decade and conducted his Ph.D. research on the wild giant pandas of the Wolong Nature Reserve in Sichuan province.

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Q: Where did the researchers find this panda, and what were they investigating with their camera traps?

Matt Durnin: The work is being conducted in the Motianling Land Trust Reserve a 110km2 area in Pingwu County, Sichuan Province. The reserve is a vital, healthy habitat for conservation target species including the endangered giant panda, and is adjacent to two existing giant panda reserves – Baishuijiang and Tangjiahe National Nature Reserves.

We use remote cameras as a “non-invasive” way to monitor species presence in the reserve. Remote cameras are a now widely used and well proven methodology to gather information not only on the presence of species but — as is evidenced in these photos — on behavior (e.g. feeding or scent marking).

In previous work done on giant pandas in the wild, I was able to capture photos of pandas at “scent trees,” sniffing the scent of other pandas as well as leaving their own scent on trees. Remote cameras have also been used to identify the presence of previously unknown species or species that have been considered extirpated from an area.

Q: Was this news a surprise to you?

Matt Durnin: This news is not so much a surprise because researchers have previously found the remains of animals in panda feces. But it is exciting and significant. I’ve only ever heard of one other incident of a panda being photographed on a carcass and those photos have never been published and were taken with a mobile phone.

What makes these photos significant is the number and quality of them, as well as the systematic way in which they were obtained. Researchers came across the carcass (so were able to estimate how long since its death) and placed the camera there to photograph any animals that might come along and feed on it. I don’t think anyone expected that it would be a panda but rather some other carnivore. This is a panda feeding on a carcass over a 6-hour period; it’s the most extensive photographic footage of a panda in the wild doing so.

Q: What can you learn from these photos? How common is meat-eating in pandas, and is something new happening here that might be increasing the behavior?

Matt Durnin: Pandas are technically carnivores. And we know from finding feces in the field that contained animal remains — as well as anecdotally from conversations with locals living and spending time in panda habitat — that they do eat meat from time to time. So this is not a “new” behavior — but it is, we believe, very uncommon. So documenting it with such a large number of high quality photos is an important result of this research.

From the photographs we have what appears to be a very healthy panda (it’s not possible to say if it’s a male or female) feeding for approximately 6 hours on the remains of a takin. There is plenty of its primary food, bamboo, in the area. So we can assume it was not starving from lack of access to bamboo but rather it was hungry, found a “fresh” carcass and so did what carnivores do and ate the meat.

However, there is only a small amount of data supporting that wild pandas do eat meat, so we still consider this a rare behavior. I’ve collected hundreds — perhaps thousands — of feces for DNA and bite-fragment analysis in my research over the years and have found only one feces with anything other than bamboo in it.

These 600 photos tell us that, despite decades of research on pandas in the wild, we’re still learning.

Q: When most people think of panda bears, they think of sweet, seemingly cuddly creatures. Is that popular image true to the facts, or do pandas have a not-so-cuddly side as well?

Matt Durnin: The famous field biologist George Schaller was once chased and climbed a tree to get away from a female panda that he was observing. Just like any large carnivore, they have very powerful jaws, sharp teeth and claws — if they were to get a hold of a person or other animal, they could do a lot of harm. Zookeepers and zoo guests (that have jumped into enclosures or stuck their arms through cage bars) have been injured and mauled to death by captive pandas. Whlie there’s no evidence that anyone has ever been killed by a panda in the wild, they are wild animals — they are extremely strong — and if threatened can be as lethal as any other large carnivore out there. They are also, despite most people’s image, very fast albeit in short bursts.

However, like most wild animals they do whatever they can to avoid humans and the chances of someone being mauled by a panda are infinitesimally small.

Another little known fact is that their fur is quite bristly and not at all soft as many imagine.

Q: This takin was already dead when the panda started eating it. Given the photos, do you think it’s possible a panda would kill an animal for meat if it were hungry enough?

Matt Durnin: I believe if a panda had to it could catch and kill prey, but it’s not designed for long-distance running. So pandas would need to do any “hunting” by waiting and ambushing a passing animal.

However, in the early 1980s, there was a huge bamboo die-off in a large area of Sichuan inhabited by pandas. If there was ever a time for pandas to resort to hunting prey, it would have been then. But as far as I know, there is no evidence any did so, even though in theory they are capable. So there’s no evidence that they hunt and kill their own prey.

The evidence we have shows that when they do eat meat, it’s carrion.

Q: This panda was photographed on a land trust reserve — the first organized form of private land conservation in China. The United States has certainly had a long history of private land conservation, but not so in China. What can these private initiatives add to China’s nature reserve system?

Matt Durnin: The nature reserve system in China, again as in many places around the world, is sorely underfunded. So tapping into the potential that “private initiatives” have is critical to successful conservation in China.

The overall goal of this project is to overcome existing barriers (lack of funding being one of the biggest barriers) to effective conservation in China by introducing the land trust model, which enables participation by all sectors of society (non-government as well as government) in protecting critical lands while also incorporating sustainable development opportunities for struggling local communities.

The land trust model is a “new” concept to not only China, but much of Asia. Research findings like this help us gain support for piloting this new model.

(Image: Panda eating meat captured by motion sensor cameras stationed on the Motianling County Land Trust Reserve in northern Sichuan. Image credit: TNC. View more photos from the remote camera here.)

Joanne Wilson (above) surveying coral reefs in Raja Ampat

You’ve probably heard about coral bleaching — the mass die off of coral reefs because of warming sea temperatures, a dynamic that can be attributed at least indirectly to climate change. It’s a problem of growing concern to the hundreds of millions of people whose lives depend on reefs and the fish they shelter. But as ocean temps continue to rise, is there any hope for coral?

Science to the rescue! Researchers are learning tons about which kinds of coral species are either resistant to bleaching or bleach more quickly — and using that data to figure out which reefs are going to be more resilient to climate change…which will feed into where to focus protection efforts. As part of the work, marine scientists often need to do painstaking fish and coral surveys in beautiful but remote locations — which is why The Nature Conservancy sent a science team led by Drs. Joanne Wilson and Sangeeta Mangubhai to spend two weeks in November to the Indonesian archipelago of Raja Ampat, known as the global center of marine biodiversity. I caught up with Jo and Sangeeta — barely dry from all their diving — to get the skinny on what they found…including giant clams and an anchovy fish ball:

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Q: You found less coral bleaching on this expedition than you’d thought you would. How significant is that finding? Should we be less worried about coral bleaching than we were before?

Joanne Wilson: Coral bleaching occurs when water temperatures are warmer than normal – for example, during La Nina events like the one we experienced last year. The increasing frequency and intensity of these warming events is associated with climate change. Fortunately, during our expedition, water temperatures were within normal ranges, so corals on Misool reefs were not bleaching. But with bleaching events predicted to increase in the future, we are still vigilant and concerned about Raja Ampat’s reefs.

Q: OK, so we’re still concerned about bleaching — but what can we really do about it?  

Joanne Wilson: We can help build reef resilience. During the surveys we did find a few pale corals, indicating slight temperature stress. These corals belonged to a species that is very sensitive to temperature stress. Studying those corals will help us better understand the different responses of coral species to increased water temperatures. By combining this new knowledge with information on the distribution of coral species, we can predict with increased accuracy which reefs are likely to be more vulnerable to bleaching in the future — which can in turn can guide reef resilience efforts.

Q: Marine protected areas like the one you were visiting often have “no-take” zones where fishing is restricted or banned. You were studying whether fish were bigger and more numerous in these zones — essentially, whether these zones were serving as “fish banks” for the rest of the region. Are they?

Sangeeta Mangubhai: Our expedition took us to the Southeast Misool MPA [marine protected area], which is still in the process of being zoned, though there is currently one 425-square-kilometer no-take zone that is being actively enforced. Our data show that the fish biomass and abundance were higher within the existing no-take zone, especially in areas with high current (often at the points of islands) where many fish species tend to aggregate. We also recorded more sharks in the no-take zone as compared to other areas of the MPA where fishing continues. So yes, the existing no-take zone is acting as a fish bank. However, given how overfished the reefs are in Misool, it will take a few more years before the no-take zone accumulates enough fish to spill over into adjacent areas.

Q: How do you determine whether fish are bigger and more abundant in a particular region? How do you know you’re not just finding a lot of big fish that day?

Sangeeta Mangubhai: Over the last two years, we’ve been classifying the reefs in Misool to give us a better understanding of the range of coral reef habitats there. We do this because we know all coral reefs are not the same — they differ depending on the habitat and oceanographic conditions they are exposed to, and so do their fish populations. The fish population in a lagoonal reef is going to be different – both in terms of species and numbers — from the fish population in an adjacent reef that’s exposed to waves and wind.

When we do our reef health surveys, we make sure that we are surveying similar reef habitats so that the data is comparable. We also survey multiple reefs belonging to the same habitat type, so that we can develop an average that reflects the general condition of the reefs. In addition, we know which fish tend to spread themselves out on a reef, and which tend to aggregate in large schools, and we take this into account when we do our surveys and when we interpret the data.

Q: Speaking of aggregation, you also found a “fish ball” of anchovies — which I’m guessing isn’t something that goes into a Caesar salad. What is it? Why is it significant?

Joanne Wilson: An anchovy fish ball is an aggregation of perhaps millions of these small silver fish. By following the principle of safety in numbers, these anchovies were hoping that at least some of them would escape being eaten. Anchovies form the base of the food chain – they\’re a staple meal for fish like tuna, for sea birds and for many whale and dolphin species. They are also caught by the ton and then dried and sold for human consumption in Indonesia. So it’s important that anchovy habitat is protected and the anchovy fishery is well managed to provide for both a healthy ecosystem and a sustainable harvest.

A veritable Dr. Seuss book of coral (above): From left to right, Cynarina, Physogyra, Euphyllia ancora and Lobophyllia coral.

Q: One scientist I know described the fish and corals in the Coral Triangle like something out of a Dr. Seuss book — totally wild. You both have done a lot of diving in the CT — did you see anything this time you’d never seen before?

Joanne Wilson: Absolutely. This is the center of reef biodiversity, so we certainly saw a lot of creatures that are not commonly found in other reefs and had us poring over photos and reaching for the reference books each evening! Some of the coral species form weird and wonderful fragile shapes in very sheltered coves among the limestone karst. We found a strangely shaped anenome that looked a lot like a black fern and also came across mating octopuses on two occasions.

Q: A number of Indonesian scientists helped you do the monitoring on this expedition. Does that presence help the credibility of your findings with the people who live in Raja Ampat? And how are your findings going to be used there?

Sangeeta Mangubhai: There are a number of reasons we have mainly Indonesian scientists on our trips. First, the Conservancy feels that if we work in a country like Indonesia, it is important to invest in long-term capacity and empower local scientists to lead the monitoring work themselves instead of relying on outsiders. Second, it does create real credibility for our findings at the local level as well as a great sense of pride for communities to have locals involved in an expedition and collecting data on their reefs. And third, it is the Indonesian scientists that will be working with outreach staff and the local communities to finalize a zoning plan for the MPA — to do this, they need to be experts with firsthand knowledge and understanding of the reefs, to enable them to stand on equal footing with local communities while discussing the communities’ resources and how best to manage them. Local scientists know how to speak to their government and communities better than outsiders.

Joanne Wilson (left) and Sangeeta Mangubhai

Q: Everybody thinks diving is fun and glamorous, but Raja Ampat isn’t an easy place to work — you had to bring in everything you needed from a town 98 miles away across open ocean, which I understand is 16 hours by steamboat. What was the most challenging thing about this expedition?

Sangeeta Mangubhai: Given how remote this region is, we had to put a lot of thought and planning into the trip before it began. There was no shop we could duck into to pick up something we had forgotten, so we needed spares of essential equipment. We had to be prepared to fix any equipment that malfunctioned or broke down ourselves. Every night, on top of entering our data, we also had to take inventory — check how much fuel we had used, investigate the state of our gear and decide where we could safely anchor the boat each night, taking into account that there were many unmarked reefs we couldn’t afford to damage. In some areas, we had to rely on the local knowledge of our community monitoring assistants to safely navigate narrow passages. With no accurate information available on tides and currents, we had to make sure that, when we chose dive sites, the currents were not too strong. And we had to be prepared to put into place additional safety measures, if they were required for the dive.

Q: Coral reefs are in trouble worldwide — most everybody knows that. But are you as scientists more hopeful now than you were before the expedition about our ability to protect them? Why or why not?

Joanne Wilson: We came away from the expedition with mixed feelings. Raja Ampat is certainly a very beautiful and diverse area, but even this far-flung corner of Indonesia, the reefs showed signs of overexploitation and damage from bomb fishing.

But we saw strong positive signs, too — all of the local community members on our expedition used to be illegal fishermen, and now they’re now active conservationists. There’s now an agreement between Misool Eco Resort — a local dive resort — and local villages to sustainably manage local reefs while creating livelihood opportunities. We’re also supporting the local government’s efforts to develop management plans for all of Raja Ampat’s marine protected areas. This will give some communities their first opportunity to affect the decisions that determine how their resources are used and accessed. So while there’s still reef exploitation, these developments give us hope.

Note: the following post is the last in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

As Jo and I sit on the top deck of the Putiraja watching Misool’s karst islands disappear behind us, we finally have time to reflect on the last 15 days.

Each of the expedition’s ten participants have gone on 40 dives. Between the two teams, we’ve covered 80 sites in some of the most diverse coral reefs on the planet. We have so much data that will help us better understand the health of the reefs and that can be used to complete the zoning plan for the MPA. We also have data that will help predict Misool’s potential resilience to future climate change impacts.

So did the expedition live up to our expectations? I think we came away from the expedition with mixed feelings. Misool is without question stunning, both above and below the water — there were dives we did that kept us buzzing for hours after we returned to the surface. The network of limestone karst with hidden channels and lagoons is like a maze that you want to just get lost in and explore!

But even in this remote corner of the ocean, there were also clear signs of overexploitation as well as reefs damaged by past bomb fishing. The lack of sharks on most of our dives was profoundly disturbing for the team, as it is clear that overfishing is pushing local populations to extinction.

But there are strong positive signs too. The coral communities are healthy and virtually free of disease and we found plenty of sea turtles, productive fish populations within the MPA’s only no-take zone and vibrant fish nurseries for groupers and parrotfish.

The positives extend to people, as well. The local community members who joined our expedition were once illegal fishermen and now are active conservationists. Plus, the arrangement between Misool Eco Resort and local villages to protect and manage large areas of reef while improving livelihoods is a great success.

We are currently supporting the local government to develop management plans for all the marine protected areas in Raja Ampat. This will give local communities their first opportunity to voice their opinions on how their own local resources should be managed and who should have access to them.

By combining scientific information we’re collecting with the communities’ local knowledge of the area and their resources, we can make decisions that help stop any further declines and give the reefs a chance to recover. There is hope!

Explore further coverage of this expedition on nature.org and learn more about the Conservancy’s involvement in the game-changing Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security.

(First image: Sunset at Jef Pele. First image credit: TNC. Second image: Local family from Jef Pele. Second image credit: TNC. Third image: Sangeeta and Jo. Third image credit: TNC.)

Note: the following post from Sangeeta Mangubhai (@smangubhai) is the latest in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

Growing up in Fiji instilled me with a profound love of the ocean and, in particular, coral reefs. Corals fascinate me: they are anatomically very simple animals, but they show remarkable complexity in growth form, reproduction and life history.

Did you know that coral taxonomy is based on their fine skeletal structure? And that it takes three large books weighing 8kg (!!!) to provide detailed descriptions and photographs of most known species?

Corals are notoriously difficult to identify underwater because a species can sometimes have very different outward appearances depending on the habitat where a given specimen is located. For example, a certain species of coral may grow lots of branches when it lives on shallow reef flats, but this very same species may become flat and plate-like in deeper reefs. To make things more confusing, some corals can hybridize like plants.

One of the challenges of working in the global center of marine biodiversity is that there are more than 550 coral species living in Raja Ampat alone! For our surveys, we only have to identify the corals to genus level, but even that has its challenges when some groups look very similar to each other. Have a look at a coral up close if you have the chance — you will be surprised at how intricate corals are in terms of their skeletal architecture and how much they can vary in appearance.

Rizya Ardiwijaya, a Conservancy diver who assists monitoring staff at all our sites in Indonesia, is currently helping me with the coral resilience assessments. He and I spend most of our dives with our noses 30cm above the reef, identifying and counting corals.

Sometimes we have lively debates underwater (via our waterproof slates, of course) about the genus of coral we are observing. In the evenings, we spend up to two hours looking through the coral books to make sure we have our identifications correct and in synchrony with each other. So far, we have found 54 genera of coral in Misool and we are expecting this number to go up as the expedition continues!

Explore further coverage of this expedition on nature.org and learn more about the Conservancy’s involvement in the game-changing Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security.
 
(First image: Acropora coral. First image credit: TNC. Second image: From left to right, cynarina, physogyra, euphyllia ancora and lobophyllia coral. Second image credit: TNC.)

Note: the following post from Sangeeta Mangubhai (@smangubhai) is the latest in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

Three months ago, we began a community monitoring project that aims to empower local Papuan communities to monitor their marine resources and link the data they collect to decisions they make about their local fisheries. Five representatives from Raja Ampat’s Kofiau and Southeast Misool MPAs work with Conservancy staff as Community Monitoring Assistants (CMAs), and we are lucky to have four of them — Ali, Wahab, Andi and Naftali — on our expedition!

A couple of days ago, I learned that two of them were previously compressor fishers who have each spent more time underwater than Jo and I combined! Compressor fishers use a hose to maintain a continuous air supply from the surface, allowing them to remain underwater for long periods of time harvesting marine animals.

Compressor fishing was banned last year in Indonesia because of the impacts the practice has on local fisheries and the method’s associated high health risks. Now, both our CMAs have stopped using compressors and want to learn more about coral reefs and how to help improve the local fisheries their families and communities rely on.

L-R: Naftali, Andi, Ali and Wahab

Two of the CMAs — Wahab from the village of Fafanlap and Ali from Harapan Jaya — have been collecting invertebrate data, focusing on key fisheries species (such as sea cucumbers, sea snails, giant clams and lobsters) as well as predators like the crown-of-thorns starfish, which eats live corals.

Wahab and Ali already have such sharp eyes for finding invertebrates hidden in reefs, and we are getting good estimates of the densities and abundance of these species in the marine protected area. They are recording the names in their local language and helping Muhajir and me to match these with the scientific names.

So far, the numbers do not look good — actually, they are depressing. Both Wahab and Ali have recorded less than six animals per dive, which is a strong indicator that many of these species have been over-harvested. With such low numbers, I cannot help but wonder how these animals will successfully reproduce.

Sitting down with Ali at lunch today, he told me he remembers snorkeling as a child and seeing five to 10 giant clams every time he visited his local reefs. He told me Misool used to have a lot of giant clams (Tridacna gigas — or, as it’s known locally, kima), which can grow to be over a meter in length. Now, he lamented, shaking his head, he has seen only one giant kima in 10 consecutive dives. But Ali has hope: he is keen to share the data he is collecting with his local community and work with them to find ways to help these important fisheries recover.

Explore further coverage of this expedition on nature.org and support Ali’s efforts to rejuvenate Raja Ampat’s fisheries here.

(First image: the expedition team dives at Manta Mountain in Misool; credit: TNC. Second image: the expedition’s CMAs are, from left to right, Naftali, Andi, Ali and Wahab; credit: TNC.)

Note: the following post is the latest in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

Misool. Perfect one day, even better the next. The weather is so calm we could be forgiven for thinking we’re diving in a lake! We’re on schedule, fitting in three dives per day, and our evenings on the boat are busy with everyone entering pages of fish and coral data into the computer.

We’re collecting data on the status of the reefs for two reasons. The first is to check on sites identified for extra protection. These sites will be declared as no-take zones in the future, and we want to make sure they’re in good condition.

The second is to compare the health of reefs in different types of zones within the MPA. In particular, we want to compare no-take zones with zones where certain human uses are allowed. Even in Misool — a highly biodiverse area where protective measures have been taken — populations of valuable species like grouper are declining. We hope no-take zones will create “fish banks” — places where fish can grow and reproduce. There is already one no-take zone which has been established for a few years in Misool, and more are planned.

Increases in the number and size of fish are good indicators that a no-take zone is working well. Increases in fish size result in exponentially higher levels of egg production. For example, if a fish that’s 20-cm-long produces 10,000 eggs, then a 40-cm-long fish can produce 100,000,000 eggs! Many of those eggs will drift outside the no-take zone to replenish areas where fishing is allowed. That’s good incentive for leaving the fish in the water to develop a little longer…

We’re also looking for a return of some of the large iconic species, like grouper, bumphead parrotfish and napoleon wrasse (see above), which quickly disappear even with moderate levels of fishing. These large species all play different but critical roles in keeping a natural balance on the reefs. Groupers are top predators that keep populations of smaller fish in check, bumphead parrotfish are experts in keeping the reefs clean of algae, and napoleon wrasse eat the notorious crown-of-thorns starfish — a voracious coral eater.

But it’s not just the big fish that are important. Two days ago, we were thrilled to see a “fish ball” (see above) — a school of hundreds of thousands of anchovies whirling above us, trying to escape the many hungry predators lurking at the ball’s edges. These are some of the smallest fish on the reef but are, in many ways, also the most important. They are the main food not only for fish but for other animals in the ecosystem, including sea birds and dolphins. A school of anchovies this size means there’s a good foundation for a healthy productive ecosystem in Misool.

(First image: A reef in Misool. First image credit: TNC. Second image: A napoleon wrasse. Second image credit: TNC. Third image: An anchovy fish ball. Third image credit: TNC.)

Note: the following post from Sangeeta Mangubhai (@smangubhai) is the latest in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

I am often asked to explain how climate change affects our work with Marine Protected Areas (MPAs). Why do we invest time and money in tropical MPAs if climate change impacts like coral bleaching events and ocean acidification are likely to become even more severe?

It’s true that periods of unusually warm ocean temperatures have already caused mass coral bleaching like we witnessed during the global bleaching event recorded in 1998 that is estimated to have killed 16 percent of the world’s reefs. But we know that many coral reefs survived this bleaching event. Some reefs remained healthy while others that bleached were able to recover quickly once the temperatures cooled again. We call these reefs “resilient.” Resilience is the ability of an ecosystem to absorb shock and regenerate after natural and human-induced disturbances. For coral reefs, this means being able to withstand warmer-than-normal temperatures or rebuild healthy communities after sustaining damage.

Now imagine this — what if you could use basic ecological data to predict which reefs might not bleach, or might recover quickly from future bleaching events. And what if you could then use this information to ensure these areas are included in MPAs?

After this expedition, we’ll be able to do both those things. We are now collecting data from reefs around Misool to identify sites that are likely to be more resilient to climate change impacts. We will then provide this information to managers who are currently designing a zoning plan for Misool that will include areas for protection in no-take zones, where fishing and other activities are prohibited. In this way, we can address climate change in our management of coral reefs.

Working with our partners Wildlife Conservation Society and Reef Check Indonesia, the Conservancy has been trialing an IUCN reef resilience assessment method in a number of MPAs across Indonesia since 2009. The assessment involves counting the number of new coral recruits, noting any bleaching or coral disease, and counting the number of fish that eat algae — the “lawnmowers” of the reef. We also record if there are any other stresses to the reef — like pollution, overfishing, anchor damage or sedimentation — because we know these factors are also important for coral reef resilience.

Earlier this year, we worked with experts from the University of Melbourne and the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority to help translate the scientific data we’ve collected into simple and clear messages for MPA managers. Using the framework we developed, we can identify the most resilient reefs and the sites that have human-induced stresses that are affecting the reefs and their resilience.

On this trip, we will complete the resilience assessments we started in 2009, and this time we hope to survey some really unusual coral reef habitats that we have not visited before. We will dive in lagoons and channels deep in the limestone karst chain, as well as seamounts that rise up from the great ocean depths. We hope by studying these different types of reefs that we will be even better equipped to show that protecting tropical reefs is both possible and important.

Explore further coverage of this expedition on nature.org and learn more about the Conservancy’s involvement in the game-changing Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security.

(First image: Clouds of fusiliers at Misool reefs; First image credit: TNC. Second image: Joanne Wilson examines reefs at Jef Pele for signs of disease. Second image credit: TNC.

Note: the following post is the latest in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

Yesterday afternoon, we picked up the rest of our team from the Conservancy’s Misool field station and headed southwest to start our surveys at the edge of the Misool marine protected area. There is nothing quite like waking up to a perfectly calm, clear ocean with rugged, forest-clad limestone mountains all around you. Breathtaking!

But we are here to work (!), so we divided our team of ten into two groups. The first team consists of experts in evaluating general coral reef health, and the second team specializes in assessments of coral reef resilience (stay tuned for our next blog, which will provide a full explanation of reef resilience).

Our reef health team consists of six people: three from the Conservancy and three volunteers from the local Misool community. From the Conservancy, Purwanto is our resident fish expert, Muhajir is our coral expert and I’m here to check if there is any coral bleaching or disease. Our community volunteers Ali, Andreas and Naftali are already experienced divers and are doing one of the most important (but often underrated) monitoring tasks: swimming down to the ocean floor to lay out the transect tapes that the rest of us follow while diving.

The resilience team is led by Sangeeta, who has done many of these assessments in Raja Ampat and other parts of the world. She is joined by the Conservancy’s Rizya, an Indonesian resilience expert; Ubun, a second fish expert from our partner organisation Wildlife Conservation Society; and Wahab, our fourth community volunteer.

As our speedboats headed out early to our survey sites from the Putiraja, our live-aboard diving vessel, a group of 15 bottlenose dolphins welcomed us to Misool!

Between the two groups, we surveyed six sites today and we were very pleased to see that the reefs here are in excellent condition. One of the islands we surveyed has been proposed for protection by the local communities because it’s supposed to be an important place for sea turtles. We were excited to confirm this: both teams spotted turtles. As an added bonus, this island has flourishing reefs, with some big fish like groupers and napoleon wrasse among the local residents that will be protected along with the turtles.

But we can’t be complacent — as beautiful and remote as this part of Misool is, there are still signs of overfishing and past reef-bombing in some isolated areas. Our surveys will help inform managers where to focus their efforts in protection and patrolling and provide information on just how quickly these areas are recovering.

Explore further coverage of this expedition on nature.org and support Jo’s efforts to improve protection in Raja Ampat here.

(First image: a mountainous island in Misool; credit: TNC. Second image: the entire expedition team; credit: TNC.)

Note: the following post is the third in a series chronicling the ongoing expedition to the Raja Ampat Islands. Read more here.

We made it! After 16 hours of blissfully calm and almost uneventful steaming on the Putiraja, we arrived at the Conservancy’s Misool field station on a perfect, sunny afternoon. We’ve met up with the remaining team members from Wildlife Conservation Society and our local community volunteers from Misool.

We spent our time on the boat organizing our many underwater data sheets to record our observations and doing important but small things like tying the pencils to our slates to ensure we don’t lose them underwater. On the way, we stopped to buy some fresh fish from a local fisherman.

We negotiated our way carefully through the chain of hundreds of limestone karst islands that Misool is so famous for. It’s always a stunning vista sailing into Misool: clear blue water, turqoise reefs, brilliantly white sand beaches. I could go on but I’ve run out of superlatives!

At the station, we did last-minute preparations for diving tomorrow. The team responsible for monitoring fish practiced estimating lengths on the beach using plastic fish (see above) before they get in the water and practice with the real thing. The coral team went through a similar rehearsal so we can all agree on the same name for the same type of coral. It’s one of the challenges of working in the center of marine biodiversity — we have to learn all those species!

Tonight we’ll steam to our first diving destination in southwest Misool called Jef Pele, an area well known for its big fish.

Explore further coverage of this expedition on nature.org and learn more about the Conservancy’s involvement in the game-changing Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security.

(Image: Fish monitoring team prepare for the field; credit: TNC.)