The Grey Nurse Shark is a graceful and majestic creature to behold as it cruises through the rock valleys around the island, seemingly disinterested in the groups of oddly-shaped mammals with plastic fins that also cruise around at different times of the day. The wildlife out here is used to the attention and a long-upheld 'do not touch' policy has ensured everyone feels safer in the water. Many cases have been made that there has never been a shark attack on a beach where there is also shark-meshing and baited hook being used as protection measures. I put it to you that there has never been a shark attack in a marine park. Not that a Grey Nurse shark is likely to attack you, anyway. But I digress because as beautiful as these creatures are, they're not the ones I'm looking for.
The East Australian current was strong today, powering southwards from Queensland with magnificent warm, clear water with visibility so good that to mention it would surely be skyting. The current was hitting the side of the rocks head on and sweeping around the northern and southern ends of the rocks taking the weaker oddly-shaped mammals with plastic fins with it. The wildlife is diverse and prolific everywhere you look. Sting-rays, fishes of all shapes and sizes, leopard sharks nanna-napping on the seafloor and wobbegong sharks tucked away cryptically under rocks ledges, and I haven't even moved that far from from the boat yet.
But these beautiful marine creatures are not what I'm looking for here either. I'm looking for what the indigenous folk call "Bing-ing", sea turtles. Particularly Hawksbill sea turtles, but any species will do. Nguthungulli is in a very interesting part of the world, inherently biodiverse as it's influenced by both temperate and tropical climate variations. Let's say, hypothetically speaking, seas warm and we begin to notice that species more commonly seen in tropical waters become able to exploit this new extension of their habitats to the south. Given that Nguthungulli is right in that zone, monitoring it's abundance and diversity is key to our ability to protect and conserve this rich area for the future. We know now that sea turtles are resident in NSW. Take this Hawksbill turtle for example, who has popped up in sighting reports regularly since being tagged around 2002. The question is, how would we notice a change in the resident, or even migratory population if we don't know how many are there now? The fact is, we don't know how many are there now. Did I mention that Hawksbill turtles are critically endangered on a global scale? There I go again, tangentially swinging away from the story, let's get back in the water.
The East Australian Current was warm and in the deep crevice in the middle of Nguthungulli the rocky walls were lined with a type of rhodophyta (red sea-grassy stuff) that was swaying back and forth with the swell like a pack of red-heads at a Metallica concert. When I got to the end of the valley I came face to face with three teenager green sea turtles frolicking at the surface in the surgy, bubbly, white-wash. They appeared to be making extra effort to access some of the red weed that was being exposed to the air, at some times taking some risk to get there. As teenagers do I guess.
And so, the counts begin!!
