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A school of tiny bait fish entered the back of the fish pool
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date: 16/4/2009
Author:Nick Brennan
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Weather: Sunny
Air Temperature: 26.3°C
Wind Speed / Direction: SE 10- 15 knots
Water Temperature: 25°C
Water Visibility: 20+ m
Sea State: Chop
Guests were incredibly fortunate and the fish not so lucky with some amazing behavior observed at fish feeding today. A school of tiny bait fish entered the back of the fish pool giving one brown booby bird a fantastic meal. It hovered on the breeze menacingly above before diving into the clear water in front of a captive audience, emerging with its catch. It did this for about 20 minutes and those guests with cameras captured some dramatic photos of this sensational predator. They loved its funny face with its tiny little eyes set on the front of its beak.
The bird watchers were mesmerized by the frigate birds soaring overhead. These birds don’t have very good ocean going feathers so they rely on stealing other birds food, a strategy called clepto-parasitism. One guest said he had witnessed an amazing pursuit of a crested tern at the end of the air strip where the birds appeared to get tangled up in mid air before a fish was dropped to the water where the frigate bird then swooped in to pick up its feed. A reef eegret was also spotted wading through the shallows in the white colour morph which is the most common variety on the Great Barrier Reef.
Snorkelling conditions were second to none today with guests well and truly satisfying their turtle fix out on second reef. Green turtles as well as the much less frequently seen hawksbill turtle were out in abundance with everybody having their own special little moments with these awesome creatures.
In the evening everybody was keen for some reef bingo and some very intense little rounds ensued. At the end the prize was to be the guides first helper with two tiny little turtle hatchlings that had been found during the day. They were taken down to the coral
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Frigate Bird - Wayne Fox
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