A tour group from “Die Tauchprofis” of Braunschweig/Germany, recently visited the “Cocktaildivers” in the “Garden of Eden” of Sabang Beach Puerto Galera /Philippines for a fantastic underwater adventure. 16 days of diving at 33 dive spots with a fantasticfull of stunning marine underwater worldlife…
We already came with the best expectations:The Cocktaildiver had won the „Tauchen-Award“, given by readers of the german magazine “TAUCHEN” in the category „best diving base Pacific“ for four times. The dive operation is well organized, three boat dives to three to five dive spots are offered every day. One can sign up in lists for the preferred spot. Additionally, unlimited house reef diving is available as well as fascinating night dives to different places. A big thank you to all diveguides: Lito, Ren, J.R., Obeth, Bobby, Marvin, Mark, Frian, Marven and to base leader Fernando!
The Philippines are located in the so-called „Coral Triangle“, the marine region with the highest biodiversity worldwide. The country of 7107 islands comprises a multitude of habitats, each with a different structure and varying conditions for their inhabitants. The biodiversity is really extraordinary – even after nearly 50 dives you still find numerous “new” species. The sea in this area is very rich of plankton, that is the reason for the great variety of filter feeders like feather stars, sponges, ascidians, hydrozoans, feather duster worms, – various azooxanthellate corals, like gorgonians, wire coral, sea pen, black and yellow cup coral as well as corals which possess zooxanthellae algae. All these organisms are providing food and habitat for countless species of invertebrates, nudibranchs and other mollusks, crabs, shrimps, echinoderms, polychaetes and of course the fishes, sea snakes and turtles.
The diveguides know the places and constantly pointing at special highlights like well-camouflaged ghost pipefish, frog fish, velvet fish, stargazer buried in the sand, seamoths, snake eels, various pipefish and seahorses, nudibranchs and crustaceans. The pygmy seahorse for instance, can be found at some sea fans around 25 m depth. In fact they occur in 3 different colour morphs in pink, yellow and orange – perfectly adapted to those same-coloured sea fans! Likewise, inside of feather stars there live tiny, well-camouflaged shrimps and clingfish. But even the various damselfish, wrasses and parrotfish, fusiliers, moray eels, butterfly and angelfish make the divers´ heart leap for joy. One can make swifting drift dives at the dive spot „Canyons“, with big snappers and sweetlips, tunas and jacks. The dive spots „The Hill“ and „Dalaruan Point“ are located in a sheltered and sandy lagoon alongside Puerto Galera, where you can be amazed by various „critters“ – an El Dorado for makro-photographers. Even the threatended Giant clam (Tridacna gigas) occurs at this place. There are also some nice wrecks in the region, e.g. the MV Alma Jane at max. 32 m depth, which was sunk in 2002.
Our excursion to Verde Island and it´s fantastic reefs was a special highlight. The Isla Verde Passage has been described as the “Center of the Center of Marine Shorefish Biodiversity” in the philippines. Stay tuned for some more photo posts about the gorgeous marine life in the philippines!
Next, a short introduction of a totally fascinating creature will follow:
Das Pygmy seahorse Hippocampus bargibanti (Whitley, 1970)
Which is well known by UW photographers mainly from Indonesia, e.g. Sulawesi. But it also occurs at Sabang in the Philippines!
Lito Viana, who works for Cocktaildivers since 24 years was the first who deliberately searched and discovered them in Muricella Sea fans in 1994. Today, the animals are shown to divers by experienced dive guides who know their mates!
