My Entry at the Marine National Geographic Photo Contest 2012!

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/photo-contest/2012/entries/173242/view/

Please Vote and Share!

Scuba Diving Law of Boyle & Mariotte in a practical Example! A bubble-ring is expanding towards the surface.

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Hey there green thumbs!

A couple of days ago we did our October Underwater Clean up day! Successfully we get less and less ropes and nets!

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On 08.09.2012 at the Local Islands Ao Nang

We went out for Scuba-Diving on the 12.09.2012 to our local Island Reefs to do some clean up, small rubbish bags and plastic. But we were overwhelmed when we saw a big net about 30m in length and 15m in width stretching and hanging over the pinnacle at Koh Talu at our first dive site!

Fishing in these waters can cause problems like this because the fishermen throw the net, which will too often get entangled into corals! They will then just abandon the net and leave it on the reef! This not only leads to death for so many fishes and other marine life, such as turtles and cuttlefish, but also causes serious damage to the coral life. If not removed, more and more marine life gets entangled and dies from starvation and suffocation!
Many People don’t know that most of our Oxygen gets produced by Corals, but if they are stressed by a net they will die, fishes will move away and the whole reef becomes a “Serengeti Desert”.

Corals are the slowest growing creatures in the world! Some of them will only grow as slow as 0.01 millimeter per year, even the fastest growing corals only grows about 1 centimeter per year. But they can die in a day!

We removed the net as carefully as we could to not break more corals than had already been damaged and I was glad to have 4 other divers with me to help take care of it! I couldn’t have done it myself! Thank you very much to Jai, Roxanne, Happy and El!  With all 5 People we were not able to remove the net on our first dive so I took the guys back to our boat and returned to remove the rest of it by myself!

When we did our second Dive at Koh Meaurai which was supposed to be a Fun dive we came across another huge net about 20m in length and 10m in width, lots of dead fishes entangled and struggling ones too! We carefully cut out those that were still alive, but, sadly, they were few! There was a tasseled Scorpionfish entangled in the net; Scorpionfish are very dangerous and it’s even more dangerous to cut them out of the Net but fortunately we could manage without getting stung!

We managed to get the two nets on the boat and once back on shore, we ensured proper disposal.

I wish something could be done urgently to improve and implement better fishing practices, not just in Asia but throughout the world, in order to maintain and preserve our fragile and diverse marine life system!

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This morning was a wonderfull morning we released 86 turtles which were one year old from a Turtle farming station! I wish the small turtles lots of luck and hopefully we will see you underwater again!!! Take care my friends!

Welcome to the NEW Poseidon Dive-Center Ao-Nang!

We have a new Address!

If you have any more questions do not hesitate to contact me and let me know!

Have a great day!

PS: at the end there are a couple of links! Homepage as well as Facebook and Twitter. Especially on Facebook you can see Pictures and a couple of Videos from our latest Dives! Please Like us!

Web. www.poseidon-diving.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Scuba.Diving.Krabi
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Dive_Center
PDC Blog: http://aonang-diving.com

Poseidon CMAS/TDA 5***** ITCMaster Dive Academy has a New Location

New Address of Poseidon Dive Center:

68/13 Moo3
81000 Ao Nang / Krabi
Thailand

Now its even easier to find us!!! We are still on the Main Street. Just follow the Mainstreet towards Nopparat Beach and just before you pass the River bridge you will find us on the right hand side! Thats it!

From Krabi Airport just take a cab for about 600.- THB or a Mini Bus for about 250.- THB. The cheapest solution is the Airport Bus which runs every 20min and will cost around 150,- THB.
Tell the driver that you want to go to Ao-Nang Poseidon Dive-Center that should know every Taxi driver, if not just print the map and show the driver!

If you own a GPS device try out our coordinates.

Latitude: 8° 2’17.88″N

Longitude: 98°49’0.61″E

Help us to Save our Sharks with your Signature!

Sign the Petition
Jump to the German Page

With a mouthful of teeth, sharks do not seem to need much protection.
In fact one shark goes through thousands of teeth in a lifetime. Each row of succeeding teeth is larger than the set before.
But sharks´teeth are built for eating. The shape of a sharks teeth depend on the type of food it eats, and some sharks’teeth change shape as they grow older and their diet changes to suit the needs of their growing bodies.
sharks also have other types of protection. A protective lid, called the nictitating lid, helps keep its eyes safe from harm when it attacks prey or nears an unfamiliar object. Some sharks will also roll their eyes back into the sockets showing only the whites while attacking prey to protect the more important seeing part of the eye.
Bottom feeding sharks, such as the angel shark or wobbegong, have coloration matching their environment. Others will bury themselves in the sandy ocean bottom.
However, sharks have little or no protection from humans who hunt them for almost every part of their body to make leather, jewelry, soup, cosmetics, and other items. Sharks are also hunted for sport and many are inadvertently caught in fishing nets or in nets placed to protect humans.

Shark finning
However; the product that drives the market are the fins. After drying, collagen fibers are extracted from them, cleaned, and processed to make ‘shark fin soup’. In spite of the fact that these fibers have little flavour or nutritional value, the soup is considered a delicacy, and may sell in the Orient for more than $100 ( £65) a bowl. As long as the humans pay a lot of money for these fins, it will never stop, and we will kill  the sharks and ourselves
The explosive growth of the Chinese economy and rapid expansion of trade with the outside world during the 1985 and 1995 created an unprecedented situation. Suddenly there was an insatiable demand for shark fins of almost any size or type. Improvements in shipbuilding and navigational electronics meant that shark fishing boats could now go anywhere in the world, moving from one place to another as local shark populations were destroyed. The fins are now so much more valuable than the rest of the shark that the carcass is often discarded after the fins are removed, to save storage space on the boat. Often the fins are sliced off when the shark is still alive and the mutilated shark is dumped back into the water, where sinks straight to the bottom because without back fin can´t swim, to die a slow and agonizing death.

Helping To Protect Sharks
Since sharks reproduce at a much slower rate and mature more slowly than bony fish, it is important that people are careful not to deplete the shark population to a point where it can not be recovered. In some cases the environments in which the sharks live are being destroyed.
While sharks have a bad reputation, they rarely attack people unless they are provoked or mistake a human for their normal prey. More people drown in the ocean each year than are attacked by sharks. Only a few of the 365 types of sharks, the bull, the great white, the oceanic white-tip, and the tiger shark are aggressive toward human.
Encouraging the use of electric barriers instead of nets to keep sharks out of an area is one way to help. Also discourage the hunting of sharks for sport or the production of unnecessary articles such as jewelry and souvenirs. In addition learn more about sharks and inform others of ways to live peaceably with these fascinating animals.

A Shark’s Sixth Sense
In order to live and hunt in the ocean waters, sharks have the same 5 senses as human do. They have smell, taste, touch, hearing, and sight. These senses vary in their strength. Many sharks have sharp eyesight, some of which seem particularly sensitive to movement. Most sharks also have a well developed sense of smell.
However, sharks possess a sixth sense which people do not have. Sharks are able to detect weak electrical signals generated by their prey. This sense is detected through small sensory pores called ampullae.

Shark Facts
• The smallest shark is the dwarf dog shark which is 6 ½ inches (16 cm) in length.
• The largest shark, ranging up to 40 ft. (12m) in length is the whale shark.
• Whale sharks are large non aggressive creatures which will sometimes allow divers to hitch a ride by holding on to a pectoral fin.
• Most sharks give birth to live young rather than lay eggs.
• The shark with the longest tail is the thresher shark. Its tail can be 5-8 ft. in length, or as long as its body.
• The hammerhead shark swings its head from side to side as it swims, allowing it to use its well developed sense of smell and many ampullae to search for prey in a wide variety of directions in a small amount of time.
• The fastest shark is the Mako, which can swim at 20 mph (32 kph) and leap completely clear of the ocean surface when it is excited.
• Angel sharks have extra large pectoral fins resembling angel wings. These sharks spend their lives mostly on the ocean bed resting in the sand waiting for prey to come to them.
• Some sharks migrate hundreds of miles using what scientists believe to be a sense of the earth’s magnetic field to guide them.
• One shark makes oval shape bites in its victim, by creating a suction with its lips and swiveling around for the bite. It is appropriately named the cookie cutter shark.
• One of the smallest sharks, the lantern shark, grows to only 8 in (20 cm) in length and glows in the dark.
• The most recent discovery of a shark was not made until 1976. This was the large Megamouth shark, of which only five more have ever been found. This unusual shark which feeds on krill has luminous organs around its mouth.

Please sign our Petition to protect our sharks and in the end ourselves and especially our Kids!

Poseidon Dive Center now on Google+

We are a professional friendly and individual Dive-Center in Thailand / Ao Nang. We offer Trips to the amazing Nature Marine Park Phi Phi Islands as well as to the famous local dive sites which are Koh Sii, Koh Haa, Koh Talu and many more!
We offer a big range of courses from beginners up to professionals, fun dives, Free-Diving and Specialties in different languages! German, Swedish, English, French and Thai.
You want to know more about Scuba- and Free-Diving?!
Have a look at our Homepage Facebook & Twitter or send us a mail.

 

Honeycomb Moray

Despite many press releases worldwide the Thai Government DOES NOT close all dive sites in the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand region!
Correct is that a few Dive Sites will be closed due to research. The dive sites which will be closed do not reflect on diving pleasure in Thailand. Please find the links where you can see and find more detailed information that only a few reefs will be closed for scientific research purposes:
Another fact: The coral bleaching comes from to warm water temperatures and not from Divers at all!

http://www.tatnews.org/VISITOR-INFORMATION/5263.asp

Also coral bleaching phenomena is not damaging more than 10% of all corals throughout the Kingdom’s seas, but partly in shallow water areas some of the coral life. You still can enjoy wonderful and colourful reefs in the Andamnan Sea and as well in the Gulf of Thailand!

We awaiting you and looking forward to some amazing dives!

The Poseidon Dive Academy Team!

 

Honeycomb Murray

Pressemeldungen mit mangelhafter oder gar gänzlich fehlender Recherche ziehen Kreise und verbreiten, alle Riffe in thailändischen Marine National Parks werden gesperrt – Das ist SCHWACHSINN..!!!Richtig ist, dass ein paar wenige Tauchpläzte zu wissenschaftlichen Studienzwecken gesperrt werden, die nicht tauchrelevant sind, bzw die sowieso kaum einer der thailändischen Tauch-Fan-Gemeinde kennt oder jemals betaucht hat. Namentlich und geografisch gelistet findet Ihr die gesperrten Riffe unter folgendem Link:

http://www.tatnews.org/VISITOR-INFORMATION/5263.asp

Dem ungetrübten Tauchspass in thailändischen Gewässern steht also nach wie vor nichts entgegen!

Wir erwarten Euch und wünschen euch immer gut Luft!

Das Poseidon Tauch-Team!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2011 from Poseidon Dive Center Ao Nang Thailand!

Project for an Artificial Reef from old C-47 Dakota Planes!
Please Donate so we can save and protect our Marine Life!

More Information here!