Article: Rich heritage under the sea

Saturday September 5, 2009

By ZULFIGAR YASIN

IF the diversity of corals is taken as the currency of richness in the undersea kingdom, Malaysia will certainly be one of the weal-thiest nations in the world.

If an imaginable line is drawn linking the richest nations whose diversity of corals is at a maximum — a line connecting the seas with more than 70 genera of corals, it will form a perimeter around the seas of Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea and northern Australia. The area is now generally known as the 'Coral Triangle.'

This fact has repeatedly been underlined by recent scientific assertions since it was pointed out by one of the better known coral gurus, Charles Veron, more than 10 years ago.

Diversity in biology is taken as a sign of stability and so it generally stands that a diversified habitat is indicative of its good health.

The submerged reef with stony corals reaching for the light.

In the South China Sea alone the total acreage of reefs is more than 10,000 sq km with all the different types of reef habitats being represented.

The coral reefs themselves are home to many living creatures. Some are familiar but many are still waiting to be discovered.

It is generally acknowledged amongst scuba divers that the 'lifescape' (as opposed to landscape) changes as you explore the reefs in the day and again at night.

The day scenery is composed of fish and the sedentary marine backdrop such as corals and plants.

If you don a torch and take another dip after sunset, it is entirely a different panorama. Cryptic animals that lie hidden within the structure of the reefs start to appear at dusk. Among this nocturnal assemblage, you will discover the feather stars and basket stars (cousins of the starfish) looking for plankton.

There will be shrimps and lobsters. Larger moray eels forage the crevices for crabs, which in turn rummage the sand for food.

Then there are myriad creatures that defy common classification — is it a crab or a spider?

Even the water, itself, appears to be alive. Within the beam of your torch, tiny creatures congregate. Some, like insects to a flame, hover and tickle your ears. Others are long and stringy and form translucent glass-like mucilage as they emerge from the deep.

A humphead wrasse resting within a coral promontory at night.

Perhaps just as anonymous as these creatures are the scientists that study them. These valuable specialists spend most of their time differentiating or lumping these animals into their various groups.

Many animals, like insects, metamorphosed into externally different creatures as they age but to which box do they belong?

The taxonomists are a dying breed. It takes years of training and more of experience to name their specialised groups of animals and plants with any certainty.

It is said that the South China Sea is endowed with over 3,200 species of fish at the last taxonomic count — about 300 species of stony corals, 203 species of sea cucumbers and several species of dolphins (perhaps one extra if the Sarawak platanistoidean river dolphin turns out not to be a rumour).

Such accounting is vital and is one of the main objectives of this scientific expedition.

My young toddler asked me an innocent question the other day, "Do fish sleep at night?" I explained that fish do not sleep as they do not have eyelids and, therefore, could not shut their eyes.

But then again, as I probed the crevices of the reefs at night with the light of my underwater torch, I chanced on a group of humphead wrasse sidled quietly beneath a rock. So this is where they 'sleep'.

With the diversity of life comes the diversity of behaviour. I will have to tell my daughter that they look fast asleep with their eyes wide open but I definitely did not hear them snore.

* The writer, a marine biologist at Universiti Sains Malaysia, is on a 52-day expedition with 30 scientists undertaking research on the marine world in the South China Sea, Sulu Sea and Sulawesi Sea.

This article was taken  from: The Star Online: Metro: North, 5 September 2009