To get an idea of green turtle densities on foraging grounds around the Derawan Archipelago I hopped over the border to Malaysia to visit the islands around Semporna (Mabul, Sipadan, Pom Pom, & Pandanan). Steve Oakley and Celebes Beach resort were so kind to host me on Pom Pom Island. Read the blog post by […]
Author Archives: Marjolijn
Experiment finalized
The last fieldwork of my Phd is finished! While writing this blog post in Dubai on the way back to the Netherlands the dried seagrass samples patiently wait on the seat next of me, together with the other 70kg of equipment where I travel with. The first unofficial results are promising. On the aerial pictures […]
And it flies!
After crashing my aerial photography plane directly after the first flight, we retrieved the bits and pieces (the plane from the top of a 70m telephone tower & the catapulted-rest by logging a 20m perimeter of bushes), and shipped the plane around the world to get repaired. But 1.5 months later DHL delivered it in […]
Green turtle foraging in Raja Ampat
Our second destination in our quest to find the green turtle foraging grounds was Raja Ampat. Some of the tracks of the GPS tagged turtles show foraging greens that travel all the way from Raja Ampat to Kalimantan. We were based at Kri with papua diving and did 2 short expeditions; 1 to Batanta & 1 to Wayag […]
Green turtle Foraging areas in Wakatobi
After spending so much time on Derawan where green turtles are so abundant we wanted to compare Derawan with other foraging grounds in Indonesia. Wakatobi was our first destination. In contrast to nesting sites of which a lot is known. It is unclear where the green turtles forage in Indonesia, so the majority of the […]
Notes from the field: Barang Lompo, South Sulawesi
This time my colleague from Singapore Siti Yaakub wrote up a story on a recent check of the seagrass near Makassar, Sulawesi. With my photo’s next to it. Enjoy it on the Seagrass Online site!
Article in Seagrass Watch
I was delighted to be requested to provide an article for Seagrass Watch magazine. The articles is published in the November issue. You can download the issue from their site (my article is on page 6) or download directly from the Seagrass Watch site (big pdf of 22MB). Enjoy the reading!
The latest experiment on Derawan
Just got back on the mainland. Last month we succesfully set-up a large experiment on Derawan to look at interactive effects of hydrodynamics & turtle grazing on seagrasses. This involved building 30 cages and 15 large underwater wave-bunkers for which we almost used al the sand from the nearby sand spit. To determine the location […]
Checklist week 1 fieldwork Indonesia
And were back! To give you an idea of what we did before travelling to our remote fieldwork site, here’s a (simplified) checklist: Arrange research & travel permit, KITAS, letters for governors, certificate of good conduct police (10 trips, at least 3 days) Give presentation at World Delta Summit & follow EcoDynamic Design workshop Buy […]
CERF fieldwork trip: Manatee!
After a week of CERF-ing (Conference of the Coastal & Estuarine Research Federation) in Daytona Beach, Florida, USA, I was totally saturated with new knowledge. So a great time to go out to the field & spend a day searching for Florida seagrasses near Sebastian Inlet. Lori, our guide never saw the seagrass in such […]