Let's move across the Indian Ocean to the Maldives.
This is actually the first story I ever did
for
And I met Guy Stevens. He's a Manta ray researcher.
And he had discovered what he reckoned was
the world's biggest manta ray feeding aggregation
in the world, and...
the place was called Hanifaru, and he had a major issue.
And the issue was the fact that this site
was basically about to be developed into a marina.
He asked me to be the first person to photograph
his manta rays.
And basically, you know, hopefully we were able to
use those images to try to raise awareness
about this amazing, amazing location there.
We had to travel in the Southeast Monsoon.
Now this is not the Maldives of your honeymoon.
It rains, it's dark, the seas are very rough
for us to get out to the study site using local boats.
The manta rays, they love it
because what happens, there's upwelling.
You know, a lot of nutrients pushed to the surface
and you know, a lot of plankton aggregate.
And these manta rays migrate there
from all across the Maldives mainly to feed.
Hanifaru Bay is basically this
sort of, little island on the bottom right
and then you have this, sort of, weird indentation in the reef.
That indentation makes for an incredible plankton trap.
And when the tides and the currents are just right
all the plankton get sucked into this bay
and it just gets circulated in this eddy.
And it just increases and increases and increases.
And this is where the manta rays go.
Now when the plankton concentrations
are quite patchy and low
the mantas, they're solo artists
they feed by themselves.
Now, imagine you are a manta ray
and the food is quite patchy.
There's a patch there, there's a patch there,
there's a patch everywhere.
Now, they can either swim through
and feed on the plankton like this
but then they have to go all the way around to come back
and by that time the patch might have moved.
So they do somersaults backwards.
Like a puppy chasing its own tail.
They just go around because, I mean
that is the most effective way for them to feed.
As the plankton density increases,
they start to feed cooperatively.
They create these feeding trains
where one lines up head to tail.
Now why do they do that?
Well, plankton can't exactly swim away from a manta ray.
But they can outmaneuver a ray.
So, the plankton can actually feel the pressure wave
of the manta ray as it swims. And they can leap
a few centimeters upwards or downwards.
And they can leap over the mouth of the ray
and then they tumble down the back.
Of course now all they do is
they've tumbled into the mouth of the next ray
or the next ray or the next ray.
So, it's an, you know, a really efficient way to...
hunt down your food.
Plankton increases,
the water gets incredibly cloudy and milky.
Hundreds of these guys are aggregating now
and they're basically coming together
for something that's called "mass feeding".
Which is when multiple of these feeding chains
kind of almost connect and they create this sort of
crazy, in your face, mass feeding ballet.
Free-diving here is quite interesting.
You know, you have to be careful not to get hit by these guys.
You know, they are completely non-aggressive but they're big.
Three, three and half meters or four meters of a wingspan.
And they can knock you out, but most of the time it's a ballet.
You know where they are going to be, they know where you are.
And then...
every year once in a while something weird happens.
You know, these sort of ballet dancers turn into drunks.
Bumper cars at a country fair, it's just things go nuts
and they start crashing into each other.
And something just goes horribly wrong with the choreography
and you know, and that's when you are in trouble
'cause you're sitting underneath them
you're holding your breath and you're going
"Oh, no!" And then you have to
swim slalom-wise to get through them
without them knocking you on the head, which...
never been hit by a manta ray, which is, you know
knock on, is this real wood? ( audience laughter )
Knock on wood. Great.
Manta rays, you know, when the plankton's gone, they leave.
And there's a few enterprising rays that have figured out
that plankton hides on the seabed.
So they go down on the bottom
and they scrape their bellies on the seabed
and all the plankton pops up out of the sand
and gets vacuumed up into the manta ray's mouth.
So, you know, incredible feeding behavior.
This was published I think in 2008 or 2009.
And overnight, you know, Hanifaru and its manta rays
were kinda teleported into the offices and homes
of millions and millions of people.
With the article, a lot of
grassroots conservation movements on the ground
and you know, a very fortunate change of government.
Hanifaru became a marine reserve that same year.
And the President himself actually vetoed the development.
So, today, you know, Hanifaru is still
the place in the world for tourists and divers to come
to actually observe this fantastic manta ray aggregation.
And it's not a marina for super-yachts, which is great.
In the Maldives, manta rays are worth way more alive than dead
and I think they bring in millions and millions
in tourism revenue, every single year.
So as far as the conservation of manta rays goes
the Maldives really are the place to be these days.