Wednesday 7th May

Today I had my first ever whale shark encounter. We left Tantabiddi boat ramp at around 8 am and were taken out the our main boat "Draw Card" in the little inflatable. Whale shark tour operators begin each day with a snorkel on the Ningaloo Reef. This provides customers the chance to get used to the water and check out some of the fantastic marine life that Ningaloo Reef has to offer. It also enables the divemasters to decide whether people are strong in the water, or whether they need extra help when snorkelling.

At 10am the spotter plane goes up and starts looking for whale sharks. No one knows when or if we will see the whale sharks. Sometimes it's not until late in the afternoon, sometimes it's never! Today it was right away. At 10:05am the boat got a call on the radio telling them the direction to head for our first whale shark.

The system works by having a 'spotter' (predominantly females) jump in the water and swim out to the whale shark. Once the the spotter has found the whale shark he/she raises his/her hand in the air so that customers can swim over and see the whale shark. I swam over and peered into the crystal blue water. A dark image began to get closer and eventually i could focus in and recognised the aming creature. A 5m whale shark was slowly gliding through the water towards me. I was amazed by the size and the graceful movements of this huge creature. As it came past me I snapped a couple of photos for the www.whaleshark.org photo library and then swam alongside, observing this stunning creature.

That day was an extra lucky day, we swam with 3 different sharks, some more than once. I have included a pic below of one of the sharks we swam with....

Thursday 8th May

Another tough day on the water (hope you detected the sarcasm there). We got picked up at 7:30am by the crew from King Dive and were taken to Tantabiddi boat ramp where we were once again taken out the the main boat in the rubber duckie. Today we were on the boat 'Blue Water' and once again we had a quick snorkel then headed out the back of the reef, waiting for a call from the spotter plane. Once again, it didnt ake long to get the call. Half past ten and the call came through so it was full speed ahead to swim with our first shark of the day. It was a smaller onetoday, around 3 and a half metres in length. Today the sharks swam much slower and were a lot easier to keep up with.

We were on a mission today, to take some photos (especially left side photos behind the gills) for the photo database. When taking these photos you have to be side on to the shark and sit inline with it, directly behind the 5th gill. If you take the photo from the top or bottom on an angle, it may not be properly recognised by the computer software. The second picture I posted yesterday (found above) shows the correct orientation for taking photos for the photo ID library.

We swam with 3 sharks again today and the visibility was fantastic. In the afternoon the sea glassed off and we decied to have another snorkel. We swam with turtles, sharks, clownfish and observed many other fantastic species of corals and marine life. Another fantastic day on the spectacular Ningaloo Reef.

Friday 9th May

Today was our turn to work in the lab so we had a bit of a sleep in (well until 7am) and headed out for a coffee at the local cafe. After our coffee it was time to do some work. We upoaded all our photos from the previous day and began selecting the best ones to add to the database.

First we had to rotate the imaes so the top of the whaleshark was parallel to the top of the screen. Then we had to crop the image so just the area we need for ID was in the screen. Here is an example of a cropped and rotated image ....

After this we open the image in a program called Interconnect. Using this program, we add dots to the centre of each of the whalehsark spots. This is so the scanning software can correctly identify where the spots are on the image and then scan through the database for a match. The software is similar to the software that NASA uses to map the stars.

The final step is to actually send the photos to the www.whaleshark.org database. This is the bit that ANYONE can do. All you have to do is click on 'report and encounter now' and enter the details. You also need to add any photos (unedited) that you have taken. Preferably a left side view in the correct orientation. Details you should try find out while diving with the sharks are: Location (GPS if possible), water depth, size estimate of shark, gender of shark, direction shak is swimming and any noticeable features such as scars. Simple!

After uploading our photos, we searched through DVDs creatd by local film makers and captured images from them to add and edit. It was a long day but all for a good cause!

Saturday 10th May 2008

Today we ventured out fo our final day on the whale shark boats : (

Today we were diving with 'Ningaloo Blue' and again putted out from Tantabiddi. We started the day with a snorkel over the reef and then headed out the back of the reef to await a call from the spotter plane. Things were a bit slower today, we waited for a while but eventually a call came through and we sped out towards the whale shark.

Unfortunately the shark dived down when the first group went in from another boat so we had to wait for it to resurface. This happened time and time again, the shark would come up but when people jumped in it would dive back down out of view. Our team leader and marine biologist Helen told us that whale sharks tend to do this as they move through different patches of water. We could see patches of nice clear water which the whale sharks tend to surface in. There were also cloudier patches of greenish water. This is caused by the silty water from inside the reef moving out to sea with the tidal movement. Whale sharks seem more likley to dive when the are in this siltier greenish water.

After a few hours the shark decided to stay on the surface for much longer. We managed to snap some shots for photo ID and the customers were happy. Just another day in sunny Exmouth on the world famous Ningaloo Reef! The left side picture I shot which was used for photo ID can be seen below....