Raine Island - Nature's Cradle on the Edge of the Coral Sea
Satellite Web Cast From Turtle Heaven and Hell
Journal Entry - 12- 3 - 02

Sitting here at the keyboard of this Apple G4, I am reflecting back on how special today has been. We were back at Raine from Great Detached reef by 7:00 am. The searing low profile of the island and smell of bird guano gives the island a forbidding aura. From fifty yards offshore we can see several turtles obviously moribund and struggling to make it back to the water. If they are still on the beach in two hours they will most probably die there. Several carcasses visible in our limited range of vision show just how tough it is for the turtles. By the end of the first day at Raine I had the thrill of watching, albeit from the boat, female turtles start to come ashore, breaking the wave line. Somehow there was something thrilling watching this 120 million year old natural history process. At about 6:30, sunset, we saw the first five turtles appear like crawling boulders, out of the tidal surge. In another hour and half there were some 60 or 70 turtles crawling up the beach looking for nesting sites
What a thrilling sight! Even having seen umpteen nature shows on television somehow doesn't diminish the feeling of how special this place is. There are between 1000 and 1500 turtles coming ashore a night which isn't a particularly high number for this island. But what this figure does mean is that at any given time there between 15 and 20,000 turtles in the water around the island. Which is a lot of turtles.
We did three dives today. To get to two of the dive sites we took the zodiac and motored fifteen minutes around the island to the East side. On the way we must have seen more than a hundred turtles floating about, gliding and resting in the deep blue water. One of the dives we dropped in and swam back to the South working with about twenty turtles as we made our way back towards our mother ship the Floreat. Several allowed a very close gentle approach before moving slowly away. On our second dive we headed back out to the eastern most point of the island and dropped into the blue water - right into the middle of eight turtles which promptly darted for the deep.
Late in the afternoon we had a boat visit us from a resort about 60 miles away. The boat pulled alongside and we exchanged pleasantries. It was only a few minutes and we recognized that one of the resort guests on the boat was former Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawk. Shortly after learning about our visitors I jumped in the water for a late afternoon dive, taking the Nikon D100 in the Sea & Sea D100 housing. This time I set up the camera to operate on auto focus. I also took my trusty Nexus housing with a Nikon f4 and a 105 mm macro lens shooting film. This was the housing which, for some reason, leaked for two days. No more. We have a few more little kinks to work out but things are getting there. This dive was sort quiet time for me getting back to work of finding subjects and just slowly working away making images. Dusk is a very nice time to be on the reef. There is a lot going on and the light is beautiful.
We also did a test and confirmed that we will be able to use a specially designed infrared light filter to shoot turtles laying in absolute darkness with the digital cameras. Should provide some interesting material.
And in closing, at 11 pm, we've just had another two visitors to the back of the boat: one charming and the other an interesting yet less desirable visitor. The first was a green turtle hatchling. Very cute. Probably minutes out of the egg. Swam right to the swim step and was plucked from the water for a few minutes and then returned. The other is a new species of box jelly fish which, my colleague and team member, Dr. Jamie Seymour, confirms is a new species and because some of the specimens captured had vertebrate prey in their tentacle or bells they are obviously venomous to humans therefore the chances of us night diving have been reduced. Nothing is said about all the sharks swimming around. They'll just play with your head. Box jellyfish will kill you.
Don't forget you can email us questions at
raineexpedition@netcarrier.com


The Raine Island project begins in earnest........ and you will be there.
Built on an Apple G4 Titanium Powerbook courtesy of Apple Computers Inc., Connected to the world by Iridium Satellite LLC and Digital eyes courtesy of Nikon - the new D100 digital camera, Captured on LexarMedia digital film.
© 2002, Paul Sutherland Photography LLC. All images and text on this and every other page on this web site are protected by US and international copyright law. No unauthorized use of any kind whatsoever is permitted.
Photo Captions:
• Kerra Lin: This is the boat used by the Raine Island corporation research. It is owned by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority.
• Seymour Tag Test: Dr.Seymour listening through headphones in order to test the range of the tags he will attach to turtles in order to track their movements around the island.
• Sweet lips: One of several species of fish with the common name sweet lips.
• Clingfish: These little fish live commensally hidden in the core tentacles of certain species of crinoid feather stars (you'll have to look it up on the web) I'll shoot the whole animal tomorrow as a reference.
• Camera setup: Dr. Jamie Seymour (in blue) and Ian Bell prepare a housing for Ian's Nikon 990 digital camera.
• Batfish: These curious fish often swim right up to divers attracted by the bubbles exhaled. Shot with the Nikon D100. Obviously have much to learn with this new system. But I was surprised how quickly one can flatten the learning curve.