This year in July I went back to finish the project.
Constructing the giant steel hands wasn’t always easy. Working with very limited resources, in temperatures well above 30 degrees and mother nature who made welding impossible with heavy rain.

Photo’s Carla August

But when we, with the help of many people, finally had the hands in place on the bottom and during my safety stop with Frank back to the surface, I looking down to see those giant hands standing in the CoralGarden, the reward couldn’t be any greater!

Photo Lee Jellyman

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The local action group Get Involved Koh Tao every month organizes an EcoDay and is active to persuade bars to stop using plastic straws and plastic cups. On EcoDay many divers, freedivers and tourists from different diveschools come together to get a morning full of education with presentations and documentaries. In the afternoon the group is split up to do a beach clean-up, a reef clean-up and join building or assembling the new artificial reef under water.

We know the drill of building a flower underwater with divers, but freediving is quiet a bit different. Bringing parts of structures down with freedivers has been done before. And now is the next challenge, assembling the flower. A pair of two freedivers take a deep breath, go down and assemble a piece of the flower. When you “run out of air”, you go up and do your recovery breath. On the surface your buddy keeps an eye out for your safety. Then the next pair goes down and assembles the next leaf, etcetera. Sometimes it takes longer to put a piece in the flower, so when you can’t hold your breath any longer you have to leave it for the next team. It is great fun to work on the flower as a team. Great for the team spirit as well!

All the freedivers had to go down many times. When they came back on the boat, they were really exhausted. But I will never forget the smiles on their faces!

Thanks to Blue Immersion for their involvement creating a few flowers on our workplace and assembling the flower under water. Big thanks to Ocean Candy for the beautiful video!

Thank you for all (divers and freedivers) who participated in this amazing achievement! It was great to have one big boat full of dive enthusiasts sharing this experience with different dive methods. Wonderful to see we all share the same passion!

And of course thanks to our local partners on Koh Tao and the sponsors and donators from all over the world. Thank you to all who make this possible!

Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see the video of planting the flower.

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On June 30, there was the monthly EcoDay on Koh Tao and CoralGardening took this opportunity to put two new statues down underwater, with the volunteers who made it. There were two groups for the two statues, one with scuba divers led by Charlotte and Emiel and one with freedivers led by Vera. Me myself had taken the job of supplying the materials from the boat to the divers. Fortunately, I could just take part in assembling under water, by filling the flower with the ballast and placing the top on one of the flowers. The assembling of a flower by the freedivers was a new experience for me and many of us. Also because it is the first time an artificial reef has been created, put down and assembled by freedivers.

During their presence on Koh Tao, Frank and Vera are experimenting with materials. In addition to the concrete mache developed by CoralGardening in 2015, we have also made flowers consisting of metal and sisal. In my opinion the concrete-mache flowers are more beautiful to see, but they are also harder to plant coral on, an important thing. With the ropes, it is easier to open the rope and place the coral between the fibers and then close the rope so that it holds the coral. They also experiment with a full metal flower. This new flower has the great advantage that these are much easier to connect to Bob’s Coral Aid.

After this successful placement, we organized a “CoralGardening only” construction morning. With the five of us (me, Frank, Vera, Emiel and Charlotte) we made various leafs, with Charlotte learning to weld. This was a very charming face. Later during my holiday we did this again, by that time Charlotte was already back in the Netherlands. I was able to discover my own welding qualities and was not dissatisfied with the result, and even the critical Vera could live with the final product.

Charlotte gets a lecture from Emiel.

I also learned to weld.

And yes, now you have flowers underwater so then you need some coral on it. One week after the placement we went to the CoralGarden by longtail, twice in one week with the CoralGardening crew. We collect broken pieces of coral from the sandy bottom, that are still alive and place it on the flowers. Half of the corals we put on the rope flower and the rest on the concrete flowers. It proved to be true that correct coral placement is a skill. It is important that the coral is firmly connected so that it can attach itself to the substrate, the flowers in this case.

Finally, the building of the flowers and planting coral on it, is great fun to do. But it must also be maintained and of course it has to be monitored if it is growing well. We returned with the longtail and we strengthened the foundations of one of the flowers and we cleaned the concrete mache leaf from the algae that growth on it. We also did a baseline measurement of the size of the coral and the degree of bleaching. Now I’m curious about the results in a half year. And oh yes, I have learned something new: diving slates FLOAT. When you are at eleven meters and you are focussed on measuring, and when you look up to see your notes floating to the surface. My reaction was not something recommended by dive instructors, but I could finish my notes at least.

Summarizing, it was a great and productive holiday and it gave me a good feeling about the project.

Arjan Blaauw

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In the afternoon I joined them at a flower building workshop. I was feeling kid again for a few hours. Bending metal, sculpting with chicken wire and “paper mache’ing” with concrete and cloths.

After the workshop Frank an I started chatting. I wanted to know more about coral and artificial reefs. I just had no clue yet what I could offer the project. Time passed by. Frank and Vera went back to Holland to raise money for the project. I started doing my instructor course and we kind of lost touch. Till in early February Frank and Vera came back to the island and I bumped into them again during another Eco Day. I joined another workshop and I guess I had some smart ideas how to improve the project. That’s when things started to roll.

Since then I started to become more and more part of CoralGardening. I have a background in Engineering and Frank and Vera on regular basis throw constructional problems at me what is fun for me to solve. We have hours long brainstorm sessions about how we can improve the project and what we can change. At the same time Frank and Vera educate me more about coral and building artificial reefs.

But not just that. Frank and Vera inspired people to think further. Building an artificial reef is cool and fun to do, but it is very small scale. In my opinion this is not the only solution to solve bigger issues like coral bleaching and climate change. Inspired by the flower building project, I started thinking about what I can do to improve our ocean. Personally I think that awareness, educating people about what is happening to our ocean and our world is important. Based on that thought I’m now working on setting up a presentation for Thai school kids to educate them what is happening with our ocean. And hopefully soon I will be giving this presentation throughout different cities in Thailand!

What inspires you? What can you do to improve our ocean? Think about it for 5 min. Talk about it with your friends. It doesn’t have to be big, every little bit helps!!

Thanks Frank and Vera for all the fun and inspiration so far. Hopefully much more to come!!

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1. Reduce the use of energy, water and raw materials. Choose for renewable energy sources. Climate change accelerates both the rise of the ocean water temperature as ocean acidification. Both are bad for corals.
   The Footprint Challenge
   Sustainable Lifestyle
2. Reduce and recycle waste: In the Netherlands, plastic is only partially recycled. Most of it gets burned or landfilled. Street waste eventually ends up in the ocean. Choose sustainable products.
   The Majestic Plastic Bag (Mockumentary: how litter ends up in the ocean)
   Zero Waste Home
   GreenBiz – What makes a sustainable product?
3. Get rid of your car. Go hiking, take the bicycle or public transport. If it’s impossible to get rid of your car, choose an electric car.
   Sustainable Mobility
4. Learn more about the ocean, for example by watching documentaries, reading books, discussing with family, friends or organizing a theme evening at your local association.
   Movies for action
   Ocean Documentaries
5. With spending your money you vote for what matters to you, every time you do so. But what does your bank do with the money on your account? Switch to a sustainable bank.
   Global Alliance for Banking on Values
6. Support an organization that protects the ocean (donate money or time) and sign petitions that contribute to a clean and healthy ocean.
   Overview different organizations
7. Do not eat fish: there is no sustainable fishing, we are emptying our ocean. Fish is necessary for the natural balance of our seas. They eat fast-growing algae that are in conflict with coral.
   Overfishing
   National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration – Overfishing
   If you want to eat fish, know which fish is critical endangerd with extinction!
   By-catch

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We do not know where the males and females meet. For a long time scientists thought that whale shark lay eggs. This is not the case, they are carrying their babies like humans. How long the females are pregnant and where they give birth is not known. Baby whale sharks can be 30 to 60 cm long at birth. In the past a female was found dead with 300 babies in her body.

There are several ongoing researches on these very beautiful animals. If you see a whale shark it is the requested to take a picture of both sides, preferably at least his/her left side and send it to www.whaleshark.org. The whale sharks dots and lines are unique, just like our fingerprint. At whaleshark.org they can see where the whale shark has been before or that it is a new one in their database. By researching their whereabouts, researchers try to map the migration behavior of the whale shark. Our first whale shark we saw in 2010 was not registered yet and is included in the database thanks to our photographs.

This year, Koh Tao has seen more whale sharks than ever before. How comes, nobody knows. This is being investigated and recorded by different organizations, including Koh Tao’s Facebook page: Koh Tao Whalesharks.

If you see a whale shark, you know what to do: enjoy it and take a photo from the left side and send it to whaleshark.org.

Please take notice of the Code of Conduct when approaching a whale shark:

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Ninja is running around at the workshop area, she is a red cat. Are you curious how she helps us in her own way creating artificial reefs? Then look at our YouTube channel. And give us a paw by subscribing to our channel.

Ninja, the CoralCat

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We signed up for the activities of the New Heaven Reef Conservation Program (NHRCP). In the morning we attended a lecture from Pau about mineral accretion devices. These are systems that place a very weak current on a metal structure that is placed under water. This current accelerates the natural process of calcium carbonate depositing on the iron structure. The coral grows faster and is better resistant to diseases. And it also prevents the iron from rusting. CoralGardening is looking forward to connecting the Coral-Aid system to the CoralGarden.

After the lecture we dive to pick up broken pieces of coral and attach these on the metal constructions. Fun work! To get a little impression of how this works look at our video at the bottom of this page.

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EcoDay starts with a number of presentations in the morning. Frank gives a presentation about the importance of coral reefs and what you can do to protect these. The audience reacts enthusiastically to the presentation. After the presentation, a large group of people are inspired to participate in the planting of the flower in the afternoon.

After Frank, Mathieu, of the organization Blueming, gives a short presentation about reducing the use of single-use plastic. How can you contribute to this? This is often part of our presentation. It is interesting to hear this from someone else sometimes.

The last presentation is by Marcel of Get Involved. He talks about the use of social media in major cultural changes. It is important to have a positive attitude. “Blame and shame” does not work. The effect of blame and shame it creates a negative atmosphere, people will not like you for it and eventually people will not want to work with you anymore. In addition, subsequent messages are often not very constructive. The trick is to focus more on people who already made a positive change. When you put them in the spotlights, social media often gives you many more positive and constructive responses. Plus that people who want to change can see that change is possible. This creates a platform for these people to ask questions to those who have already made positive changes.

The last point is: Walk the Talk! People do not do what you say, they do what you do! Be the change you want to see and inspire others.

In the afternoon we get started with the flower. We have about 20 people to help us to plant the flower. Vera gives a briefing on how to put the flower together. Also the task of who does what is discussed and last who takes what part of the flower under water.

Due to the waves on the west side of the island, we go by taxi to Hin Wong Bay, the east side of the island. The roads are constructed differently here than in Europe. Here are no hairpin bends to steadily climb the hill, the roads go just straight up. A steep and challenging road, a roller coaster is nothing compared to these rides. The car stales a few times before we reach the top of the mountain. Safe at the top we drive down the other side of the island.

On the other side of the island we load all the stuff from the taxi onto the big boat that brings us to the divesite. With the small boat of Davy Jones Locker, the different parts of the flower are brought from the big boat to the Coral Garden. The parts of the flower are sunk 1 by 1 to the bottom. The small parts are simply taken by divers to the bottom. The heavy parts are brought down with liftbags or ropes. For most divers, this is a new and interesting experience. But equally exciting. Most divers are not used to diving with their hands full. Does no one drop a part unintentionally? Or does no one forget that if he/she lets go of a part, that he/she suddenly has a lot more positive buoyant? Fortunately, everyone is well instructed and everything goes well!

The only thing that is less fortunate is the visibility underwater. As the flower is placed on a sandy place, it is difficult to not disturb the soil. The water is getting a little more silted around the flower. This is not a problem for planting the flower, but unfortunately, this is not good for making pictures.

As mentioned in a previous newsletter, the first flower was thrown over by the strong currents and landslides that occurred close by last January. During this dive we will also try to restore this flower again. The flower is firmly nailed to the ground with a number of anchor hooks. In this way she will definitely be ready for the next monsoon season.

The operation goes smooth! We are proud of all our volunteers and want to thank them for their efforts. We also want to thank our donators who have made this wonderful result possible by their donations. Without donations for the materials we could not realize this flower. Check out the video of placing the flower here, and subscribe to our YouTube Channel to receive a notification when we made our next video.

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There have been encounters with whale sharks at various locations for several weeks. A mother and young, or two at the same time, that also “talk” to each other and even one shark with a rope around his tail, which was removed by a brave diver. In short, we also wanted to see a whale shark. We took a day off and went on an excursion. It’s always a gamble, we did not count on actually seeing one, as the encounters are rare. In the 13 years I’ve been diving, I’ve seen just one.

At 6 o’clock we left on a fully loaded boat. We arrived on the dive site after about 2 hours. There is another boat present. We tie our boat to the boat line, and immediately a small group of divers jumps overboard.

When everything has come to a rest, we enter the water. We are not the only ones who have come to see if the stories about whale shark sightings are true. There are dozens of other divers. It’s a real whale shark Mania. But I cannot deny participating myself, otherwise I would not be here.

I enjoy the beautiful coral and the many fishes, until somebody pulls my fin. I look around and it appears to be Vera. She points upwardsenthusiastically . And yes, it wouldn’t have been the first time to happen, but I almost missed the whale shark that swam over me. It’s a small one. Men usually have some difficulty assessing sizes, but I try nonetheless: 3 to 4 meters. It is an amazing view seeing him / her swimming on a light background and accompanied by a lot of remorse / suction fish. You become quiet and before you know it, he / she has passed you. We continue with our dive.
As mentioned, there are quite a lot of divers. You may have seen a group of fish or birds that suddenly change flight or swimming direction. Well, the divers act like that too. Suddenly they all go to the right, a little less coordinated than the fish, but still. You start to suspect another whale shark. And indeed, he appears between all the bubbles and divers. Divers respond in different ways, some spear forward with their GoPro on their selfie stick, as if they want to pinch the shark. Others keep calm in their place and just look. I choose for the last, not wanting to interfere with this mighty beast. I wonder what the whale shark thinks about all the divers and their bubbles. He swims right towards Vera, she moves aside and the shark calmly passes. So there’s at least 2 whale sharks! And one of them was rescued from that rope on his tail recently. The scar is clearly visible. I’m happy knowing that he survived. A tribute to the responisble diver, removing that cannot have been easy.

When we emerge, we see about a dozen boats have arrived. A couple of diving boats but also some speed boats. While we rest on ours, we suddenly hear a scream! One of the whale sharks has emerged and swims on the surface. The boat next to us almost rolls over, as everyone hurries to the side to get another glimps of this animal. It’s intereseting to see how the shark behaves. It’s going straight towards the divers and snorklers, which of course bolt away. Then it turns towards one of the boats, and in his curiosity almost hits the camera of a guy on the stern. What a sight.

We can enter the water for a second dip after an hours’ rest. And we meet him again! It’s a great dive: great clarity, beautiful coral, many beautiful schools of batfish, baracuddas, groupers and of course, at least 2 whale sharks! It could not have been better. Isn’t diving great?

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