Rebels to the Coral Reef Cause (Part 4)

It was so cold and rainy in Cairns on Tuesday, but it didn’t stop us getting on a cruise boat and going out to Moore Reef, which is part of the Great Barrier Reef. We went on the Sunlover day cruise with about 310 other paying customers.

Peter Ridd with me and some of the participants in the IPA’s new Reef Rebels program.

It was blowing a gale and the rain was relentless, but it didn’t stop us getting into the water and seeing some corals and fishes.

Me, climbing down from the pontoon on Tuesday.

Less than 5% of the corals that I saw exhibited colourful fluorescing, which is a form of bleaching. There were so many fish and between us we saw three different species of anemone fish/clown fish.

Did you know there is such a thing as a tomato clown fish – its Latin name is Amphiprion frenatus. We also saw the dusky clown fish – Amphiprion melanopus. But the only one that I have a photograph of from Tuesday is the clown fish known as the pink skunk – Amphiprion perideraion.