One of the most important reasons that we're doing research out here is because Monarch
Show is one of the only places in the world where pelagic pressure sharks come to such
shallow waters that we can study them in situ, that is to say in the field.
And to have that opportunity to work with these animals in a wild environment is for
a scientist and an amazing experience.
Monarch Shoal, which is the dive site we do our research at, as I say is one of the
most important in the world for pelagic pressure sharks and one of the things they do is they
come into the old shoal to clean.
So there's little blue street cleaner wraths and crescent wraths and as the sharks swim
around these wraths come up and they clean the sharks.
The sharks are loaded with parasites and they need to be cleaned, same as we have a shower
when we're dirty, the sharks need cleaning and that's what they're doing, that's why
they come into shallow to the shoal.
I'm Erin, I've been working on the project for two and a half weeks now and I've really
enjoyed my time here.
I think being a volunteer here has been an awesome experience for me and I feel like
I've gotten to do a lot of work for helping the project which has been good.
We are trained on how to dive in a way where you can get all the research done and do a
lot of things underwater without having any impact on the environment you're in.
My favorite moments I guess were when I was in the water with the animals and it was really
cool getting to see the sharks swim around and they obviously love those cleaning stations
and when I was on the site seeing the thrusher sharks it just became really real to me that
we need to preserve these areas.
They are very scared of divers yet they still come day after day in the midst of divers
in order to get clean so it's obviously really important for them to be at those spots.
My name is Medell, I'm the field operations manager for the thrusher shark research and
conservation project.
My job is to make sure that the project runs smoothly, that we're gathering data in a scientific
manner and I also train the volunteers that join us in scientific diving, we've adopted
technical diving procedures to make our dives more safer, make our work easier.
Our methodology is to deploy a remote camera down at the cleaning station and this camera
runs for five hours and we're recording behavior, natural behavior which the sharks display
which is opposite to what you would see when you're diving in the water and you're with
the sharks because we've found out that the sharks human presence influences shark behavior
and so with a remote camera we're able to observe this repertoire of behavior without
us causing any impact or influence on the sharks.
And Monad Show is very special in the sense that it's one of two sites in the world where
you can see visiting elasmor banks, particularly the pelagic thrusher shark, come to a shallow
part of the reef and get cleaned and this shallow part of the reef is well within the
recreational diving limits and a big industry, tourism industry is built around this special
interaction and it's providing livelihood and incentives and economic opportunities
for a big province in Cebu.
The sharks are reacting and interacting with divers in the water.
We're looking at the damage that divers can cause through bad diving practice which is
unfortunately something that occurs throughout the world with divers, there's a lot of divers
out there who don't dive as environmentally friendly as they could do.
We're very lucky here with the project that we work with global underwater explorers
and GUE train us and we train our volunteers in scientific techniques for diving which
prevent us and cause us to be very aware of not damaging the environment.
Any and all information we can gather for these sharks and to get more data and more
knowledge about these sharks can just only help to conserve the sharks here locally in
the Philippines, regionally in Southeast Asia and globally as well.
My name is Maeta, I'm the Education Officer for the Thresher Shark Research and Conservation
Project here in Malapasca.
So my main task is to teach the kids at the Logo National High School, we take over their
biology class twice a week, this is on Tuesdays and Thursdays, four to five in the afternoon.
We teach them basic biology stuff and marine conservation, basically these are the things
that everybody should know like take care of the corals, why it's important and what
we can do to conserve the environment.
We are spreading information everywhere, especially to these kids, starting them young, letting
them know about conservation and hopefully getting them to love their place so that they
will conserve it in their own way.
Tell any volunteer that's thinking you come here that they should definitely come because
their efforts are really going to a great cause, you're going to meet a lot of great
people in the community that really appreciate the work that you do and you're going to have
a great time diving every day and just living in paradise.
Thank you guys for watching.
You
