Day six is complete! The trip is sadly almost over. Went out on two more dives, but these were really cool since they were dives out to shipwrecks. We saw the ships up close and swam through the decks of two different ships. The bigger wreck was the Kittiwake, an ex-navy submarine rescue vessel. It was sunk for the purposes if creating an artificial reef and a cool dive site. Unfortunately, however, we learned that the ship had been moved significantly by storms and the ship was now on its side and had little reef built up on it. The second wreck had not been moved in any way, so the reef was much more prominent there. In addition to the wrecks themselves, we took a look at the surrounding reefs as well. I saw many similar fish, and I even saw a ray swimming in the distance with a fish tailing right beside it. This was super cool because, like the turtle from yesterday, it was the first ray I had seen in the open ocean.
Because of this, I remembered our trip to Stingray City and realized that, in both instances, fish were close to the rays. I decided to look into this because I have noticed it happens with sharks as well. In the case of sharks, they are typically followed either by pilot fish or remora. These fish share a symbiotic relationship with the sharks because they are provided with protection from predators and scraps of food that the shark did not eat. In return, the shark has parasites that irritate ornsicken the shark and they are eaten by these fish. I figured that there was similar relationship between the rays and the fish that followed them. At Stingray City, the rays are being fed by divers and I would assume that the fish are there to collect any scraps that were missed or uneaten by the rays. In return, predators that eat the fish but not the rays will ignore the fish since they can hide behind the rays for protection. It was interesting to see to how fish can develop relationships and co-exist in their environment so well. This eventually leads to a dependence on each other that is not based solely on a dietary restriction, such as the need for one organism to eat another certain organism for survival.
The day then continued with a beach clean-up, where we found loads of trash along the shore. It was satisfying to help the environment by ridding it of some waste. Cannot wait until tomorrow’s last two dives! It will certainly be super fun and will end the trip in a very cool way!
