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Philippine Paradise Divers7,107 Islands of Diving Heaven (yes, we counted). The meeting place for those interested in some of the best diving in the world - the Philippines.
In Sarangani Bay, Gen San City, in April 3 years ago a couple of friends while drinking a few cold ones decided that it was time that something should be done about the poor state of some or the reefs in the area! It was decide, after a few more cold ones that the local government would not do anything so it was to be their baby!
Very soon, the artificial reef domes started to flow into the bay and areas beyond and as of now a total of 4,868 domes are deployed, not bad in 3 years!
The coral cover varies from area to area but some of the coral cover is more than we expected in our wildest dreams! Maybe (Dr Stan]can help with a few photo's as he has been doing a wonderful job of recordin the progress of the domes!
In many areas the fish population has blossomed and at Lion Beach, which used to be more like a septic tank rather than a city fore shore from seeing just 3 fish during a 1 hour dive (lots of Brown Flounders though) today, with 700 domes in the water the fish population as increased to at least 40 families of fish mounting into the thousands!
The project is totally non profit as each dome is sold for p200, less than 3$ which is the cost price, all diving, transport to site by road and boat is all donated so no money is wasted!
This project has been done using all local materials so we are hoping that maybe some interested parties in and around the Philippines might want to creat a similar project in their home waters!
Here in Gen San we are a very small diving group so I am sure that it would be a much more simple event in areas with many divers, who knows, you might be able to sell domes to visiting divers who can deploy them themselves!
Our project is very successfull and if you do not believe me then come and see for yourselves! You will be made very welcome!
Cheers.
These 5 members have said "Thank you." to Gen San Chris for this useful post:
Good stuff Chris, that a lot of work getting all those domes in the water. When do you think number 5,000 will sink, a month or two? I thought I might put up a couple of dome pictures, although Dr Stan will have much better ones...And I know you have a lot of pictures of the dome molding and deployment.
Heres a shot showing new domes behind an older one which was starting to show the beginnings of coral growth, with the dome masterminds floating above.
And this one had made a lot of progress, by now it must really be covered with corals.
Look forward to seeing Dr Stans pictures, maybe a superdome shot?
This member has said "Thank you." to Kupu for this useful post:
WELCOME TO CULASI, ANTIQUE, PHILIPPINES
Soon we will open the doors to the only SCUBA diving resort in the area. Come see our part of the Sulu Sea. PADI OWSI /EFRI / SPECIALTY INSTRUCTOR #481247 www.panayexplorers.com
I have had a couple of inquiries on how to construct the domes so I will try to explain it in simple terms as I am a simple person! Being a bit thick i will get Dr Stan to post the pictures and I will give the explanation of how to construct!
very cool! Did you need to get permits to sink them? Would we need permits? $3 is pretty cheap...can't imagine they would be that affordable to make here.
The above picture of a basic hollow concrete hollow block was which first gave us the idea to do an artificial reef project! At the time we first really looked at it it had an Octopus in one compartment and a Lion Fish in another, I had been in the water for quite some time!
Having read lots of stuff about the concrete requirements which say that only marine cement must be used and the mixture must have the PH balance similar to the local water!
Having seen this hollow block we wondered if the local block maker knew of the special requirements for concrete in the ocean or was it not really so important and the normal concrete mix would do!
From this, we decided that for our project we would use normal and locally available Portland Cement as it was also cheap and easy to get!
Thats how we started the Reef Dome Project, the next picyures from Dr Stan will show the simple stages of how we made the domes and it will show you the simple form work that we used!
Thanks for your interest!
Hi,
I started a blog on how the blocks are made today showing a hollow block where the domes idea came from, there should be a seriese of pictures starting tomorow how to make them, I hope these show you how to make them!
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