News from the divers of the Scubasigns Foundation
August 18, 2010 Leave a comment
Scubadiver Australasia just hit the shops with the whalesharks of Ahe on the cover and a story on the whalesharks by ‘yours truly’ Get your copy or have a peak at the digital version here
July 9, 2010 Leave a comment
Never saw this one before… the fishermen and whale sharks over here have developed a special relationship. The fishermen feed them small fish by hand.
June 26, 2010 Leave a comment
one of the whale sharks playing peek-a-boo at the fishing platforms near Ahe.
June 12, 2010 3 Comments
At first it looked as if the whale shark was going to have Mike as a small morning snack but it turned out they 
became really good friends. We had the privilege of witnessing something very special on a two hour meet and greet with some very friendly whale sharks in Cenderawasih Bay Papua where we stayed in the 
Ahe dive resort. All is going really well on this scubasigns project and we receive more and more guests that like us are amazed with the whale sharks and their behaviour.
Note… at the Ahe Dive Resort we follow a strict no touch, chase or in any other way harm a whale shark policy .. so far the divers/snorklers comply but the whale sharks just won’t listen.
May 2, 2010 Leave a comment
Thanks to the training of Rutger, Annet & Maurice our staff learned a lot the last weeks.
Rutger Annet & Maurice kicked of with an open water training to staff that did not yet have their certificate.
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Congratulations to Stephen Raraawi, Jeksi Manuaron, Polyo Sawaki, Risal Manuaron and Rido Manuaron. All staff on Ahe now have a diving certificate. Even when our staff is not part of the dive team, we still encourage them to dive for their hobby and get to know their unique environment.Next all staff received a training on dangerous marine life and the first emergency respons if problems occur! Everybody loved this / very interesting!!
Robert Sawaki, Enos Sawaki & Lupiaga Rouw received their advanced training. They will follow further training on rescue and divemaster and will be prepared to strenghten our current dive team.
Then there was a unique training given by Rutger to the dive team, our captians and head of diving materials Yulian. Rutger learned them everything about servicing and repairing their dive gear and that of the visiting tourists if need be. Big big thanks go out to Eddy van Vliet of Scuba Support in Loosdrecht, Rob
Dekker of Dive Post in Zoetermeer and Richard Wagenaar! They donated a huge amount of special tools that we need to do the service and repairs.. stuff like that is like gold for us in Papua (not available!!) thanks ever so much!
Our staff loves to learn and will never forget the truly unique experience Rutger, Annet and Maurice gave them!
April 23, 2010 3 Comments
When diving with the whale sharks at Ahe, you don’t just see one swimming by but they stay at the same location for hours. Sometimes we encounter a few (2-3) but if you are lucky it is teaming with whale sharks.. record stands at 10 individuals during one dive. The reason for them staying at one spot is because they like to suck on the nets of the soft net fishing boats. These boats go out fishing at night using bright lights to attract the bigger fish. They use smaller fish to attract even more. The smaller fish are kept in a big net under the boat and the whale
sharks swim up to these nets and start sucking on them. We don’t yet know why. .is it because they can suck the small fish through the maze, is it because the plankton concentration is higher? We have yet got to find out. Here are some pictures of the whale sharks in action…. Ps.. we have found out that the two days after full moon we don’t encounter whale sharks / reason is very simple, because then there is another big ‘light’ in the sky and the boats don’t go out fishing using their lamps. The days after full moon also the visibility gets worse (see the difference in water color in the pictures). Normally we do get up to 50 meters!! We have now set up a partnership with various organisations to find out more about the behaviour of these magnificent animals. Mike and I will stay on one of these fishing boats for a couple of days to see if we can find out more and the dive team will start a whale shark identifying project to see if we can understand how large the whale shark population is and if some of them have been seen in other parts of the world before. More will follow in the course of June. What is also very interesting to see is their behaviour when we are diving with them. It is a policy around the world that snorkling with whale sharks is prefered 
above diving because the whale sharks are afraid of the bubbles. We see that around here it is completely different. They swim into the bubbles on purpose because they somehow like the feeling, they will even try to ‘gulp’ the bubbles with their mouths. The whale sharks come up to you very close as long as you stay very calm and relaxed and don’t chase them as some torpedo. We see that when we don’t interfere with their behaviour and keep our cool they
come up to us. They check us out to around one meter in front of us and then gently choose direction.
April 13, 2010 4 Comments
some first picks! We used only natural materials and included a private kamar mandi (bathroom) in these spacious bungalows all with view of the beautiful sea.
March 9, 2010 Leave a comment
Just a nice picture of Ahe to dream away for a minute, taken by Richard Pelupessy on his dive trip to Ahe Eco Dive Resort Papua.
March 5, 2010 Leave a comment
One of the local Dive guides on Ahe Michael Wabes was unfortunate enough to step on a stingray. Not for the first time…. for the 5th time. There are a lot of stingrays of varying sorts around Ahe, but none of us or the other divers ever got stung. Michael appears to be a magnet to these animals. The pain inflicted is of the category … ‘ really ouch ”’ in the first hour to hour and a half after the sting / it went straight through the shoe of his fin by the way. Fortunate enough the medical post at Mambor (15 minutes by boat) offered quick assistence so Michael was back on his feet and diving again within a day. Want to know how to best treat a stingray sting? visit this link.
February 18, 2010 Leave a comment
One of the big attractions in the Ahe Dive resort are the residential whale sharks. They are always there / 365 days a year. So if you want a private session with our big neighbours, please let us know and we will welcome you on our island! On the picture you can see one of the bigger Whale Sharks we call Wim together with Diveguide Michael. We named him Wim after Mr. Drs Wim CH Rumbino (minister of tourism & culture Papua Province). His continuos help means a lot to the development of Ahe!
Click on the picture to see a full size view:
Diveguide Michael and his big friend Wim
