DOLPHINS RANGIROA: TOUCH YOUR KEY?

Like many of you, for about 5 years, I have been discovering here and there images of divers stroking dolphins in the middle of the Tiputa pass in Rangiroa. Strange behavior because, 20 years ago, it happened quite regularly to meet them but no contact had been observed. Except with Junko, a Japanese instructor who gave a beefy effect to a large resident male… How? Why? I decided to go there to find out and try to find an explanation if there really is one ...

RANGIROA: OUR EXPERIENCE WITH THE DOLPHINS

Often heard, I only saw them 3 times out of the twenty or so dives carried out on site. Twice very furtively, a brief passage just to say ... and goodbye. It was during my last immersion that I was able to take these few images. No editing, no cuts, no fades, it's a sequence of almost 4 minutes as it unfolded in front of my lens.

Before going any further, I would like to point out that the objective of this report is to be informative. In no case is the object of this one to carry out any witch hunt to establish a classification of diving centers according to their attitudes or ways of proceeding.

We showed this video to some specialists to collect their reactions. We deliver them now below.

YVES LEFEVRE - RAIE MANTA CLUB

Yves Lefèvre, wildlife photographer and diving instructor, fell in love with French Polynesia more than 30 years ago, during a trip around the world. He landed his fins in RANGIROA where he created, in 1985, the 1st scuba diving center in the Tuamotu archipelago: the Ray Manta Club.
His passion and his knowledge of underwater fauna, and more particularly sharks, led Yves to develop a new form of animal approach: the underwater safari. Rangiroa has also become, thanks to his work, one of the most famous “shark” diving spots in the world.

ALAIN PORTAL - GEMM: HOT REACTION

Professional navigator, repented whale-watcher, founder and president of Polynesian Marine Mammals Study Group, his training as an animator specializing in scientific and technical cultures (DEFA) predestines him more particularly to give a “participatory science” dimension to the GEMM. He is also the “factotum” of the association, all at the same time a mechanic , electrician, plumber, sailor, cook, diver, columnist and skipper, as needed, on all of the Group's actions.

FRANCOIS SARANO - LONGITUDE 181

“I am not in favor of divers petting animals, and I strongly disapprove of any attempts to hold on to them. And I am obviously opposed to the aggression by divers of dolphins trapped in a confined space, an enclosed bay, or in a resting area.

However, I think that in the middle of the ocean, what this video suggests is that the dolphins are the masters of the game. In this video, who comes to the other? The diver or the dolphin? Who is in his world, free to choose, the diver or the dolphin? Do you think for one second that the dolphins do not come looking for contact? If instead of dolphins the video showed divers and snakes that sometimes come to wind up in our regulators, or Cerniers who come to shelter against the diver, remoras that stick to us, we would have asked ourselves who chooses the meeting?

Man, by far the worst and the slowest of marine mammals, can be considered a fixed point as it is slow. While cetaceans and pinnipeds compete with our fastest vessels. As long as we use our only muscular strength, it is the animals that decide ... the rest is a matter of respect.

This is the motor boat approach that can be questionable. Beyond 5 knots, the boat is an attacker for marine animals. It is these aggressive approaches that must be banned. It is the number and speed of motorized vehicles that must be regulated. I stand out against the aggressive pursuit of a troop of dolphins or whales by one or, worse, several boats ... This is where the animals are stressed, that's when they are pushed into their entrenchments. But when a troop of pilot whales approaches and encircles the boat, engine stopped, the situation is very different!

I have lived several times these magical moments where the animals come to pick you up to play. I remember a dive at Cape Horn where dark Lagenorhinch dolphins came from nowhere and spent an hour with us twirling, swirling around the edge of the kelps. Short of air, we had to go back on Alcyone. We inflated the bottles and went back to the water an hour and a half later ... The dolphins came back. We spent the dive doing a cabriole contest. How many unforgettable dives with mischievous sea lions came by surprise to nibble my palms to train me in crazy arabesques? These animals were untamed, free ... they did not satisfy my whims, but their desires!

Last month, I was with my friends René Heuzey and Hugues Vitry in Mauritian waters. René was filming a young sperm whale. I went to the water a hundred meters away to not interfere with the filming. The young whale saw me; he turned around and he came towards me, until he got close to me ... What did I have to do? Swim as fast as you can to go out? Absurd! No, I took advantage of this moment of immense happiness that the sperm whale offered me !!!
In places that are still wild, where men do not attack animals - the subantarctic islands, for example - animals do not flee. On the contrary, very often, curious, they come into contact ... It is this relationship that should be the norm!

These encounters in the open ocean are chosen by dolphins, whales, sperm whales, sea lions. Why give up? What else, who else, can better make you touch the happiness and peace of our living planet and therefore the irresistible urge to preserve it?

Why deprive yourself of these exceptional moments, of these overwhelming encounters that they change your life forever? ”

More:Longitude 181

Communicable diseases from dolphin to humans

Beyond everyone's opinions, suspicious spots that look like scars have been observed and photographed on the skin of some dolphins. They look like lobomycosis. It is only found in humans and cetaceans, where it has so far been reported only in the bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) and the sotalies of the Amazon (Sotalia fluviatilis). This disease is manifested by the appearance of small areas of circular discoloration of the skin, which enlarge, taking the appearance of warts which can then ulcerate. Despite its dermal location, lobomycosis can in the long term lead to loss of mobility, even death. The source and the mode of contamination are still unknown.

More: Franck Dupraz, Veterinarian

CRY FOR LOVE

In 2012 already, our friend Peter Schneider had produced this video to alert the public to these practices ...

What do you think about these close encounters?