Today we started our day at the Coral Reef Research Foundation (CRRF) where we listened to a presentation about Marine Lakes and Jellyfish Lake. We learned that a Marine Lake is a body of saltwater completely surrounded by land. They are often connected to the ocean through underground channels in the limestone. There are 55 marine lakes in Palau, and only 5 have golden jellyfish. Of all 55 lakes, only one is open to the public. At CRRF, one of their projects is measuring the population of the jellyfish in the lake and how natural events such as El Niño have caused the jellyfish population to disappear. For instance, in 2002 there were an estimated 20 million jellyfish in the lake, but after the most recent El Niño they disappeared again. The researchers believe that warm water caused the jellyfish to vanish, among other things such as sunscreen and invasive species. The reason that the population is able to recover is because the polyps (jellyfish larva) are able to survive despite the warm temperatures. Currently, there are roughly 20,000 jellies in the lake (less than 1% of their previous number- but we still saw several!).
the native sea anemone, there is currently an invasive brown anemone in the lake as well.
After leaving the research center we went out to Jellyfish lake with some of the researchers from the foundation. Currently every visitor to Jellyfish Lake must buy a special rock island permit in order to access it. We snorkeled around for an hour, before departing to a different island for lunch. While at the island, Jesy got stung by a jellyfish (ironically, this happened after we left Jellyfish lake, where the jellies have very mild stings). After lunch we went snorkeling at Fantasy Island. There we were able to witness a wide variety of fish feeding in the coral and a black tipped reef shark! We ended our day at a cove nicknamed Milky-Way, where we used the mud-like sand to exfoliate ourselves!
Nikki, Balang, Alayna having fun with the Milky Way sand!
