Turtles, Rays and Coral — Life on Our House Reef
Our resident marine biologist on the 40+ coral species, the turtle that returns every November, and how you can help monitor the reef.
Most guests first meet the house reef on the morning snorkel safari, when they lower their faces into the water and discover an entire city beneath the surface. As the resort's marine biologist, I get to spend every working day in that city, and I would like to introduce you to a few of its residents.
The Corals
We monitor 40-plus species of hard and soft coral along the reef edge — brain corals the size of dinner tables, staghorn thickets, and plate corals that shelter juvenile fish. Since our coral restoration nursery was set up in 2023, guests have helped transplant more than 1,200 nursery-grown fragments back onto the reef.
The Regulars
A green turtle we have named Chandra has returned to the same cleaning station every November for four years running. The blue-spotted rays patrol the sandy gutters at dawn, and a resident moray eel has lived under the eastern jetty since the resort opened.
How You Can Help
Every snorkel safari booking funds a fragment in the nursery. Guests can also join our monthly reef-mapping dives and log their sightings into the island's citizen-science database — a small act that feeds real conservation decisions across the archipelago.
The reef is not scenery. It is a neighbourhood, and it has been very good to us.