Australian.Geographic_2014_01-02

54 Australian Geographic

 I

T’S AN IDYLLIC spring morning on More-

ton Bay, southern Queensland, and the

clear skies make for perfect conditions

for fi nding mermaids. Flocks of shear-

waters bob on a glassy sea. Green turtles

break the surface at regular intervals for

noisy breaths between dives to graze on seagrass

meadows. Pied cormorants pop up periodically,

their long necks like periscopes on mini-

submarines. Sleek-swimming pods of inquisitive

bottlenose dolphins steer towards our boat.

Photographer Darren Jew and I are not,

of course, expecting to find mermaids, but

instead the creatures that are believed to have

sparked the legends. And soon enough a perfect

ocean-going tail – shaped like a dolphin’s, but

at least a metre wide at its trailing edge – breaks

the water. It waves briefl y, Brisbane’s distant

skyline glistening behind it in the early light.

It’s easy to understand how lonely sailors

from a bygone era might have imagined this

could signal a creature of submerged beauty.

But minutes later we see a face that’s more

Dr Seuss than nereid. Clearly, those old

mariners liked spinning tales, or were heavily

infl uenced by rum and extreme isolation.

The exquisite tail and contrastingly comical

face belong to one of the estimated 800–1000

dugongs in Moreton Bay, which is adjacent to

one of Australia’s most rapidly developing

regions. The creature’s odd-looking head

emerges just long enough to retract the valves

that keep the water from its nostrils while sub-

merged; with a snort like a snorkelling human,

it sucks in a breath of fresh air before quickly

disappearing, either too shy or uninterested to

remain above water long enough to look around.

Limited surface time is a trademark of

dugongs. As well as their tendency to stick to

murky, or turbid, water, it’s one of the main

reasons they’re so elusive – and why few

Australians have ever seen one. Yet they’re the

most common marine mammals in northern

Australia’s coastal waters – outnumbering seals,

whales and even dolphins. They’re also surpris-

ingly big, with adults reaching lengths of about

3m and weights of 400–600kg.

 D

UGONGS OCCUR wherever there are

seagrass meadows, in the tropical and

subtropical waters of about 40 coun-

tries across the Indo-Pacifi c. Australia is the

stronghold for the species: a signifi cant chunk of

the world’s population – an estimated 70,000

• cruise about in the shallows of at least 10
  dif erent locations along the 25,000km of our
  northern coastline, stretching from Shark Bay,
  Western Australia, to Moreton Bay.
  Torres Strait has the biggest population:
  recent fi gures suggest there are at least 15,000
  of these enigmatic marine mammals.
  Mostly, their diet consists

Shy disposition. Despite being air-breathers, dugongs spend as little time at the

surface as possible, preferring instead to remain in the obscurity of murky waters.

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