Achievement report December round up of the year

Round up of 2017
14 monitoring sites completed, 191 dive certifications completed, 112 coral watches and a
few saved turtles.

Objective
Over the past year we have continued to gather data for our partners whilst promoting envi-
ronmental education.

Summary
This year has seen the continuation of Pez Maya’s long term objectives with regards moni-
toring the various sites for Amigos de Sian Ka’an, we have also really pushed to promote
environmental education for all on base with many extra lectures from staff and other videos
for experts in their field. This way we have had a more conscious impact on people who
leave, giving ideas to those of ways to live a more conservation minded lifestyle. All this
while still teaching people to dive and living on a beautiful beach in Mexico.

Report
What have we done this year?

Science: We managed to monitor 14 sites at Pez Maya in-

cluding 2 in one day at Punta Allen, for all those involved it
went without a hitch, the planning of the previous days paid
off and it was a fun, exhausting, but worthwhile day for all.
We continued to collect Coral Watch data, 112 surveys! Due
to all the surveying of everyone Pez Maya is now number 2
in the world for providing Coral Watch data, so well done
everyone. Beach clean continued as ever and thanks to eve-
ryone we collected well over 2000kg of rubbish from our own
beach and also a huge amount during a cleanup organized
by the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas over
a huge part of the Sian Ka´an Biosphere, along with our lec-
tures on rubbish we really hope that the experience of even
one beach clean is enough to make people consider how
they dispose of their waste. We also helped Healthy Reefs
for Healthy People collect vital data on coral bleaching in the
area. Some of you were lucky enough to swim with dolphins
and sharks during your time here. All that data has been
added to international databases for global use. We rescued
stranded turtles and watched nests hatch. We set a new
record this year, removing a huge 50% of the invasive lion
fish we saw on the reef, this is great work, reducing their Fig. 1: Life below water
numbers and giving juvenile fish a better chance at survival.

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Diving: Many volunteers completed courses while they were at Pez Maya, 23 – Open Water
(OW), 58 – Advanced Open Water (AOW), 28 – Rescue diver, 7- Divemaster, 75 - Coral
Reef Research Diver Certification (CRRD). We were super happy to see so many people
grow in many areas of their dive ability. This Year saw the newest dive programme on base
as we began training Divemasters here on base, which was a great success, developing as
it went so as to give those involved as much experience not only as a dive masters but in a
scientific environment. Though the combine work we do, we were also able to train 7 AOW
divers from Punta Allen who monitor sites for Comunidad and Biodiversidad (COBI) another
of our partners, this is great news as we get to give back to the community and the people of
Mexico, who ultimately have the final say in conserving their homeland.

Community: The great work we have done over the years continued in Punta Allen for 86
children, not only with the lessons in English and about environmental education but we also
taught the children about Coral Watch. Some of the most attentive children got the chance to
visit Pez Maya and see what we have been doing over the years. We also ran a summer
camp and continued to provide activities at the turtle festival with over 100 children from
Akumal and Tulum.

From everyone at Pez Maya we would like to thank everyone who has been involved this
year and we look forward to meeting more wonderful people in the New Year.

Fig. 2: The beauty of Pez Maya

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