Special Feature
Receiving Sonar Greetings
Tania Drebenstedt
Last February, we took a group of visitingstudents, teenagers and prep school children from Florida, allaround Little Cayman and Cayman Brac to show them a typical dayin Paradise.
Some of them had participated in the adventure of a lifetime ona night dive the evening before, at the Bloody Bay Wall, off LittleCayman, where they had encountered a huge shark.
The stories were flying around in our van as we travelled aroundthe Brac. The shark got larger in the story as the day went on.
Earlier in the afternoon, we had taken a slow drive around LittleCayman. Everybody was whispering during the ride, since we anticipatedseeing some iguanas taking their afternoon nap in the sun.
Iguanas are very shy by nature, and the least bit of noise sendsthem off into the bushes to hide, within split seconds.
The iguana is an international endangered specie and as such isprotected by the Convention on International Trade of EndangeredSpecies (CITES), and recognised by the World Conservation Unionas a species in need of further study and protection. They looklike throwbacks from the days of the dinosaurs, mysterious creatures,blending perfectly with their surroundings, and are thereforeable to hide in the still isolated parts of the island.
The students watched in fascination as an iguana family showedoff its young, only to dash off in search of a hiding place, muchto everyone's disappointment.
The attraction of escaping the crowds and feeling somewhat likepioneer had created a novelty with these young adventurers. Thisvacation was a learning and pleasure trip combined into one. Theyhad studied the sea world, and their fascination lay with thewhales and dolphins and the inter-connected belief of the sonarworld of the bat. We had a plan in motion.
We knew that even if the humpback whales would be too far to spotwhile they were migrating past Cayman Brac and Little Cayman,we would know by the behaviour of the frigate birds and watchingthe brief encounter of the colony of bats that they were reallyclose.
Some fishermen have been lucky enough to spot these giants ofthe sea. Their expert eyes, trained to observe the ocean, hadbeen watching these ancient creatures blowing plumes like volcaniceruptions, then re-entering the water with controlled grace. Whalesneed to stay within a certain depth of water; if they are wanderingoff to shallow waters, it confuses their sonar, and these sensitivecreatures could get totally disoriented.
With all these studies during previous weeks, we were ready totake part in the actual observing of events. We watched the frigatebirds taking slower and ever slower circles, then rushing outfurther over the open sea. We knew that something was 'running'out there.
Binoculars poised over the ocean let everybody only 'feel' thepresence of these giants of the sea, but we had read of the communicationsonar waves that even the dolphins used, not only to 'talk' toeach other, but to their family of whales.
Spot, the Brac dolphin, had expressed a happier mood when encounteredby divers around Cayman Brac. He was 'spy-hopping', actively crashingbetween the surface and again diving to the deep sea floor. Hewas communicating with the migrating whales on their way to theirbreeding and birthing ground. Exciting sounds like warm comfortinghands were sent by sound waves across the sea, showing their presenceto each other, ancient greetings guarded and never understoodby humans.
We were getting ready for our night of bat watching, with lotsof 'oohs and aahs'. After all, we are spending some time afterdark in a bat cave. The sun set with the brilliance of a perfectCaribbean day, dunked in a golden river with ruby and jewels spreadingacross the sky.
We all sat very still, watching the night heavens take shape,with dark quiet mystery. Five of the teenage students, two adultchaperones and myself had volunteered to listen to the behaviourof the bats in their habitat. We were all very quiet; I thinkit was more out of fear of disturbing the bats, and making themfly around, than from pretending to do serious studying.
We could hear rustles all over the cave, with squeaks and unsettlingfluttering of wings; some bats coming and going on their feedingroutes. We watched outside the cave and could hear from a distancean increasing high shriek, not from this bat cave, but furtherdown the Bluff, high up where no one was able to actually climbto.
We realised then that our presence had disturbed the daily routineof this bat colony. We climbed from the cave and sat down furtherup the road across from one of the highest points of the Bluff.Here, one could see caves high up on either side.
As the night extravaganza turned to stillness, all of a sudden,in the distance, we could hear a piercing shriek. Then othersseemed to join in, a concert, not just from the shriek of bats,but between the lonely night owl's wailing sound. We could hearmany other species of birds join in this frenzy of a night concert.
At that moment, we were absolutely sure that we could hear echoingsounds coming back from the sea. We knew we were witnessing creaturesthat were family, greeting each other as they were passing through.The sonar greeting of millions of years of existence in the universe.
The tribal people of the Americas, including the Taino tribes,believed in the sonar communication of these land and sea creatures.
This experience was a perfect end to a perfect day, and to a perfectstudents' holiday on the Sister Islands.