Cooks Spear Them

Cook Islanders first heard of the starfish plague when Premier, Mr. A. R. Henry, gave a radio talk on the starfish

(Acanthaster planci), over Radio

Cook Islands recently. The talk

was repeated some days later,

and considerable coverage of the starfish plague was given in the Cook Islands News, the govern ment-owned and only newspaper in the Group.

Mr. Henry said Acanthaster was very common in Manihiki and that there were large patches of dead coral in the lagoon there. Numbers of others had been reported from Palmerston, Penhryn and Aitutaki, and fisherman-skin diver, Tekake William, had brought “a number of them ashore at Rarotonga.” The Premier urged Cook Islanders to spear every crown of thorns they saw and bring them ashore for burn ing.

Three days later Tekake William and loane Kaitara, fishing and diving together, brought 30 more Acanthaster ashore at Rarotonga, and three days after that, another 40.

Couldn't take many

Tekake said they speared the star fish on a one-mile stretch of northern reef, and that there were heavy con centrations of the coral-devouring animals on the seaward side of the entrance to Avatiu Harbour. They had sighted as many as 12 of them on a single coral head, but were limited by the size of their boat, already laden with fish, as to the number of starfish they could carry.

The first batch was speared at depths from three to five fathoms and the second lot at about nine fathoms where, Tekake said, the creatures were quite common and appeared to be coming up from greater depths.

It was only during the last 12 months that Tekake William began to notice a substantial increase in the number of Acanthaster at the entrance to Avatiu Harbour. He thinks it probable that the under water blasting done there to deepen the harbour attracted the starfish, drawn there by the “smell of the coral” broken up by the explosions.

Investigations as to the extent of

damage caused by crown of thorns in the atolls of the Northern Cooks will be made soon, and Mr. Henry has mentioned the possibility of send ing a Cook Islander overseas to learn the best methods of combating the plague.

With the soon to come advent of international jets and tourism to the Cooks, the problem of damaged or destroyed reefs looms very real. But even greater is the spectre of star fish destroyed reefs collapsing under the heavy ocean swell, exposing the precious 93-odd square miles of the Group to erosion and inundation.

Reef enclosed lagoons in the Cook Islands provide the only natural

harbours and anchorages for local and overseas ships.