The Turtle Pinnacles
By Howard Hall
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Doug Perrine, Michele, and I slipped off the side of Doug’s Boston Whaler and dropped down into the clear Hawaiian water. I began swimming west with my awkward high definition video camera followed by Doug and Michele with their still cameras. After a few seconds of swimming slowly forty feet below the surface, the larger of the two Turtle Pinnacles materialized against the dark blue background. I recognized the Pinnacle immediately and a moment later the smaller secondary pinnacle just to the south. And I recognized the twenty-foot rubble-filled channel that separated the two small spires. It had been more than ten years since I had last been to this spot. That I recognized the spot easily after so many years immediately filled me with nostalgia and joy.

Doug had warned us that green turtles seemed to visit the Pinnacles less frequently than when I last filmed them in 1993. Back then I was using a 16mm movie camera to capture marine wildlife behavior for a series we produced for PBS called Secrets of the Ocean Realm. Doug said that, if anything, there were more turtles in the waters off Kona than a decade before. But he also suggested that the popularity of the Turtle Pinnacles with local sport divers had caused the turtles go elsewhere much of the time. I was thinking about what Doug had said as I approached the channel between the two Pinnacles. But just as I began to worry, a large green turtle caught my attention as it approached from the south and disappeared behind the smaller Pinnacle. Michele saw the big reptile too and together we swam over the top of the Pinnacle to watch the turtle. But when we reached the top and looked over to the other side, the turtle was gone. How can that be? The water was clear yet the turtle seemed to have vanished. I scanned the area around the Pinnacle looking for the turtle. He was nowhere in sight. I looked over at Michele and she just shrugged. But as I drifted down to the bottom I noticed a cave at the base of the Pinnacle. Sure enough the turtle was in the cave. He was fast asleep. I pointed him out to Michele as Doug swam over to have a quick look. The turtle was out cold.

A sleeping turtle was not the subject we had in mind. Unfortunately, the fact that Michele and I had traveled all the way from California, subjected ourselves to the modern horrors of negotiating airports with fifteen boxes of heavy equipment, and had invested a considerable amount of money to film green sea turtle behaviors, was a fact that could not have mattered less to the unconscious turtle. As Michele and Doug swam off looking for subjects to capture with their still cameras, I swam to the top of the larger Pinnacle and began scanning the surrounding reef for other turtles.

The Turtle Pinnacles off the Kona Coast of Hawaii is one of those rare and wonderful places where something really special happens. In the early morning hours green sea turtles come to this one special spot to rest and be cleaned by herbivorous reef fish. When a turtle approaches the Pinnacles, dozens of yellow tangs, convict tangs, and bluelipped surgeonfish dash up from the reef and begin feeding on algae that has accumulated on the turtle’s shell. As the turtle settles to the reef, more tangs and surgeonfish gather and soon every inch of the turtle is covered with grazing fish from the tip of the turtle’s beak to the tip of its tail. It’s one of the most beautiful examples of symbiotic behavior I have ever seen. And ten years ago it happened every day off Kona, right outside the harbor. The behavior was so predictable that local divers tend to take it for granted. There are other places in Hawaii where turtles are seen being cleaned by reef fish. But nowhere is the behavior as predictable or spectacular as at the Turtle Pinnacles. At least that’s how it used to be. A lot can change and usually does after ten years.

I had been hovering over the top of the larger Pinnacle for about fifteen minutes, conserving air, conserving bottom time, and wondering if the turtles no longer came to the Pinnacles to be cleaned when I saw the second turtle swimming toward the cleaning station. It swam slowly over the reef as it approached. As I watched the turtle approaching the Pinnacles, I watched it swim over dozens of yellow tangs and bluelipped surgeonfish all of which showed absolutely no interest in the turtle. But just as the turtle passed the Pinnacle and moved over the rubble channel, the behavior of the tangs and surgeonfish beneath it changed. They left the reef, rushed up to the turtle and began grazing on its shell. I wondered what was so special about this small area. Why did the fish recognize turtles as a willing food resource here and not twenty yards away? Were the fish right here different; having learned generation after generation that turtles carried a shell covered in tasty algae? And did these “educated” fish never travel more than a few yards from these Pinnacles? Or was there some change in the turtles’ behavior as they approached the Pinnacles, something so subtle I couldn’t see it? Or was it something about the place itself, something that was recognized by both turtle and fish as making this place special?

I watched the small turtle settle on the reef as more fish crowded over its shell feeding voraciously. As I dropped down to film the cleaning frenzy, something caught my attention on the other side of the Pinnacle. The large turtle that had been sleeping in the cave was awake and moving away across the reef. Just ten yards from where the smaller turtle was being enthusiastically cleaned, the larger turtle was totally ignored by the tangs and surgeonfish.

I knelt on the rubble, steadied my camera and triggered the run switch. Then I watched the video image in the viewfinder as eager yellow tangs covered the turtle’s shell. A bluelipped surgeonfish cleaned the skin on the turtle’s head and the turtle closed its eye in ecstasy as the fish cleaned above the reptile’s eyelid. It was beautiful, colorful, and wonderful. I have never seen anything like it anywhere else.

Three turtles visited the Pinnacles that morning and each was serviced well by reef fish. I had captured a very nice sequence for my stock footage library, but more importantly, I learned that the cleaning behavior at the Turtle Pinnacles was still active, essentially unchanged since my last visit more than ten years ago. There are very few places in the ocean where wildlife populations and behaviors have remained unchanged for so long especially in this age of accelerated over-fishing and ocean warming. I was very encouraged, especially because in April I will be back. And in April my crew and I will attempt to film this wonderful behavior with the massive IMAX 3D camera. If we succeed, this behavior could produce unforgettable images for our film, Denizens of the Deep.
As I watched the turtle being cleaned in my video viewfinder, I tried to imagine this colorful and fascinating image hovering three feet away in an IMAX 3D theater as children reach out to touch it and being amazed to find nothing there.