The Exhibit showed from June 3, 2007 - November 1, 2007

 “Rachel Carson: A Visionary Remembered in Photographs”

 at the Headquarters of the Society of Woman Geographers

The exhibition honors the forty-fifth anniversary of the first publication of Silent Spring in the New Yorker and will remain up until the end of October. The June 16th program will feature a lecture by Priscilla Coit Murphy, author of What a Book Can Do: The Publication and Reception of "Silent Spring" and an authority on Carson’s ideas and the controversy they precipitated. A collaborative effort by SWG and the Rachel Carson Council, the show consists of rare photographs of the scientist, including several by Life Magazine’s noted photographer, Alfred Eisenstaedt, and other memorabilia.

Underwater Photography

The Society of Woman Geographers

   Photographs by:

Idell Conaway

The exhibit showed from November 17, 2006 through June 1, 2007.

Women at Depth

Hand List

Underwater Photography by Members of

The Society of Woman Geographers.

These photos are copy-writed by the photographers. 

They may not be copied or used without permission. 

Please contact SWGHQ@verizon.net for additional guidance.

A.  Idell Conaway

#1. Oxymetra sp. Crinoid

Family: MARIAMETRIDAE

This featherstar or crinoid is a new one to me, curled so tightly as it moves around on something similar to feet.  It furls and unfurls in response to feeding and other stimuli.  Crinoids are characteristic of the reefs in every corner of the world’s oceans, and come in many colors.

This image was shot with a Nikon Coolpix 4300 in an underwater housing, taken in Batangas (southern Luzon Island) in the Philippines in 2005.

#2. Pleurogyra sinuosa

Family: CARYOPHYLLIIDAE

This colorful bubble coral or grape coral is actually one of the group of SCLERACTINIA stony corals, a crossover family of Caryophylliidae.  Probably not too dissimilar to the Ctenactis of the Fungiidae family, it feeds with the bubbles extended as in this picture.  The acoel shown on the surfaces is actually a scale type of marine entity, feeding off of the Pleurogyra sinuosa.

This image was shot in Batangas in the Philippines (southernmost point of Luzon Island) in the southeast Asian waters of the Pacific with a Nikonos V camera on Fujiichrome slide film in 2005.

#3. Tubastrea sp.

Family: DENDROPHYLLIIDAE

This species of Tubastrea (sp.) like other Dendrophylliidaes, sends tentacles from its ‘knuckles’ much like the delicate fingers of the anemone at night or when feeding in the surge of the water.  These and all living coral structures actually house colonies of marine animals, each one ‘blooming’ during a feeding cycle such as is captured in this image.

This image was shot in Batangas in the Philippines (southernmost point of Luzon Island) in the southeast Asian waters of the Pacific with a Nikonos V camera on Fujichrome slide film in 2005.

#4. Astropyga radiata – Fire Urchin

Family: DIADEMATIDAE

This fire urchin is aptly named as it has an acid burn to its injection should it come in contact with skin or any frivolous starfish predator.  This species was at home in extremely shallow sandy “muck” and created a nursery shelter for young cardinalfish.

The Astropyga radiata’s colors have a truly electric impact on the viewer; one hovers gently over this urchin, drawing on one’s best skills in buoyancy!

This image was shot with a Nikon Coolpix 4300 in an underwater housing, taken in Batangas (southern Luzon Island) in the Philippines in 2005.

#5. Amphiprion frenatus – Tomato clown

Family: STICHODACTYLIDAE – anemone host

POMACENTRIDAE – clownfish

This image captures the symbiotic relationship existing between protective anemonefish and their host anemone.  The clown’s color attracts food to the anemone; the clownfish takes ‘crumbs from the table’ as it also takes shelter from its predators amongst the stinging tentacles to which it has become immune.  Other examples of this symbiosis in the marine world include that of the goby and the blind shrimp who keeps the burrow clean, relying on its host goby for food and protection from attack.

The image shot with a Nikonos V camera on Fujichrome slide film was taken in Batangas (southern Luzon Island) in the Philippines in 2005.

#6. Protula magnifica – Tubeworm

Family: SERPULIDAE

This is a medium-large tubeworm which spirals up and out of its casing when it is feeding in the water column.  This Protula magnifica is indeed hard to photograph as it is sensitive to the diver’s movement and retracts defensively into its ‘cocoon’ buried in the coral or simply in the sand.  It is a truly beautiful marine animal and simulates metamorphosis many times in its day.

This image was shot in southeast Asian waters of the Pacific with a Nikonos V camera on Fujichrome slide film in 2002.

#7. Ctenactis albitentaculata

Family: FUNGIIDAE

The hard coral of the Fungiidae family has sharp central-radiating ridges, shaped like a large biscuit.  The bubble-looking florets emerge when feeding in the surge of the water.  These and all living coral structures actually house colonies of marine animals, each one ‘blooming’ during a feeding cycle such as is captured in this image.

This image was shot in southeast Asian waters of the Pacific with a Nikinos V camera on Fujichrome slide film in 2002.

#8. Fromia mollis

Family: OPHIDIASTERIIDAE

This brilliant starfish moves across the seabed and coral reefs on tiny feet, feeding as it goes.  Starfish appear in many colors and species, the most notorious among them being the Crown of Thorns species, which devastates reefs around Australia in a cyclic fashion.

This image was shot in southeast Asian waters of the Pacific with a Nikonos V camera on Fujichrome slide film in 2004.

#9. Sarcophtyton sp.

Family:  ALCYONIIDAE

This is a leather mushroom coral, usually not this intense in color, which puts out flower stalk-like tentacles during nighttime and periods when feeding in the surge of the water.  These and all living coral structures actually house colonies of marine animals, each one ‘blooming’ during a feeding cycle such as is actually not captured in this image.

This image was shot in Batangas in the Philippines (southernmost point of Luzon Island) in the southeast Asian waters of the Pacific with a Nikonos V camera on Fujichrome slide film in 2005.

B. Michele Westmorland

#1. Green Sea Turtles (Chelonia mydas)

 The fossil record indicates a long history of reptilian adaptation to marine life. Sea turtles remain as part of this evolutionary legacy having traveled the seas for more than 100 million years and survived the extinction of dinosaurs. Now they, too, are threatened with extinction.  Here a young pair of green sea turtles swims safely in the protected waters of Le Meridien Turtle Center. Named for the green color of their fat, a byproduct of munching algae, green sea turtles are extraordinary divers and long-distance swimmers.

Bora Bora, French Polynesia

#2. Giant Mantas (Manta birostris)

Adorned with hitchhiking remoras, a pair of mantas glides through the water on giant pectoral "wings," their graceful movements made possible by flexible, cartilaginous skeletons. With wingspans measuring up to six meters or more, giant mantas are definitely a sight to behold, whether encountered at the ocean's surface or in deep blue water.

 Isla Revillagigadas, Mexico

#3. West Indian Manatees (Trichechus manatus)

 I particularly enjoy watching these homely yet charming creatures. Who couldn't love their squished-up faces with whiskers and beady little eyes? During one winter dive, I chuckled when a calf decided to try me out as a new mom by suckling on my kneecap. The laughter stopped when I suddenly had 500 pounds of gray matter trying to show me some affection. Once mistaken as mermaids by sea-weary sailors, but more frequently called "sea cows," these gentle giants don't have a mean bone in their torpedo-shaped bodies. -M. W.

Homosassa Springs, Florida

#4. False Clownfish (Amphiprion ocellaris) on anemone (Heteractis magnifica)

A pair of false clownfish nestled in the golden mantle of their host anemone. The protection provided by the anemone is essential for clownfish, as they are poor swimmers and would quickly perish in open water. Clownfish have an interesting reproductive system. They are protandrous hermaphrodites: they all mature as males and then sex-reverse to females as needed. The largest fish in the group is always the female. Should she die, the largest male then changes into a female to replace her.

Papua New Guinea

#5. Long-nosed Hawkfish (Oxycirrhities typus)

Camouflaged in a gorgonian sea fan, a pair of long-nosed hawkfish waits for dinner to pass. Named for their predatory habits and pointed "beaks," hawkfish perch on sponge and coral-head lookouts, then swoop down on small unsuspecting fish and crustaceans that come within range. Lacking swim bladders, hawkfish are negatively buoyant, which enables them to launchtheir split-second attacks. In between meals, their otherwise sedentary behavior-holding onto coral branches with the thickened rays of their pectoral fins-makes them an ideal photo subject.

Kimbe Bay, Papua New Guinea

This romantic image in Valentine colors was taken during an important moment in my own personal life: I had traveled to Papua New Guinea to get married. Stuart and I had just exchanged vows on a beach while wearing tribal dress. The following day while diving, I discovered this hawkfish pair tucked under a coral branch-- a nice wedding gift! -M. W.

#6. Lined Sea Horses (Hippocampus erectus)

Equipped with gills, fins, a swim bladder, and eyes that move independently, like those of a chameleon, sea horses are actually bony fish. They use their prehensile tails to hold onto coral and seaweed, relying on camouflage for survival. The ancient Greeks gave them mythical attributes, describing them as sea monsters (campus) with the head of a horse (hippos). These ambush redators suck in their tiny prey with their long tubular mouths. During courtship, the monogamous pair pivots, promenades along the bottom, changes color, and finally rises to the surface to mate. The eggs are fertilized and protected inside the male's brood pouch. Once hatched, the miniature sea horses are off to the races, highly vulnerable to predation.

Intracoastal Waterway, Florida

These images are from Michele Westmorland's book Ocean Duets published by Fulcrum Publishing Fall, 2006.  All text was written by Barbara Sleeper and is also from the book.

C. Cherie Northon

Pacific Green Sea Turtle, Chelonia mydas

This shot of the Green Sea turtle was taken near the crescent-shaped remnants of an extinct volcano called Molokini.  It is just offshore of Maui in the channel between Maui and Kahoolawe.  Molokini is designated as a State Marine Life and Bird Conservation District, and offers superb diving and snorkeling.  Several turtles were in the vicinity -- spending most of their time on the botton, which was about 30-40' below.  Periodically they would ascend to the surface for air, then return to the sandy bottom.

Molokini Island, Hawaiian Island, 2005

D. Susan Leonard

#1.Solomon’s Reef

The abundance of life in the underwater world as well as the clarity of the unpolluted waters of this part of the South Pacific can be seen in this picture.  The tropical reef is home to at least as many species as the tropical rainforest.  We must learn what life exists here and work to prevent its destruction.  The health of the reef reflects the health of our world.

Solomon Islands July, 2003

#2. Galaxea sp., “Starburst”

This starburst shaped coral looks like galactic explosions.  This is a macro photo, which covers about two inches square of a large plate.

Solomon Islands July, 2003

#3. “Nemo’s Cousins”

These South Pacific clownfish live in a symbiotic relationship with an anemone.  The beautifully clear waters of the Solomon Islands let you see far into the distance and the surface fifty feet above.

Solomon Islands July, 2003

#4.  Mr. Ed.

This seahorse was nicknamed “Mr. Ed” by the dive masters.  He was always found in the same territory on the reef.  He is about three inches tall.

Roatan,

Honduras July, 1990

#5. Tridacna maxima and Clavularia

This giant clam measured about eight inches in length and was surrounded by the soft polyps of the coral.  Both the clam and this coral are commonly found in the South Pacific.

Fiji, July, 1986

#6. Reef Reflections

The top of the reef was just two or three feet below the surface of the water, just at the edge of the island.  You can see the beautiful colors of the reeftop as well as the reflection in the water and the green of the trees nearby showing through.

Solomon Islands July, 2003

E.  Joan Koven 

#1.Feather Duster Worm

If only the worms in my garden were this beautiful! Sabellestarte cf. sanctijosephi, is commonly called a feather duster worm. The two tiered tentacular crown of long feathery gills serves for respirations and filter feeding in the currents.  The rest of the animal resides in a tube that is has created from mucous and sand or sediment.

Near Madang, Papua New Guinea, 1994

#2. Soft Coral

Dendronephthya sp.is only one of the soft corals in its genus and family.  Its fleshy trunk, branches and twigs are filled with a gelatinous substance, but also contain calcium carbonate sclerites, visible in the trunk, that vary in shape, size, color and arrangement from species to species. These soft corals do not build reefs, but their sclerites become part of the sand when they die.

Taveuni, Fiji, 1984

#3&#5 Crown of Thorns Starfish.

These starfish (Acanthaster plancii) are the bête noires of scleractinian  (stony) corals as they devour the living polyps. They pull the coral polyp from its stony skeleton using suction cups that extend from the underside of their arms.  Stiff thorns on the body and arms protect them from predators. Like most echinoderms, they are capable of regeneration: cut off the arms and each will become a new, fully armed, starfish.

These starfish are normally nocturnal, but the 2000 coral-bleaching event in Fiji drove them from their daytime crevices to feed on the remaining live corals. In one area of the North Astrolabe, I found a cluster of thirty of them that year, feeding in daylight.

Great Astrolabe Reef, Fiji, 2000 and 1996

#4. Squirrel Fish and Coral

Squirrel fish surround this Chironephthya, sp., a cousin of gorgonia and the softer corals. The trunk and main branches are rigid, but the twigs are flexible.

Great Astrolabe Reef, 1998

#6. Stony Peony

Pectinia paeonia looks like a stony peony. The mouth is ajar in the corallite’s center that is surrounded by ribbed “petals.” The different colors in its flesh indicate that there are several species of the symbiotic zooxanthellae (algae) in the coral tissue. It is often found growing singly in sand or sediment. (About ten times life size)

Great Astrolobe Reef, Fiji, 1997

#7. Goby Fish and Pipes of Pan

A goby fish swims through the Agelas schmidti, the Pipes of Pan sponge. Groups of five or six tubes are fused at the base and sometimes closer to the exhalant siphons.

Dominque, 1994

#8.  A Coral Garden

Photographed off Taveuni, Fiji, 1984.
 

For more information about Joan's Astrolabe, please visit this web site and view the video:

www.ofiji.org/astrolabe.htm

F. Nevada Wier

#1. Moken Sea Gypsies

In April 2005 I traveled the length of Myanmar’s southern coast, the Mergui Archipelago, from Kawthaung to Mergui. The some 800 idyllic islands scattered along 250 miles of the Andaman Sea are home for the Moken “sea gypsies,” a small nomadic sea culture. Extended families live on small wooden boats, living on land only during the monsoon. They live primarily off what the sea offers. In order to express how absolutely comfortable the Moken are in the water, I went free-diving with them, photographing with a small digital camera, as they hunted for fish, mother-of-pearl shells, and sea urchins.

Biographical Notes

.

Idell Conaway

Having traveled in Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Idell Conaway has photographs of remote indigenous people, their children and habitats. Scuba diving extended her reach to far off oceans that nurture the boat people know as the Sea Gypsies, From her ongoing underwater photography of marine species has merged a fine art collection, “The Underwater World of Idell Conaway,” many images from which have been displayed in many office building lobbies in Manhattan. The Pfizer Corporation has hung an exhibit of Conaway’s work in their corporate gallery at 150 East 42^nd Street in New York. In January 2007, the American Museum of Natural History in NYC will open a major show in the Akeley Gallery of Conaway’s coral reef photography to run through July of that year.  

Michele Westmorland

Michele Westmorland is a freelance photographer and runs her business, Westmorland Photography, LLC in Seattle, WA.  Westmorland has created a vast library of imagery from around the world.  Her skills in underwater photography have been recognized by a large community of divers and non-divers alike.  Her topside photography includes the wildlife, landscape and culture of exotic locations.

Westmorland and photographer Karen Huntt carried the SWG flag on their 2005 journey to Melanesia in search of the sites of portraits of indigenous people by Caroline Mytinger from 1926. They spent two months photographing and video taping existing cultural practices on which Westmorland reported to the SWG. The Smithsonian Magazine published an article, “A Gibson Girl in New Guinea,” about Mytinger and Westmorland’s project in April 2006.

Cherie Northon

Cherie Northon has a B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. from the University of California Berkeley Geography Department.  She is a practicing 

geographer and cartographer, who now lives in Anchorage, Alaska, and travels extensively.  Her career includes university teaching, 

research, lecturing around the world, and owning a successful cartography firm.  Besides being a member of SWG, she was elected 

in 2001 as a fellow to the Royal Geographical Society (UK) and elected to Phi Beta Kappa upon receipt of her B.A. in 1980.

Susan Leonard

Susan S. Leonard graduated from Oberlin College with a degree in French and a  minor in Art History.  She furthered he studies in art 

history courses at the University of Pittsburgh and the Ecole du Louvre in Paris.  After graduate work at Duke University, she worked in 

several  public and private schools.  She is currently Director of the Middle School at The Birch Wathen Lenox School in New York.

Leonard, a member of the Society of Woman Geographers and a Board member of Astrolabe, Inc. and MERI, the Marine Environmental

 Research Institute, has studied photography with the Nikon School and underwater photography with various experts. She has given illustrated 

lectures in oceanography at numerous schools, and her photographs have been used in lectures on the medical aspects of scuba diving.  Leonard 

has had four one woman photography shows and has participated in several group shows as well. Her love of the undersea world has taken her 

to reefs throughout the Caribbean, Hawaii, Palau, Tonga, Fiji, the Solomon Islands, Indonesia and Vanuatu.  She has recently been swimming 

with sperm whales and dolphins in the Azores.

Joan Koven

Joan Follin Hughes Koven is Founder and President of Astrolabe, Inc., a non-profit organization formed in 1988 to promote coral reef studies and reef conservation.   The principle activities are on the Astrolabe reefs of Fiji in conjunction with the University of the South Pacific (USP).  Joan’s research has concentrated on the invertebrate diversity of this reef system.  Over 10,000 invertebrate and habitat images as well as transect photos have been digitized and are being identified for incorporation in a database for these reefs.  The molluscan collections have been digitally photographed and will constitute a major portion of the USP’s collections.

She has recorded the devastation of the coral bleaching event of 2000 and its subsequent effects that are compounded by over-fishing.  She is working with the local community to establish some areas of these reefs as marine reserves.

She is also Secretary, Treasurer, and a director of The MARPAT Foundation, a grant-making institution.

Nevada Wier

Nevada Wier is an award-winning photographer specializing in the remote corners of the globe and the cultures that inhabit them. She has traveled on numerous expeditions and private explorations in search of unusual places and photographs. Her work has appeared in numerous national and international publications including: National Geographic, Geo, Outside, and The Smithsonian Magazine. Wier's books include The Land of Nine Dragons - Vietnam Today (Abbeville Press), Adventure Travel Photography (Amphoto), A Day in the Life of Thailand (Collins), and Mother Earth (Sierra Club Books). She has been a frequent photographer on Canon Photo Safaris (OLN & ESPN), a regular guest on The Travel Channel, and featured in a Northwest Airlines international television and print ad campaign. Nevada Wier was recently featured on National Geographic Explorer and Through the Lens about her expedition down the Blue Nile, Ethiopia for National Geographic magazine. She is based in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Members of the Museum Committee

Monica Barnes

Anne Hawthorne

Frances Mahncke

Frances Stickles

Elizabeth Welles (Chair)

Guest curators for “Women at Depth”

Joan Koven

Susan Leonard

SWGHQ@verizon.net or 202.546.9228.