Indonesia - Komodo NP: Three Sisters (Tiga Dara)

General benthic features

Frames from across the gallery track the depth gradient Anderson describes. The deepest-looking frame is dim and blue-shadowed, a steep slope where the framework is foliaceous: a pale mustard-olive laminar plate with a white margin, stacked foliose sheets, a broad pale leathery soft coral, a tabulate Acropora above, and maroon and red encrusting sponges between, with orange anthias hanging in front of it — directly Anderson's note that depth here was mostly sponges and foliaceous sheets, and dark at 24 m because of the early entry (e.g., Image 2).

2

A cryptic close-up from the same band is almost pure invertebrate color with no stony framework at all: salmon and red-and-white Dendronephthya, a yellow-green crinoid, colonial tunicates, encrusting sponges in pink and maroon, and chartreuse algae (e.g., Image 3).

3

A third slope frame is high-relief and sponge-heavy: broad mustard encrusting sponge sheets, red sponge fans, wiry black-coral whips, a bright green bushy colony, salmon and gray-brown Acropora tables, and small pink corymbose colonies, with open blue water off the flank (e.g., Image 4).

4

A shallow frame shows the part Anderson rated: three Acropora tables together, the largest mustard-olive with a vivid white growing rim, a lavender-gray table beside it, and a salmon branching colony below, on pink crustose coralline algae, with several butterflyfish and a cleaner wrasse (e.g., Image 5).

5

Coral cover

• Reference: Claude CV point count (this site's photos)
• Coral cover: 8.3% — a blind Claude computer-vision point count of 34 of Anderson's edited photographs (20 points per photo; water, fish, and obstructions excluded). Other computer-vision methods are listed in the method table. These are computer-vision indices over photographs, not a diver transect, and a site where sponges and octocorals hold much of the substrate is a hard case for them.

Stressors

The photo review resolved no bleaching, disease, or predation, and nothing man-made appears; however, a computer-vision point count called 2.0% of coral points bleached (1 of 34 photos).

Fish and other fauna

One frame is open blue water with a loose school of unicornfish and no substrate (e.g., Image 1).

1

Comparisons with other data

We found no other surveys at this site as of 2026. If you would like to share yours, please email us.

Dive record

One dive, 23 January 2019, 07:30, 50 minutes, max 29.6 m, average 15.2 m, 26.1°C (dive-computer average; Anderson's notes read 25.6°C and 24-25°C), 10 m visibility, and an incessant washing-machine current (the notes).

Other notes

Saw first giant trevally of trip (much more common in Raja Ampat). Very dark at 24 m on account of doing dive early in morning (7:30). Stylophora pistillata, pygmy seahorse, Pocillopora verrucosa, small poritids, fluorescent orange soft coral, giant Isopora colonies in shallows. Large morays (green), high Acropora cover and diversity in shallows (5-8 m), though difficult to photograph on account of currents.