Indigenous divers on Chile’s island restore seabed to protect seafood sources

Daniel Caniullán has been diving in the cold waters of the Guaitecas Archipelago in northern Patagonia, Chile, for more than 30 years.

“Just by looking at the seabed landscape, you can tell what species you are going to find,” he says. Just as it is possible to recognize the loss of a diverse forest on land, Caniullán’s experience underwater allows him to quickly identify damaged areas.

To undo the damage, local divers “repair or reorganize the seabed to restore biodiversity and interspecies relationships,” according to a recent paper published in the British Ecological Society.