A team surveying a reef along a 100 m transect tape
This October, Biosphere Expeditions will run its 15th Maldives expedition. This continues our long-standing citizen-science project in the Maldives, focusing on coral reef health through hands-on volunteer expeditions. Since 2011, these marine surveys have been an important constant of local reef conservation, blending scientific rigour, citizen science and immersive adventure.
I am Matthias Hammer, founder and CEO of Biosphere Expeditions, and I will also be your expedition leader.
Coral reefs (like this one in the Maldives) are under threat world-wide.
Data collected by Biosphere Expeditions in Oman, the Maldives, Malaysia and Honduras contributes to the world’s most comprehensive assessment of coral health, exposing shrinking recovery windows and escalating degradation.
A major global report on the state of the world’s coral reefs underlines the severe, escalating pressure facing marine ecosystems worldwide, confirming that decades of climate stress have pushed coral ecosystems into continuous decline. The Status of Coral Reefs of the World: 2025 report, published by the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network (GCRMN), synthesises decades of underwater research to map trends in coral cover, disturbance and degradation.
Among the key data providers feeding into this global baseline is the international wildlife conservation non-profit Biosphere Expeditions, whose citizen science participants have systematically surveyed reefs using standard Reef Check protocols in Oman, the Maldives, Malaysia and Honduras.
Our expedition has come to an end. Thank you to all citizen scientists and partners from LWT. Here are some early results. Final ones will be in the expedition report once Lea and the LWT researchers have processed and analysed all the data and pictures.
The temperature has been steadily climbing as we move deeper into the dry season. It is hot! Lake Kazuni is showing obvious signs of water loss as levels drop. And the distance between the lake road and the water’s edge is growing significantly each day. This means less space for each hippo family and results in some of them moving further west and outside our transect. Interestingly, daily counts remain similar, which suggests that lower water levels help our research by revealing more individuals.
It’s been five days now since we saw any elephants out in the open. They seem to have altered their habit of coming by camp in the afternoon, taking a bath in the river close by and feeding on their favourite trees behind the staff tents.
Farewell to our first group of citizen scientist who leave with the satisfaction of a job well done.
102 species identified on iNaturalist, 811 hippos counted, 43 bird species identified, 6 new elephant identifications, 2 leopards captured on camera traps, the first aardvark and lions since 2018!
We placed and are monitoring 21 cameras in positions across the reserve. We have 14 at sites we utilise every year and a further 7 that we move around dependent on sightings or signs of specific animals.
There is something exciting about walking through a forest knowing that wolves are somewhere out there, even if you don’t see one. Suddenly, a set of paw prints or a piece of scat is no longer something you just walk past. It is evidence, and learning how to find and interpret that evidence is at the heart of Biosphere Expeditions’ Germany wolf project in Germany.
We have been busy. Bird transects, elephant counts, hippo transects, elephant dung analysis and camera trapping.
We start early with dawn drives or the bird transects. 05:00 up and out. Back for one of Luka’s amazing breakfasts (pancakes are popular) and then out again. Either on foot for the Hippo transects or into the vehicles for elephant counts. The elephants paid a 03:00 visit to camp this morning too.
