Scuba Diver Ocean Planet Issue 2/2016 | Page 64

ADEX 2016 APRIL 15–17 SUNTEC SINGAPORE 1 FILM FESTIVAL GOMBESSA II Laurent Ballesta and his team unravel the mystery of Fakarava’s grouper spawning aggregation By GIL KÉBAÏLI SDOP 62 There is a place in French Polynesia where, every year, thousands of marbled groupers gather in secret – shadowed by hundreds of sharks… Photographer, diver and biologist Laurent Ballesta wanted to better understand what drives these fish to wait until the exact day of the July full moon to spawn – all at once. With the help of researchers from the French N