Qatar’s Wildlife Treasures
Qatar’s Wildlife Treasures Stefanie Dekker | Senior Correspondent, Al Jazeera English
I became aware of just how rich Qatar is in wildlife when I first joined Al Jazeera and moved to Doha 15 years ago. It was while learning to kitesurf, in those early days, that I saw flamingos, turtles, even a dugong. I had also pitched the whale sharks story to Al Jazeera English around 10 years ago, and was in touch with the energy company in charge of their research at the time - but news assignments kept me away from Doha during their season. The idea started in February 2020. I wanted to do a story on the dugong - or sea cow - and how they aggregate here off Qatar’s coast in huge numbers. We did the dugong story for news - and got incredibly lucky by finding the herd. It is very rare to see them so close. The news story got a lot of attention and traction among the community here - so many people had no idea Qatar had such a privileged presence off their waters. This is also how I met Dr Mehsin Alyafei from Qatar University - a marine environmentalist and professor, and the man who was behind some of the beautiful drone images of the sea cows.
Then in April, Dr Mehsin sent me some video footage of birds he had taken - hundreds of cormorants and also herons nesting. I wondered, ‘where are you, professor, it can’t be here?’ But it was here in Qatar, so I thought let’s do this story too. I was left in awe as hundreds of cormorants flew over our heads at sunset as we stood on an island off the northern coast. And again, once the story aired it got so much attention. No one expected to see these kinds of wildlife images from our tiny desert peninsula. I was exchanging voice messages with Luis Garcia, who produces the show Talk to Al Jazeera, when I suggested, “why don’t we do a half hour on Qatar’s little known wildlife? We are stuck here after all.” He loved it - and to our joy - management approved. It took 11 shoots, each with two cameras, some postponements and delays, quite a few 3am starts, all under the brutal heat of Qatar’s summer and soaring humidity. Some of the highlights were the cameraman Nick Porter and I trying to keep calm while filming a piece to camera in the water surrounded by whale
sharks – they weren’t a problem, but the presence of a large black tip reef shark did make our hearts beat just a little faster. We set up an interview in the south of France with John and Cecile, experts on coral reefs and oil company compensation, on their sailing boat. We sent a camera to their boat and interviewed them through the phone from a beach in northern Qatar. We discovered from Cecile that the corals in Qatar can withstand major water temperature changes, and survive – unlike corals elsewhere which bleach
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