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At the southern tip of Africa, two mighty ocean systems come together. The warm Indian Ocean and the cool Atlantic Ocean meet along our coastline, creating one of the most diverse and fascinating marine environments in the world.

For some turtles, rehabilitation at the Turtle Conservation Centre is an arduous journey, often due to severe diagnoses that require significant intervention. Pearl, a loggerhead turtle rescued in March 2026 and currently in our care, is one such story. 

Our Marine Wildlife Management Programme (MWMP) team recently led an extraordinary, multi-day rescue of four Cape fur seals from Sturrock Dry Dock. 

This heritage month, we are celebrating the incredible marine life and ecosystems that make South Africa’s coastline so special.

Our Turtle Conservation Centre is currently tracking Kai, a juvenile loggerhead turtle, and Nori, a subadult green turtle. Both turtles are fitted with satellite tags that allow us to follow along on their journeys as they explore the ocean.

The orbicular batfish is a large, disc-shaped fish with a flattened dusky silver body. Its anal and dorsal fins are symmetrical, giving the adult batfish a spade-like appearance. Its dorsal, anal and tail fins are translucent yellow with black margins, and its pectoral fins are yellow.

Bluefin gurnards are a common bottom-dwelling fish that is a common throughout the Indian and Pacific Oceans.  

The sergeant majors are small, oval damselfish. It has a grey body with a yellow dorsal area. 

The steentjie (Spondyliosoma emarginatum) is a blue-grey fish that has an oval-shaped body with several faint yellow horizontal stripes on its flanks and dark blue-grey fins. It has several sets of both incisors and a row of molars. They use this combination of teeth to pick up bottom-dwelling invertebrates and crush their shells. As they mature they become more omnivorous and will graze on algae. During spring and summer months, male steentjies will take on brighter blue and yellow colours and will construct nests in the sand. Once spawning has taken place, the males will remain at the nest to guard the eggs until they hatch. The steentjie occurs in large shoals above shallow, rocky reefs on the coasts of the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and southern KwaZulu-Natal.

The hottentot is a small bronze-grey seabream with small dark fins that occurs along the coast of Angola, Namibia, and the South African West Coast to Cape Point. 

The janbruin is a robust-bodied sea bream with an orange-brown body and deep blue eyes set into a blue-brown face.