Attendees at the International Scuba Diving Hall of Fame Induction ceremony were surprised to see dead starfish as a central part of the table settings.

A number of guests were shocked enough to remove the marine animals from the tables, feeling that their inclusion was sending out the wrong message to the diving community, known as being some of the most eco-friendly people on the planet.

Reputable

However, the starfish were bought from a company that uses reputable and sustainable sources, according to Jo-Anne Brown of Celebrations, the company that dressed the tables.

“They’re not just bought from any company that goes out and kills starfish. That’s absolutely not the case. Holiday Souvenirs, who I buy from, is very strongly government-regulated.

“They are actually environmentalists as well and are very particular about the fact that what they do bring in are properly harvested and replenished. I source our supplies only from this company because they give me the guarantee that these things are not harvested crazily with no thought of the ecological effects,” said Ms Brown.

Ceramic

The Celebrations boss noted that she made sure that they purchased their goods from responsible providers, and explained that most of the starfish were ceramic, but those that weren’t were already dead when they were taken from the water by Holiday Souvenirs.

“When starfish multiply they lay on top of each other and if they don’t get enough sun they die. The company then takes the bottom starfish. They are very stringent about how they get them.

“Sea fans, sponges and everything else we might use is all stuff that washes up here on the beaches. There’s nothing that we dive and take up – we would never do that, it’s too precious,” concluded Ms Brown.

Suspicious

Although campaigners in Cayman accept that Celebrations were acting in good faith in their belief that the company selling them was ecologically responsible, they say that there are other items that Holiday Souvenirs sell that are ‘suspicious’.

Cathy Church was inducted into the International Scuba Diving Hall of Fame in 2008 and told the Caymanian Compass that she was not criticising Celebrations, who she said had been misled.

Ms Church explained that she had reviewed the Holiday Souvenirs website where she found other items for sale that could not be sold in any significant quantity without their harvesting having caused severe ecological damage.

“[One item for sale is] large brain corals that were collected alive. If they had been rolled up onto a beach they would have shown considerable damage.

“There were also Trident’s Trumpet snail shells which are quite illegal to traffic in some countries as they eat, and therefore control the numbers of, the crown of thorns starfish which can eat and destroy entire reefs where the trumpet shells are removed,” said Ms Church.

Unaware

She explained that she was unaware of any commercial farms that raised Trident’s Trumpets in order to harvest their shells and explained that the shells would rarely, if ever, wash up on the beach.

“When they die, the shells become valuable homes to hermit crabs, which often struggle to find whole shells in areas where shells are heavily collected,” said Ms Church.

Terrible

The diver and well-known photographer explained that she was therefore suspicious that the starfish had been collected in an environmental way.

“Anything that we can do to reduce the destruction of valuable sea life that have no other purpose but decoration would help the world's oceans to support more fish for food.