[Coral-List] Bleaching Management

[yusri yusuf]

Hi Suwan and others

Based on my bleaching experience in Peninsular Malaysia last year,
especially at Redang Island Marine Park, i think it is best to educate
the dive/resort operators regarding the bleaching and overall coral
reef management.  From my interaction with the operators, most of then
are quite aware of the cause and consequences of the bleaching, even
though the knowledge is quite limited, but then they are aware of the
effect of high sea temperature and coral bleaching.
As  mentioned by Julian, Marine Park Department of Malaysia did closed
some of the severely affected sites that attract lots of tourists, and
 the dive operators at Redang Island collectively did come up with
additional sites to avoid due to the incidents and took tourists to
other less affected areas.
The logic or science behind the site closure might be a bit hazy (and
we do had big argument about this with other scientists, managers,
operators and other stakeholders), but we think that removing
additional stress to the coral will help as some of the severely
affected sites at shallow reef areas did received quite high number of
daily visitors, mostly snorkelers, swimmers and island hoppers.

On  the other note, can anybody that was involved with GEF Coral
targeted research, especially from the bleaching working group provide
any insight into the management of this recurrent phenomenon or any
lesson learned from the project?
my 2 sen
best regards


Yusri Yusuf
Institute of Oceanography,
Universiti Malaysia Terengganu, Mengabang Telipot,
21030 Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia.
http://staff.umt.edu.my/~yusriyusuf/



2011/2/3 suwan Pi <suwanpita at hotmail.com>:
>
> Dear Julian,
>
> Thank you for your comment and helpful experience from Malaysia. We mostly know what we can do to reduce the stress from the reef. However, some managers who tried to apply the regulations to cope with the bleching events would experienced the difficulty like in Malaysia.
> That is my major concern.
>
> This is some of my questions about the efficiency of the regulations we think it is good:
> Is closing the site is the best way to reduce the stress to the reef ? (consequences, lack of enforcement, lost of economic benefit, fishing boat with less environment control onboard always take over the areas, more divers from closed sites move to open sites )
>
> I really love any arguments from your idea and expericence.
>
> Suwan
>
>
>
>> From: julian at reefcheck.org.my
>> To: suwanpita at hotmail.com
>> Subject: RE: [Coral-List] Bleaching Management
>> Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 14:35:34 +0800
>>
>> Hi Suwan
>>
>> Julian here, from Reef Check Malaysia. I am not really a scientist, but I do
>> follow the list and I am involved (try to be!) in coral reef management.
>>
>> We have been following the bleaching here in Malaysia since early last year,
>> and we were involved in efforts by the Department of Marine Parks Malaysia
>> to get some sites closed to diving.
>>
>> If you look at some references on reef resilience (just google reef
>> resilience if you haven't already done so!), you will see that the main
>> problem is that there is nothing we can do about the warm water causing the
>> bleaching. All we can do is remove all other stresses from the reefs so that
>> we increase their chances to recover from the bleaching. Think of it as a
>> sick human being: if that human being is tired, stressed, lacks exercise and
>> has a poor diet, then illness is more likely to strike. But if you remove
>> all those other problems, then the human is either more likely to withstand
>> the illness, or will recover more quickly.
>>
>> So we supported and joined in the move to close some dive sites in
>> Peninsular Malaysia last year (round the main diving destinations on the
>> East coast - Perhentian, Redang and Tioman), to remove as many stresses as
>> possible (divers, snorkelers, boats, anchors, fuel leaks, fishing, etc) and
>> let the corals recover. Unfortunately, the closure programme didn't work so
>> well, as it was poorly implemented. But it was still a good idea. So I
>> support your moves and recommend you go ahead and enforce closures. You need
>> to do what we need to do - convince operators that it is in their long term
>> interest, even though it might hurt today...
>>
>> I am sorry to say that as coral reef managers I don't know what more you can
>> do, other than start to address the other stresses on reefs. Here in
>> Malaysia these include:
>>
>> - pollution from poorly treated sewage, which is a problem in areas where
>> tourism has developed very quickly and resorts don't have proper
>> infrastructure
>> - siltation from rivers from land clearing/forestry
>> - destructive fishing, as dynamite fishing is still common here,
>> particularly in East Malaysia.
>>
>> The best references I can suggest are:
>>
>> - "A Reef Manager's Guide to Coral Bleaching", by Paul Marshall and Heidi
>> Schuttenberg, and you can get a copy on-line (let me know if you can't find
>> it)
>> - "Resilience Assessment of Coral Reefs" from IUCN. You can get that at
>> http://www.iucn.org/cccr/publications/
>>
>> Hope this is some help, and good luck! Let me know how you get on with the
>> stakeholder meeting!
>>
>> Regards
>>
>> Julian Hyde
>> General Manager
>> Reef Check Malaysia Bhd
>> 03 2161 5948
>> www.reefcheck.org.my
>> Follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/rcmalaysia
>>
>> "The bottom line of the Millenium Asessment findings is that human actions
>> are depleting Earth's natural capital, putting such strain on the
>> environment that the ability of the planet's ecosystems to sustain future
>> generations can no longer be taken for granted."
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>> [mailto:coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov] On Behalf Of suwan Pi
>> Sent: Monday, 31 January, 2011 7:02 PM
>> To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>> Subject: [Coral-List] Bleaching Management
>>
>>
>> Dear coral lover,
>>
>> My name is Suwan from National Park, Thailand. Since, we had very bad
>> bleaching last year and manager try to close some dive sites for both scuba
>> and snorkeling. However, it seem that only this action is not enough to heal
>> severe damage reefs.
>>
>> Next week, we will conduct a meeting between various stakeholders (tour
>> operators, organizations and NGOs). I do appreciate any comments from your
>> experiences for coral managment after the situations.
>>
>> Suwan
>>
>>
>
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