[Coral-List] What do coral reef scientists perceive are the major threats to Caribbean coral reefs?

[Bill Allison]

I think Bob Johannes deserves a mention:
Johannes, R. E. (1970). "How to kill a coral reef - I." Marine Pollution
Bulletin 1(12): 186-187.

Johannes, R. E. (1971). "How to kill a coral reef - II." Marine Pollution
Bulletin 2(1): 9-10.




On Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 1:47 AM, Clive Wilkinson <
clive.wilkinson at rrrc.org.au> wrote:

> Hi Sarah (and those interested in lists)
>
>
>
> There have been many recent efforts to list the most serious threats to
> coral reefs (usually excluding non-anthropogenic stressors). May I suggest
> you start with these.
>
>
>
> The first in the literature was via Bernard Salvat in the early 80s and
> threats were the theme of the 4th International Coral Reef Symposium in
> Manila with Edgardo Gomez leading the charge.
>
>
>
> Don Kinsey summarised the major threats in 1988 with a focus on organic
> pollution, overfishing and excess sedimentation (Kinsey, D. W. (1988).
> Coral reef response to some natural and anthropogenic stresses. Galaxea, 7,
> 113-28..)
>
>
>
> The two plenary addresses at the 7th International Coral Reef Symposium in
> Guam focused on the threats facing coral reefs, with
>
> predictions and bringing in climate change as a major threat(Buddemeier,
> 1993 p. 1; Wilkinson, 1993, p. 11).
>
>
>
> Barbara Best compiled a list of threats in 2001 (Best, B.A. and A.
> Bornbusch (eds). Global trade and consumer choices: Coral reefs in crisis.
> Proceeding of 2001 Annual Meeting of the American Association for the
> Advancement of Science, San Francisco, California, 19 February 2001)
>
>
>
> In 2004, the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network produced this 'Top Ten'
> list, based on input from more than 200 people:
>
>
> Global Change Threats:
> o    Coral bleaching - caused by elevated sea surface temperatures due to
> global climate change;
> o    Rising levels of CO2 - increased concentrations of CO2 in seawater
> decrease calcification rates in coral reef organisms;
> o    Diseases, Plagues and Invasives - increases in diseases and plagues
> of coral predators that are increasingly linked to human disturbances in
> the environment.
>
> Direct Human Pressures:
> o    Over-fishing (and global market pressures) - the harvesting of fishes
> and invertebrates beyond sustainable yields, including the use of damaging
> practices (bomb and cyanide fishing);
> o    Sediments - from poor land use, deforestation, and dredging;
> o    Nutrients and Chemical pollution - both organic and inorganic
> chemicals carried with sediments, in untreated sewage, waste from
> agriculture, animal husbandry and industry; includes complex organics and
> heavy metals;
> o    Development of coastal areas - modification of coral reefs for urban,
> industrial, transport and tourism developments, including reclamation and
> the mining of coral reef rock and sand beyond sustainable limits.
>
> The Human Dimension - Governance, Awareness and Political Will:
> o    Rising poverty, increasing populations, alienation from the land -
> increasing human populations put increasing pressures on coral reef
> resources beyond sustainable limits;
> o    Poor capacity for management and lack of resources - most coral reef
> countries lack trained personnel for coral reef management, raising
> awareness, enforcement and monitoring; also a lack of adequate funding and
> logistic resources to implement effective conservation; and
> o    Lack of Political Will, and Oceans Governance - most problems facing
> coral reefs are tractable for solutions if there is political will and
> effective and non-corrupt governance of resources. Interventions by, and
> inertia in, global and regional organisations can impede national action to
> conserve coral reefs.
> (Wilkinson, C.R., 2004. Status of Coral Reefs of the World: 2004. Global
> Coral Reef Monitoring Network and Reef and Rainforest Research Centre,
> Townsville, p.557.)
>
> This list was expanded a bit in a paper in Marine Pollution Bulletin
> (Wilkinson, C., Salvat, B. (2012). Coastal resource degradation in the
> tropics: does the tragedy of the commons apply for coral reefs, mangrove
> forests and seagrass beds? Marine Pollution Bulletin, 64: 1096-1105.)
> Thus you have many lists to start with. Not all threats will apply in all
> reef areas and the order of prominence will change radically. And it is
> important to note "that everything connects to everything else" which is
> attributed to Leonardo da Vinci around 1500 and Barry Commoner in 1971. So
> the comments by Alina Szmant that the combination of climate change and
> disease fits exactly into this connection for the Caribbean.
> Best wishes
> Clive Wilkinson
>
>
>
> PS - Sorry Gene Shinn, we have not included dust from the Sahara in our
> lists.
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov [mailto:
> coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov] On Behalf Of Sarah Young
> Sent: Friday, 11 April 2014 10:56 PM
> To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> Subject: [Coral-List] What do coral reef scientists perceive are the major
> threats to Caribbean coral reefs?
>
>
>
> Dear Coral List,
>
>
>
>
>
> I have been an active reader of coral list for the last 15 years and this
> is my first post!  Fingers crossed you can help....
>
>
>
>
>
> Newcastle University in conjunction with UK overseas territory government
> departments have amassed a large dataset on *perceived* impacts and threats
> to Caribbean coral reefs.  These range from sun cream to anchor damage.  We
> are testing the hypothesis that people will be more supportive of
> management initiatives seen to be addressing threats they view as
> important, leading to reduced implementation and enforcement costs.
>
> Notably absent from the majority of interview responses were any mention
> of coral bleaching, ocean acidification, climate change or overfishing.  So
> we would like to compare our perception data to (preferably) a ranked list
> of scientific expert derived threats to Caribbean coral reefs, but failing
> that a list of the top 10 / top 20 threats to coral reefs.
>
>
>
>
>
> There is a lot of information on the web but I am looking for something
> with a robust method - a journal article would be great, or perhaps a
> survey with a decent sample size, conducted within the last 5 years......
>
> Can anyone help?
>
>
>
>
>
> If people are interested I can post links to the reports when they are
> complete.
>
>
>
>
>
> Thank you in advance,
>
>
>
> Sarah Young (syoungresides at gmail.com<mailto:syoungresides at gmail.com>)
>
>
>
> Future of Reefs Project
>
>
>
> Intro video:
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8ZNSIUDwZ5Q
>
>
>
> --
>
> "Every morning I awake torn between a desire to save the world and an
> inclination to savor it. This makes it hard to plan the day." E.B.
>
> White
>
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"... the earth is, always has been, and always will be more beautiful than
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