[Coral-List] What's killing the corals

Eugene Shinn eugeneshinn at mail.usf.edu
Fri Jul 7 14:33:57 EDT 2017


-- 

Thanks Douglas, I realize that only those on cable TV in the US would 
have seen the commercial.  I am also quite sure most coral researchers 
do not even watch any TV, especially cable TV.  You are correct. I was 
photographing and documenting the demise of Florida's coral reefs before 
most of todays active reef workers were born. I also recall all those 
meeting where the few reef biologists that existed then constantly 
argued over which monitoring method was the best to determine reef 
health. The arguments seemed endless. I agreen with Doug, All one had to 
do was roll down the windows and see that corals were dying. It's so 
good now to see we are finally getting past monitoring and trying to 
learn the causes and try to do something about the 
problem. Unfortunately now there is few left to monitor. We can only 
hope the transplanting of the genetically most resistant corals will help.
Steve Mussman asks, "How do you account for the fact that for all these 
years the clear warnings and suggested countermeasures of so many 
dedicated coral scientists have been met with such callous disregard?" I 
asked that question many times over the years. You first might ask all 
those people who were being paid to protect the reefs. The older 
researchers out there  willremember when diving and doing any research 
on coral reefs was considered too enjoyable to be taken seriously. I 
knew many university researchers who wrote  proposals to government 
agencies but were never funded. Fish were different. We don't eat 
corals.  I was not in a position to write proposals for coral research. 
My first two published papers were unfunded hobby projects. One involved 
transplanting /A. cervicornis/ to see why it did not grow near shore. A 
severe cold front answered the question. But that was before the late 
1970s when not even hurricanes killed coral. Its all way more 
complicated now. We should get past the monitoring and do more 
experimental work. Gene


No Rocks, No Water, No Ecosystem (EAS)
------------------------------------ -----------------------------------
E. A. Shinn, Courtesy Professor
University of South Florida
College of Marine Science Room 221A
140 Seventh Avenue South
St. Petersburg, FL 33701
<eugeneshinn at mail.usf.edu>
Tel 727 553-1158
---------------------------------- -----------------------------------



More information about the Coral-List mailing list