[Coral-List] Help Us Understand the Beauty of Coral Reefs

[Osmar Luiz]

Unfortunately people won’t leave them alone.

They will do what they often do to dangerous, nasty and scary things. They will finish it for good. That’s what they have been doing for decades to sharks, wolves, snakes, and everything else perceived as dangerous.

I am amazed how smart people can come with such foolish arguments sometimes.

Cheers
Osmar



_______________________________________
Osmar J. Luiz, Ph.D.
Research Fellow - Quantitative Aquatic Ecology
Research Institute for the Environment and Livelihoods
Charles Darwin University
Darwin NT, Australia

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> On 27 May 2023, at 10:07 pm, Mark Tupper via Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
> 
> Phil, you hit it on the head. People are more likely to exploit what they
> love than protect it. Beautiful reefs, beaches, etc draw people like a
> magnet, leading to hotels, restaurants, dive shops, glass-bottom boat
> tours, increased fishing pressure to support said hotels and restaurants,
> sewage, plastic and other debris, and habitat destruction from coastal
> development.
> 
> I watched this happen over a decade in Coron, Philippines. When I started
> surveys there in 2007, there were 3 hotels, a handful of tour operators,
> and maybe 30 cars on the island. By 2017, there were 53 hotels, several
> dozen tour operators, and about 3500 cars. The nearby reefs in Coron Bay
> that were stunning in 2007 were mostly trashed by 2017. I had to travel at
> least an hour to find healthy reefs with decent fish biomass.
> 
> This same pattern is repeated globally. Coron is just one of many sites
> that has been "loved to death". Not to sound too flippant, but perhaps we
> should portray reefs as dangerous, nasty, scary places so people leave them
> alone.
> 
> Mark
> 
> On Sat, 27 May 2023, 12:02 Phillip Dustan via Coral-List, <
> coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
> 
>> I Agree. I was a co-author on this paper. My photo time-series of
>> Carysfort Reef were used to help validate the algorithm.
>> https://biospherefoundation.org/project/coral-reef-change/
>> 
>> However, there is a greater logical flaw in your thinking. For years the
>> mantra has been "People only protect what they love"
>> Cousteau popularized the idea and he always believed that it worked but I
>> think it is fair to say that the current state of affairs is that either
>> people do not love reefs or the idea is false.
>> Everyone treats coral reefs as a resource that provides goods and services
>> to humans when in fact reefs need all their productivity to maintain
>> themselves.
>> Reefs are living processes and that is what makes them beautiful to humans,
>> a healthy reef glows with life.
>> This can be quantified with image processing but that does not seem to add
>> to their conservation unfortunately.
>> Guess they need more than the perception of love to be allowed to exist in
>> the Anthropocene..........
>> Phil
>> 
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