[Coral-List] Coral List Submission

Mon Sep 26 10:10:16 EDT 2005

Hi Erik,
I'm surprised at the comment "with bleaching, etc
there are more pressing issues in the coral world".  
At this point, all corals that are in healthy
condition should be kept that way precisely because of
coral bleaching on other reefs.
Additionally, mangroves are "wetlands".  They are
important buffers to both land from hurricane damage
and to reefs from land run-off.  The affects of last
year's Tsunami were greatly worsened in areas where
mangroves had been cut back for commercial fish
farming.  The golf course construction must be costing
millions.  Surely they should protect their investment
by letting nature provide an important buffer from
storm erosion.  Mangroves will provide this.  As for a
"wet land" buffer for runoff from
the fertilizer -- does anyone on the list know if
mangroves can serve in this way??
In addition to this, mangroves are important fish
hatcheries/nurseries.  Get the fishermen and dive
operators involved in this project.  I'll stick my
neck out here and say that THERE is a direct effect on
fish populations when mangroves have been depleted.
The more involvement from various other businesses in
the area, the stronger your argument to get the
developers to work with you.
Good luck, and keep us posted on the development. 
Vanese Flood

--- Erik Gauger <erik at notesfromtheroad.com> wrote:

> At the beginning of this week, Kalai posted a public
> reply to my
> email about Guana Cay.  He asked, "how close is the
> reef to the
> golf course?"
> 
> The answer is that the reef is 45 feet from the
> shore.  There is a
> photo here.  The land is a proposed fairway.
> 
>
http://www.notesfromtheroad.com/WestIndies/bakers_bay_intro4.htm
> 
> I have received over 50 gracious replies to my
> original query.  It
> may take me a few weeks to respond to everybody. 
> However, the
> assistance I have received has been enormous.  I
> understand that
> with bleaching, etc there are more pressing issues
> in the coral
> world.
> 
> I want to make it clear that the proposed golf
> course is very
> 'green' and that this issue is one of 'best
> practices' versus 'what
> will actually happen to the reef.'  The golf course
> uses seagrass
> paspalam, and the land will be terraformed so that
> the runoff from
> the fertilizer will go into a manmade wetlands (the
> mangroves are
> being cleared for a 250 slip marina).
> 
> Several of you have written me that golf courses can
> be built in a
> very green way.  I am familiar with such golf course
> projects in
> places like Hawaii, where the golf course and reef
> are separated by
> hundreds of yards and even hills.  Guana Cay is very
> different
> because it is a tiny island only an 1/8th of a mile
> wide and seven
> miles long.  The 250 boat marina will be dredged
> from mangroves or
> wetlands, and will be as close to the reef as the
> Disney dredging
> project, which was estimated to have killed off 1/3
> of the corals
> on the Northeastern edge of the island.
> 
> A large pdf of the golf course plan:
> 
>
http://www.discoverylandco.com/images/bakersbay/illustrative_plan.p
> df
> 
> and my map of the island:
> 
>
http://www.notesfromtheroad.com/WestIndies/guana_map.html
> 
> Thanks for all your assistance in helping someone
> from the outside.
> 
> Erik
> notesfromtheroad.com
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> [mailto:coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov]On
> Behalf Of
> coral-list-request at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> Sent: Friday, September 23, 2005 1:25 PM
> To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> Subject: SPAM-LOW: Coral-List Digest, Vol 27, Issue
> 21
> 
> 
> Send Coral-List mailing list submissions to
> 	coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> 
> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web,
> visit
> 
>
http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list
> or, via email, send a message with subject or body
> 'help' to
> 	coral-list-request at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> 
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> 
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it
> is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of Coral-List digest..."
> 
> 
> Today's Topics:
> 
>    1. Re: Present Bleaching Event - PR & USVI etc.
> (Kristen Hoss)
>    2. U.S. Coral Reef Task Force Meeting (Beth
> Dieveney)
>    3. Re: Re: Coral-List Digest, Vol 27, Issue 20
> (Alan E Strong)
> 
> 
>
-------------------------------------------------------------------
> ---
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Fri, 23 Sep 2005 08:28:36 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Kristen Hoss <kristenhoss at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [Coral-List] Present Bleaching Event -
> PR & USVI etc.
> To: "scott.stripling" <scott.stripling at noaa.gov>,
> Alan E Strong
> 	<Alan.E.Strong at noaa.gov>
> Cc: Roger B Griffis <Roger.B.Griffis at noaa.gov>,
> 	coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov,
> Lisamarie.Carrubba at noaa.gov
> Message-ID:
> <20050923152836.67610.qmail at web53912.mail.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I was wondering if anyone has ever studied the
> correlation of coral
> bleaching episodes as possible indicators of what
> hurricane
> activity may be like during the year?  I was
> wondering if there was
> a connection that could be used as a prediction
> tool, or if the
> correlation would just be related to the already
> known water
> temperatures and weather patterns, etc....
> 
> -Kristen Hoss
> Marine Researcher
> and Wildlife Biologist-USDA/APHIS/WS
> 
> "scott.stripling" <scott.stripling at noaa.gov> wrote:
> With the NE Caribbean currently located underneath
> an elongated
> area of
> low pressure,
> light and variable winds will continue to dominate
> the region for
> the
> next 1 to 2 weeks.
> Computer models are forecasting only brief (6-12
> hour periods) of
> anything
> approaching normal trade wind flow during this time.
> Thus the
> stagnant
> mixing conditions will
> persist regionally through the first week of
> October, at the least.
> 
> Scott Stripling
> NOAA/NWS San Juan
> 
> Alan E Strong wrote:
> 
> > *NOTICE - Bleaching continues to evolve throughout
> Eastern
> Caribbean*
> >
> > Beginning in the central Keys during August
> (Sombrero Key
> especially)
> > the warm water episode and accompanying bleaching
> for this year
> is
> > progressing south and eastward through Cuba,
> Puerto Rico and the
> > Virgin Islands. This can visually be seen in our
> recent 12-week
> > composite of HotSpot accumulations - Degree
> Heating Weeks (DHWs):
> >
> >
>
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/PSB/EPS/SST/data2/dhwa.9.19.2005.gif
> >
> > and HotSpots:
> >
> >
>
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/PSB/EPS/SST/data/hotspotwnc.gif
> >
> > Extremely high DHWs above "8" in much of the
> Virgin Islands are
> quite
> > worrisome as these levels in past bleaching events
> typically
> bring
> > some mortality to corals. This evolving episode
> continues to be
> at
> 
=== message truncated ===

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