[Coral-List] (Coral-List) 1.5 C not plausible anymore

Thu Nov 3 03:40:50 UTC 2022

Hi all - Suppose on every reef that Adele et al. looked there were already corals that could survive and reproduce at +1.5°. Wouldn’t that change the tone of this discussion towards a strategy that would favor and seed the adaptation needed? So this is my simple question. What evidence is there to support the existence of these super corals? Or refute it? If you knew they were there, what would you do with that information? What would the local conservation managers and community leaders do? How would you test these corals in 10s of reefs, then 100s, then 1000s?

Our work - and others who’ve been testing corals - suggests heat resistance is widespread. That is a huge asset for the future that we have the opportunity to use. Maybe current resistance isn’t enough - maybe it is only enough between but not within species. But if our job is to save as much as possible of coral reefs so that there is something in 100 years to grow back from, how do we do this?

Steve

*******************************************
Stephen Palumbi
Jane and Marshall Steel Jr. Professor of Marine Science
microdocumentaries at http://microdocs.org

On Oct 30, 2022, at 8:59 PM, Robert W Buddemeier via Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov<mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>> wrote:

Geomorphology is also a major constraint on potential coral habitat as a
function of latitude,  Benthic surface area within the photic zone
decreases rapidly as you move from the tropics to higher latitudes, and the
areas where shallow water will increase due to sea level rise are mostly
the flat sedimentary coastal plains rather than the rocky coasts more
suitable as reef substrates.

Bob Buddemeier

On Sun, Oct 30, 2022 at 8:50 PM Paul Muir via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov<mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>> wrote:

Transplanting corals to the north (or south in S hemisphere) may also  have
very limited scope. It’s a huge assumption that each coral species is
latitudinally limited  by temperature and very little good data to support
that hypothesis when you dig down. Also very little good data to show
actual range extensions of corals: poor baselines, poor IDs, changing human
impacts etc all cloud the issue. There is some data to show that many
species are constrained by winter PAR rather than temperature (e.g. Muir et
al 2015, Science), although this is debated (Madin et al 2016, Frontiers of
Biogeog & Muir et al 2016 reply ). Bizarrely, there’s very little work been
done to test these various hypotheses- despite furious debate!! There’s
also very little data on which species are most at risk of extinction from
repeated bleaching events etc- again, furious debate informed by very
little data. Lots of work is currently going into high-tech magic bullets:
drones, AI, genetic engineering, climate engineering etc etc, while the
basic, unsexy science/ hypothesis testing, basic conservation biology seems
to be somewhat overlooked at present in the coral world?

Paul Muir

Refs
Muir et al 2015 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1259911
Madin et al 2016
- Frontiers of Biogeography
<https://www.researchgate.net/journal/Frontiers-of-Biogeography-1948-6596>
8(1)
response to Madin: Frontiers of Biogeography
<https://www.researchgate.net/journal/Frontiers-of-Biogeography-1948-6596>
8(4)

On Mon, 31 Oct 2022 at 2:24 am, Nicole Crane via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov<mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>> wrote:

Hello all,
I haven’t weighed in for a bit so I will now. I absolutely agree that the
trajectory is here, we are not likely to change it (99.9%?), and I
suppose
there is some possibility that it will be even worse….so on that somewhat
gloomy but realistic backdrop (and I also agree that we need to be
telling
the truth to people and helping them understand) we place our
conservation
efforts.

But I disagree that our only option is transplanting corals to the north.
In fact I would encourage our community to think more broadly about what
would motivate those efforts. Why? For whom? For what specific outcome?
At
what cost? At what gain? While transplanting or facilitated range
expansion
is one tool, I think there are many others (and I know this community is
actively engaged in them!). There is good evidence of local adaptation
happening on some reefs, lots of work on ‘facilitated adaptation’ through
genetic rescue and investigation of ‘super corals’, both in the lab and
on
reefs. Finally, I do think that the human dimension is critical. By
working
authentically and collaboratively with local communities, we can, and by
we
I mean the global Collective not the western scientists driving most of
it,
achieve important advances. One might be better local management that can
buy time for some corals to work through that local adaptation process
(which does seem to be happening in some places).
So I do think there are multiple approaches that can, despite a pretty
dire
backdrop, achieve important conservation goals that benefit diverse
stakeholders impacted by this rapid, and potentially devastating (unless
we
look at this problem from all angles) trajectory. And to do that last
part
we need a diverse set of people to come up with solutions from those many
angles. Here, diversity becomes not just a good idea, and the right thing
to do, but an imperative.
In solidarity towards working for a better planet, and coral reef
persistence, over whatever timescale we are given.
Nicole

On Sun, Oct 30, 2022 at 6:07 AM Dennis Hubbard via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov<mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>> wrote:

STEVE:

I AGREE TOTALLY. So,,,,,, the question is how to proceed. For the
moment, I
will set aside the also important issues related to point-source
pollution
and other more-local factors.... not implying in any way that they are
not
just as important.

If the strategy is simply going to be "Go north young man" (i.e.,
transplanting colonies further to the north where temperatures are more
akin to what existed in Florida in decades past), then we have to
realize
that this is a severely limited approach. At some point, as transplant
sites move closer to the southern Appalachians, higher sedimentation
will
increasingly limit  options.Because of the larger rivers and increasing
tidal range as we move into the southern extremities of the "Georgia
Embayment" (i.e., the coast from the Outer Banks to central Florida),
fluvial input is going to increase significantly - especially if warmer
climate translates into higher rainfall and runoff. At that point, the
effects of sediment stress will increasingly  dominate. In this
scenario
it
is almost certain that the combined effects of temperature and
sedimentation will negatively impact coral viability by much more is
implied by simple addition of the two. Nature has a nasty way of
increasing
impacts by exponential multiplication rather than simple linear
addition

Denny

On Sat, Oct 29, 2022 at 10:23 AM Steve via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov<mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>> wrote:

Just a couple of observations related to this important discussion.

We are not at 1.5C yet, but it is likely we will get there within a
decade
(or so). According to the WMO (World Meteorological Organization) the
annual mean global near-surface temperature between 2022 and 2026 is
predicted to be between 1.1C and 1.7C higher than preindustrial
levels
(1850-1900 averages). The chance of at least one year between 2022
and
2026
exceeding the warmest year on record, 2016, is 93%. The chance of the
five
year mean (2022-2026) being higher than the last five years
(2017-2021)
is
also 93%.

So, we are clearly on a trajectory to take us to 1.5C and beyond.
Considering the fact that virtually every study I’ve read confirms
that
1.5C will be catastrophic for coral reefs, how should the coral
science
community react?

This paper (

https://journals.plos.org/climate/article?id=10.1371/journal.pclm.0000004)
suggests that focusing on temperature adaptation and facilitating
migration
is the only logical way forward, but beyond that, how can there be
any
debate on Peter’s main point? “ . . . it is time for a new approach
to
communicating what we know of the likely future of this planet - That
new
approach is called telling the whole truth, rather than just parts of
the
truth, or sugar-coated parts of the truth. . . we will not get very
far
until we recognize that we and all other creatures share this planet
and
depend on it for our survival”.

Regards,

Steve Mussman

https://theconversation.com/most-americans-do-trust-scientists-and-science-based-policy-making-freaking-out-about-the-minority-who-dont-isnt-helpful-193085

https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/12411/strategic-science-communication

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--
Dennis Hubbard - Emeritus Professor: Dept of Geology-Oberlin College
Oberlin OH 44074
(440) 935-4014

* "When you get on the wrong train.... every stop is the wrong stop"*
Benjamin Stein: "*Ludes, A Ballad of the Drug and the Dream*"
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--
Nicole L. Crane
Faculty, Cabrillo College
Natural and Applied Sciences
www.cabrillo.edu

Senior Conservation Scientist, Project co-lead
One People One Reef
onepeopleonereef.org
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