[Coral-List] Coral reefs under threat

Sun Aug 6 00:05:03 UTC 2023

Back in the day, when there was a much larger aquarium trade in live corals, the technique used to ship corals was with no water. Just wrapped in wet newspaper. Shipping times are typically 8 or more hours. And they survived just fine.
Lonnie Kaczmarsky, PhD Coral Biologist

Sent from my iPad

> On Aug 4, 2023, at 7:11 PM, Austin Bowden-Kerby via Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
> 
> Note: This message originated from outside the FIU Faculty/Staff email system.
> 
> 
> Doug, good points.
> 
> The corals in the shallows of Fiji get exposed for an hour or two during
> extreme low tides every year, and they mostly survive, although if a hard
> rain falls during that time, it can result in high mortality.  Corals in
> areas with wave action get re-wetted repeatedly and so they do not suffer
> as long as the waves and swells occur, but corals in the calm areas do get
> more stressed, and often will bleach slightly in the exposed areas, or the
> exposed parts will sometimes die. Not all species react the same. The
> Diploastrea massive corals, for example, are much more sensitive.  Next
> time you go out in the water, notice that the Diploastrea corals of the
> subtidal boundary form flat-topped "microatolls" at a lower level than the
> Porites colonies, about 20-30cm lower, and sometimes with flat-topped
> Porites sitting on top of them.  I assume that these Diploastrea colonies
> show us the extreme low water mark for the spring tides, as they die when
> exposed, while the Porites colonies show us the mean low tide level,
> growing up as high as possible, and being able to easily survive the spring
> tides while exposed.
> 
> Austin
> 
> 
> Austin Bowden-Kerby, PhD
> Corals for Conservation
> P.O. Box 4649 Samabula, Fiji Islands
> 
> 
> https://www.corals4conservation.org
> Publication on C4C's coral-focused climate change adaptation strategies:
> https://www.mdpi.com/2673-1924/4/1/2/pdf
> Film on our "Reefs of Hope" coral restoration for climate change adaptation
> strategies:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG0lqKciXAA
> https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/emergency-response-to-massive-coral-bleaching/
> <https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/emergency-response-to-massive-coral-bleaching/>
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> On Sat, Aug 5, 2023 at 10:31 AM Douglas Fenner via Coral-List <
>> coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
>> 
>> Thank you for informing us of this!!  Yes, corals can't be out of water for
>> very long before they are in very deep trouble.  My guess is that they are
>> dead before 2 hrs out in the air, maybe 1 hr, they may well suffer damage
>> well before that.  I don't know of any studies of the effects of exposure
>> to air on corals that report how long they can stand being in air or what
>> the sublethal damage to them is for shorter periods out in the air.  But
>> they are very sensitive to exposure to air.  Does anybody know any
>> literature on this??
>> 
>> On Fri, Aug 4, 2023 at 10:08 AM International Coral Reef Observatory via
>> Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
>> 
>>> Dear Colleagues,
>>> 
>>> 
>>> In the urgency of rescuing coral colonies from Coral Bleaching areas,
>> they
>>> are being taken out of the sea to bring them without water ashore...
>>> forgetting that they are marine animals!! Let's protect better
>>> #LifeBelowWater Avoid lethal interventions that do not consider basic
>>> science.
>>> 
>>> https://twitter.com/ArrecifesCoral/status/1687552205816020992
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Cordially,
>>> Nohora Galvis
>>> ICRS World Reef Award Winner
>>> ICRO Transdisciplinary Researcher
>>> International Coral Reef Observatory
>>> Follow us on Facebook.com/ICRObservatory
>>> on Twitter / Instagram / YouTube  ICR_Observatory
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> El jue, 27 jul 2023 a las 14:27, International Coral Reef Observatory (<
>>> icrobservatory at gmail.com>) escribió:
>>> 
>>>> Dear Colleagues,
>>>> 
>>>> When we identify causes of degradation, we include climate change as
>>>> global anthropogenic pollution and local impacts both caused by
>>>> unsustainable development.  Therefore both are caused by intensive
>> human
>>>> activities that should be managed appropriately. That is why we support
>>>> campaigns of global behavior change at the United Nations implementing
>>> SDG
>>>> 14 and SDG13. Coral reef scientists and in general Coral Listers should
>>>> lead by example to avoid further greenhouse gases emissions and
>>> destructive
>>>> development, effective solutions need to find alternatives to stop
>> global
>>>> and local coral reef threats.
>>>> 
>>>> The recent 100% mortality events in the Florida Keys are a result of
>>>> cumulative stress from multiple factors. That is why we support
>>> addressing
>>>> the causes of degradation, INSTEAD OF FOCUSING ONLY in palliative care
>> or
>>>> scaling up breaking coral colonies.
>>>> 
>>>> Taking into account, Sutherland et al. (2023) while high temperature
>> has
>>>> been identified as an important cause of coral mortality in both
>>> bleaching
>>>> and disease scenarios, a predictive model for White Pox Disease (WPX)
>>> risk
>>>> in Acropora palmata (using 20 yr of disease surveys from the Florida
>> Keys
>>>> plus environmental information collected simultaneously in situ and via
>>>> satellite) indicates that the relative influence of HotSpot (positive
>>>> summertime temperature anomaly) was low and actually inversely related
>> to
>>>> WPX Risk. https://doi.org/10.3354/dao03727
>>>> Nohora Galvis
>>>> ICRS World Reef Award Winner
>>>> ICRO Transdisciplinary Researcher
>>>> International Coral Reef Observatory
>>>> Follow us on Facebook.com/ICRObservatory
>>>> on Twitter / Instagram / YouTube  ICR_Observatory
>>>> 
>>>> ---------- Forwarded message ---------
>>>> De: International Coral Reef Observatory <icrobservatory at gmail.com>
>>>> Date: mar, 25 jul 2023 a las 17:12
>>>> Subject: Coral reefs under threat
>>>> To: Austin Bowden-Kerby <abowdenkerby at gmail.com>, <
>>> helder.perez at gmail.com>,
>>>> Sebastian Szereday <seb.szereday at gmail.com>, <nicrane at cabrillo.edu>, <
>>>> jlang at riposi.net>, Alina Szmant <alina at cisme-instruments.com>, <
>>>> sealab at earthlink.net>, Mark Tupper <mark.tupper at port.ac.uk>, coral
>> list
>>> <
>>>> coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> In agreement with Judith, Alina and Nicole, there is an alert for
>>>> interventions on coral reefs that promise to save them but it may
>>>> actually may worsen the coral reef integrity.
>>>> 
>>>> Reading carefully the paper: The Influence of Foureye Butterflyfish
>>>> (Chaetodon capistratus) and Symbiodiniaceae on the Transmission of
>>>> Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease, Titus et al. (2022) have some
>>>> suggestive evidence that butterflyfish do not directly increase
>>>> infection rates, but instead might be increasing infection recovery
>>>>   https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2022.800423/full
>>>> 
>>>> Increased coral mucus is a proof of stressed coral colonies.
>>>> Considering Austin´s  message, if something has to be removed
>>>> drastically from affected coral reefs is not the mucus eaters but the
>>>> scaling up of coral fragmentation megaprojects that stress coral
>>>> colonies and support unsustainable development (massive tourism,
>>>> increased population in coral reef areas, enlargement of ports,
>>>> channels, airports, prisons, etc).
>>>> 
>>>> Taking into account that past local authorities in some case studies
>>>> have stopped plans such as a prison in the Swan Island and an
>>>> international airport on Tioman Island in Malaysia. The International
>>>> Coral Reef Initiative, the International Coral Reef Society, the
>>>> Society for Conservation Biology and UN SDG 14 envoys amongs many
>>>> other organziations should play a more active role addressing the
>>>> current decision makers of each country with respect and diplomatic
>>>> SCIENTIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS according to their mission to avoid further
>>>> catastrophes. Calling to actions to protect effectively life below
>>>> water in coral reef areas of the world that will benefit all human
>>>> beings.
>>>> 
>>>> We as an International Coral Reef Observatory, are ready to support
>>>> with letters if requested, to the top decision makers and shared the
>>>> case studies where coral reefs are under threat, as well tagging in
>>>> our social media the organizations encharged of the effective
>>>> protection of coral reefs to promote global friendly environmental
>>>> behavior and positive change to improve the conservation of coral
>>>> reefs of the world.
>>>> 
>>>> PREVENTION IS BETTER THAN TRYING TO CURE (or trying to restore
>>>> afterwards) !! It is time to find alternatives to those developers who
>>>> have coral reefs in the military target destroying ecosystems. The
>>>> Blue Economy should not be based on paying A LOT to the justifiers of
>>>> degradation, because the environmental cost will be higher sooner or
>>>> later.
>>>> 
>>>> Nohora Galvis
>>>> ICRS World Reef Award Winner
>>>> ICRO Transdisciplinary Researcher
>>>> International Coral Reef Observatory
>>>> Follow us on Facebook.com/ICRObservatory
>>>> on Twitter / Instagram / YouTube  ICR_Observatory
>>>> 
>>>> El mar, 25 jul 2023 a las 15:07, Austin Bowden-Kerby via Coral-List
>>>> (<coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>) escribió:
>>>>> 
>>>>> Hi Alina,
>>>>> 
>>>>> It's okay to be negative, as that is what scientists do- LOL!  I
>>>>> understand completely. Less is best is what we all believe in.  So
>>>>> your response is the sort of knee-jerk response I have come to
>> expect.
>>>>> I have been accused of "playing GOD" with coralliophila snail removal
>>>>> in the Caribbean and Acanthaster removal in the Pacific in earlier
>>>>> days as well.  Plus butterflyfish are beautiful, and they look so
>>>>> gentle and innocent, and so I can understand that people's hearts
>>>>> would tend to dominate their heads on this one.
>>>>> 
>>>>> However, the corals have taken millions of years to evolve and their
>>>>> future is on the line!  So if butterfly fish have even a slight
>> chance
>>>>> of being a primary means for transfer of SCTLD, the precautionary
>>>>> principle in favor of the endangered species would remove them. If we
>>>>> wait for all the facts to be published in peer reviewed journals, it
>>>>> could be too late.  There are so few of the corals left, that removal
>>>>> would translate to killing only a few hundred of the fish regionally.
>>>>> The danger we face is not just to the Caribbean: coral reefs of
>>>>> perhaps the entire planet are potentially at risk, due to the
>>>>> ineffectiveness of ballast water protocols, so certainly any risk to
>> a
>>>>> few coral predators is insignificant to the overall protection of the
>>>>> corals of the planet.
>>>>> 
>>>>> In addition to the published Noonan and Childress study, establishing
>>>>> the 4-eyes as potentially problematic, in 2004 in Honduras and
>> Belize,
>>>>> we found that the 4-eyes were the primary vector in the rapid tissue
>>>>> loss disease in Acropora.   It appeared that they were intentionally
>>>>> spreading the disease, so the tissues would lift off or something!
>>>>> They would bite an infected area and then a non-diseased neighboring
>>>>> branch and alternate.  However, a later paper by Noonan et al.
>>>>> suggests that the fish might remove diseased tissues and therefore
>>>>> help in the healing as well.  However the fish do not confine their
>>>>> feeding to the dead tissues, so while it could indeed help the
>> lesions
>>>>> by removing infected tissues, at the same time it bites non infected
>>>>> tissues and colonies, and thus is a prime suspect as a major vector
>> in
>>>>> spreading the disease.
>>>>> 
>>>>> With any emerging problem like this, we must grab what we can and run
>>>>> with it. But the precautionary principle has resulted in a paralysis
>>>>> of will, as it is being interpreted wrongly, that to do nothing is
>>>>> better than to err on the side of over-reacting.  We wait for peer
>>>>> reviewed publications, which take years to come out, and we tend to
>>>>> discount observations and unpublished work.  I find the same
>>>>> conservativeness when dealing with mass coral death due to bleaching-
>>>>> and there is no emergency working group to address mass coral
>>>>> bleaching either, no pile of funds to use for experimental
>>>>> interventions during active events.  The failure of the system to
>>>>> control this disease and to address mass bleaching threatens the
>> coral
>>>>> reefs of the entire planet, and this reflects poorly on the
>> scientific
>>>>> community.  Massive funding for urgent research and action was needed
>>>>> five years ago, to include sampling of genotypes of the species
>>>>> affected to secure them in land-based systems, predator/ vector
>>>>> removal experiments, and the like.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Back to the Titanic analogy: The ship is sinking, and our operating
>>>>> system requires that all lifeboats be fully inspected and proven
>>>>> seaworthy before we allow them to be launched and for people to board
>>>>> them, normally a good policy.  But the ship is now sinking rapidly,
>>>>> but we continue as normal, as the system requires that all lifeboats
>>>>> must be adequately inspected before launching!  The passengers that
>> we
>>>>> are supposed to be saving are now drowning.... so it is time to break
>>>>> the rules, even if some lifeboats have holes in them and start
>>>>> sinking, we can repair them as we go!
>>>>> 
>>>>> Regards
>>>>> 
>>>>> Austin
>>>>> 
>>>>> Noonan, K.R., Childress, M.J. Association of butterflyfishes and
>> stony
>>>>> coral tissue loss disease in the Florida Keys. Coral Reefs 39,
>>>>> 1581–1590 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00338-020-01986-8
>>>>> 
>>>>> The Influence of Foureye Butterflyfish (Chaetodon capistratus) and
>>>>> Symbiodiniaceae on the Transmission of Stony Coral Tissue Loss
>> Disease
>>>>> Kara Titus, Lauren O’Connell, Kristiaan Matthee, Michael Childress
>>>>> Front. Mar. Sci., 21 March 2022.  Sec. Coral Reef Research Volume 9 -
>>>>> 2022 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2022.800423
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> Austin Bowden-Kerby, PhD
>>>>> Corals for Conservation
>>>>> P.O. Box 4649 Samabula, Fiji Islands
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>> _______________________________________________
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