[Coral-List] Take care in making attributions on the trigger for SCTLD

[Austin Bowden-Kerby]

Further to the origin of SCTLD and its connection to Southern Florida.  Has
anyone tested IndoPacific corals for resistance to SCTLD?  If Indopacific
corals are highly resilient compared to similar Caribbean species, then the
marine aquarium trade might be looked into as a possible or even likely
source?  However, if Indopacific corals are just as susceptible, that
hypothesis is retired.  Certainly and regardless of the origin,
extraordinary measures should already have been put in place to prevent
ballast water transport of this horrific disease out of the Caribbean and
globally.   But I have absolutely no confidence in the present global
system, where market forces take precedence over biosecurity, and where
repeated introductions of Indopacific species have made their way into the
Caribbean via the Aquarium trade: Lionfish, Unomia (Xenia), and many
others, as if climate change and other forces were not already enough to
deal with!
Regards,  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
22 minute summary of climate change adaptation strategies
https://youtu.be/arkeSGXfKMk
https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/emergency-response-to-massive-coral-bleaching/
<https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/emergency-response-to-massive-coral-bleaching/>









On Wed, Mar 8, 2023 at 12:19 AM Kaufman, Leslie S via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:

> > Regarding the origin of SCTLD, it is important to keep things in
> perspective.  The notion that sediment disturbance could have triggered the
> coral disease syndrome SCTLD is a valid if yet unproven hypothesis.  For
> Port of Miami, so is the possibility of SCTLD being launched by the Miami
> sewer outfall and Miami River.  There may be other hypotheses as well.  The
> evidence is not nearly conclusive as yet in support of any particular
> hypothesis.  The real issue in Florida is the overall overdevelopment of
> the Kissimee ecosystem from Orlando to Key West, plus the failure to
> adequately consider the environment and marginalized people in development
> plans. There  may even be no plan other than get in, suck profits, get out.
> Environmental crusaders should stick with rigor to the data and be careful
> to choose the right enemy, unless the intent is really just to raise money
> to keep crusading.  That of course requires a simple story and a singular
> target to make funders feel good.
>
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