[Coral-List] Coral Reef Conservation Preferences

[Steve Mussman]

“What you believe is simply not our reality in the South Pacific Ocean, where there are only three small and under-funded coral reef restoration programs in all of this great vastness”.

Hi Austin,

You are right to point out that your situation in the South Pacific is different from mine. In fact, I assume that your particular sensitivity to this issue is heightened, and rightly so, by the fact that you are precariously living on what amounts to the front lines of this intensifying crisis. So, I would say that although our immediate realities may differ, our views are closely aligned. You just asserted that some researchers are claiming that they can manipulate corals to adapt to the impacts of climate change and that in doing so they are “playing to the donors and the press, and unwittingly serving the fossil fuel industries!” That is exactly the premise upon which I have based my concerns regarding some of the restoration projects here in the US and Caribbean. Now that another major bleaching event has wreaked havoc, I had hoped that restoration strategies here might change, but so far I don’t see any evidence of that happening. In the Pacific islands climate change is not some futuristic scenario based on speculative computer models, rather it is a daily-lived reality. Maybe, if we all lived on vulnerable atolls in the South Pacific, more of us would be inclined to see things your (our?) way.

Regards,

Steve

On 10/1/23, 8:05 PM, Austin Bowden-Kerby <abowdenkerby at gmail.com> wrote:

Bula Steve,

What you believe is simply not our reality in the South Pacific Ocean, where there are only three small and under-funded coral reef restoration programs in all of this great vastness. Other than in the US Pacific and Australian waters, there is almost no funding for restoration, and the entire emphasis is on MPAs, marine spatial management, and pollution control measures. All good, but the ironic thing is that this is despite having less than three million people in the entire vast region, less than the population of Puerto Rico, and thus our reefs are much less overfished and have a tiny fraction of the pollution stress when compared to the densely populated Caribbean and SW Atlantic.

The nation of Kiribati (pronounced Kiribas), has the most bleaching impacted reefs on the planet, as measured by the number of months with condition two and above bleaching events, with Kiritimati (Christmas) Atoll reaching 26 DHW in 2015-16. https://coralreefwatch.noaa.gov/product/vs/timeseries/polynesia.php#northern_line_islands The Florida Keys and central Bahamas have just gone through 22 DHW, and this will be an extinction level event. NOAAs condition two simply does not express this severe level of intense bleaching. As 4DHW starts condition one bleaching, and 8DHW starts condition 2 bleaching, then shouldn't 12 DHW be considered condition 3 bleaching?, and 16DHW be considered level 4 bleaching? and 24 and above condition 5? Conditions 4 and 5 are extinction level events, whereby entire species groups are eliminated. Using this expanded scale, from the online NOAA data, Kiritimati (Christmas Atoll), is the only place on earth thus far to have experienced a condition 5 level event, and the Florida Keys and Central Bahamas have just experienced a condition 4 event, if we use this terminology.

The totally un-fished, uninhabited coral reefs of the Line and Phoenix groups have had a major collapse, 100% related to coral bleaching. On the few islands where corals have recovered, the original Acropora dominated reefs are gone, with most Acropora and several other genera locally extinct at ecological and reproductive levels, and several are extinct biologically. A low-diversity coral population dominated by plating Montipora or submassive Porites rus now dominates on the few "recovered" reefs. Some researchers have loudly proclaimed recovery, and have asserted this as evidence that coral reefs are resilient and adapting to climate change, using coral cover as their primary metric. But in my book, this amounts to playing to the donors and the press, and unwittingly serving the fossil fuel industries! COME ON! These reefs are vastly and heavily impacted by climate change, they are ecologically and geologically altered, and the local extinction of multiple coral species has been covered up. As long as we use coral cover as our primary metric, the ongoing collapse of coral reefs will remain masked. It is like we are measuring plant cover as the metric for vegetative health, which will not recognize a shift from forests to grasslands. Collapse is occurring as a series of phase shifts, and it is shocking that this has gone largely unstudied and unnoticed, when it is staring us right in the face!

Our study on Kiritimati Atoll, the most intensely impacted coral reefs on the planet can be found on Research Gate here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/351946151_Restoration_and_Natural_Recovery_of_Corals_after_Unprecedented_Mass_Bleaching_and_Coral_Death_in_the_Line_Islands_Kiribati_March_2020_Version The study was condensed and published in the book: Active Coral Restoration, edited by David Vaughn.

SPC, our South Pacific intergovernmental body for the environment, has established an ocean acidification section, but from what I am witnessing, coral reefs will be long gone by the time ocean acidification becomes an issue. We need a focus on bleaching and coral focused adaptation that is just not happening. And somehow the plot has been lost as to what is actually happening on the front lines away from the highly resilient coral reefs of Australia and Fiji. These expansive reef systems have strong thermal gradients conducive to the development of heat adapted corals, with extensive upcurrent larval sources so that recovery is more rapid, and therefore the experts of this region, who work on these highly resilient reefs are celebrating resilience, and assuming that their reefs typify the wider situation- which they don't.

In my opinion, when the tipping-point scale change in mean ocean temperatures began last July, https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/sst_daily/ the era of coral restoration is largely over, and the era of rescuing coral genotypes and preventing coral species extinction has arrived. Just like we stop planting trees and carrying out reforestation during severe droughts and in periods of extreme fire threat, changing strategies to build firebreaks and create seed banks and gene banks and secure reproductive populations, we must now change strategies with coral reefs. I discuss this in my recent paper. https://www.mdpi.com/2673-1924/4/1/2/pdf

On closing, only one island nation in our region has escaped these many level 1 and 2 bleaching events, and that is Tuvalu. With the most amazing branching Acropora coral populations remaining (that I know of at least) found on Funafuti, the main Atoll. This includes km after km of diverse 3-meter high staghorn thickets, huge 3-5 meter wide single colonies of Acropora florida and A. grandis, and other thick branched coral species (which in other areas are under 1m wide). Heat adapted populations of these corals are located in warm shallow lagoons. There are also very large colonies of erect plate-like and knobby Heliopora, the blue corals, and very large tabulate, digitate, and corymbose species. Tuvalu has perhaps the most intact example of an Acrpora climax community. Located on the fringe of cyclone activity, Tuvalu receives the cooling effects of cyclones without the damage, and this structures the resulting community. Massive coral species, for example, are not as common, having been overtaken by the faster growing Acroporids. As the Atoll has clean oceanic waters, COTS are exceptionally rare. But sady, after many lifetimes of stability, these reefs are in their last few weeks of life, the massive heat wave now in Kiribati, is heading their way, with severe condition 2 bleaching predicted to hit by December. This is particularly sad as these reefs have not been well studied!

We are planning an intervention for Tuvalu, in partnership with a local NGO and Fisheries. The shallow south Funafala lagoon has the most interesting and largest coral colonies in <2m of water, which already experience uncomfortable temperatures in summer, and with almost no coral bleaching or mortality recorded. We are operating on the assumption that these hot pocket reefs could reach temperature extremes of >36C in the coming months, potentially 38C, like we saw for nearshore Florida waters in recent months. So we plan to sample as much of this biodiversity as possible, and to move it out to a much cooler nursery site, in a well-sheltered sandy area, located behind a small island situated between two deep reef passes on the windward side of the atoll. We are raising funds for this emergency effort, and we also plan to film the coral rescue for presentation at COP28, in partnership with the Coral Restoration Consortium group. After Tuvalu is secure then we will move to Vanuatu and Fiji with these same strategies.

If self-funded helpers are interested please write, as you would be welcome. It would be amazing if an experienced film crew could record these reefs properly before they are gone, and then return to record these same transects at the height of the bleaching, and then the same sites post bleaching. Much like Chasing Coral did, but what was missing was the human side and horrific impacts of coral reef collapse to reef-reliant indigenous peoples and atoll nations. To show the end result, all we need to do is to go on a short plane ride to the adjacent nation, Kiribati, to show the dead reefs and highly ciguatoxic reef fish dominating certain areas. Also missing from Chasing Corals was some hope- positive actions to save the corals, which are a ray of hope in the darkness. So this event might potentially become a massive wake-up call. Is there any way to create an expanded SAVING CORALS film.

If interested in these approaches, please watch our 4 minute Reefs of Hope Launching film. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnJ-eUVJwqE

Plus the more detailed 20 minute film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG0lqKciXAA

Crowdfunding site: https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/emergency-response-to-massive-coral-bleaching/ (https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/emergency-response-to-massive-coral-bleaching/)

We can not wait any longer!

Austin

Austin Bowden-Kerby, PhD

Corals for Conservation, Fiji

On Mon, Oct 2, 2023 at 2:01 AM International Coral Reef Observatory via Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov (mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov)> wrote:

Interesting analysis to note that contributions towards coral reef

conservation tend to increase when major stressors are removed from the

equation. Thus, effective coral reef management should be based on that

priority when we identify Coral Reefs Optimism.

However, current group thinking is leading international initiatives that

exactly are just favouring restoration projects over expanding marine

protected areas and strengthening legislation to avoid further coral reef

degradation. This last scenario is based on Coral Reefs Pessimism and it is

not that effective for conservation.

El martes, 26 de septiembre de 2023, Steve Mussman via Coral-List <

coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov (mailto:coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov)> escribió:

>

> A Global Analysis of Coral Reef Conservation Preferences

>

> https://assets.researchsquare.com/files/rs-2350723/v1/2b8d20

> cc-30df-4b4a-8384-0f4c4bb52e2b.pdf?c=1677092671

>

> This study’s findings should be of interest to everyone subscribing to

> Coral List as many of authors’ conclusions would seem to challenge what

> appear to be the guiding principles of many high profile coral reef

> conservation projects in existence today.

>

> Some of the more interesting findings include:

>

> “. . . there is a task for scientists and media to more clearly convey the

> true urgency of the coral reef crisis, because individuals respond more

> actively if reefs are perceived to be in serious decline”.

>

> “We also found that conservation demand is highest in relatively

> low-income countries. Residents of developing countries appear to

> appreciate reefs for their non-use values to a larger extent than residents

> of developed countries”.

>

> “. . . interpreting our findings in the context of loss aversion bias,

> implies that losses weigh heavier than gains in decision making (Tversky

> and Kahneman, 1991) and that conservation programs may highlight worst-case

> future coral reef scenarios rather than the benefits of effective

> management”.

>

> “. . . the pathway through which individuals prefer to contribute their

> money towards conservation is arguably only effective if persistent

> stressors, such as climate change and overfishing are removed. On

> aggregate, individuals prefer hands on measures, like the funding of coral

> and reef fish restoration projects, over more indirect measures where the

> conservation benets are perhaps less immediately visible, such as expanding

> marine protected areas and strengthening legislation. Coral reef

> restoration of this kind is expensive, has varying success rates (Edwards

> and Clark, 1999; Rinkevich, 2006), and is only feasible at small spatial

> scales (Bongiorni et al., 2011). This non-alignment of public preferences

> and effectiveness of conservation measure could potentially be addressed

> through information and education campaigns that explain how protection and

> legislation deliver conservation benefits”.

>

> I would argue that, to some extent, the coral science community may

> actually be (unintentionally?) contributing to the non-alignment of public

> preferences and effectiveness of conservation measures through their focus

> on restoration in their current information and education campaigns. It is

> also interesting to note that contributions towards coral reef conservation

> tend to increase when major stressors are removed from the equation.

>

> Regards,

>

> Steve

>

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