[Coral-List] cross-ocean coral transplantation idea

[Héctor Reyes Bonilla]

Saludos!

About the discussion of what would happen if we take Indo Pacific corals
and move them to the Caribbean, a similar thing happened not so long ago in
the Americas: Before the closing of the Isthmus of Panama, the eastern
Pacific fauna had a lot of Atlantic elements (Siderastrea, Favia,
Diploria..) and was gradually "invaded" by corals from the central Pacific
(Pavona, Pocillopora, Psammocora, Fungia). The fish (Thalassoma. Abudefduf,
Haemulon) and invertebrates (Diadema, Eucidaris, and many others)  of
Atlantic affinities had to adapt to the new hosts or engineer species. What
happened? To date (3 million years later), they are still learning to play
with each other. For example, fish diversity is independent of coral cover,
the effects of bleaching and coral mortality on fish and invertebrate
demography is low (most species do no use corals for food, and habitat is
provided by rocks), corallivory is caused by other Indo Pacific arrivals
(Arothron, Acanthaster) and so on.

There are many other aspects to consider before we can understand why Indo
Pacific corals and Atlantic invertebrates and fishes have not clicked in
the eastern Pacific even after millions of years of living together, but
the point is that introduced species (arrived naturally or by human hand;
for good or for bad) take a long time to integrate to new ecosystems and to
provide the adequate environmental services, which is the thing that most
people are worried about. What if we make the species change and the
fisheries et al crash?

There are two key questions

- are things really so bad that we really have to consider reshaping the
function of a key ecosystem in an entire biogeographic region?
- what is the opinion of the residents? I am not only talking about poor
people in developing countries. What would the locals in Florida, Bahamas,
the west Caribbean Islands etc., who are currently making good money from
the reefs that we consider "in bad shape", would think of this idea ?

Hector Reyes

El lun, 29 de ene de 2024, 05:46, Contessa Ricci via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> escribió:

> Hello list serve and Dr. Matz,
>
> I realize you requested private correspondence on this Dr. Matz but I
> personally find this a matter for public discussion as this is not simply
> an idea but a serious consideration you are proposing (most likely
> governments) to take action with.
>
> I know the idea has been circulating for a while that we can just
> transplant corals and we’ll save the reefs. This is exactly the kind of
> talk that was happening circa 1800s when we thought we could fix all the
> ecological damage we caused by introducing invasive around the world
> (agriculture, hitchhikers, etc) - we thought we could just “
> fix it by also artificially introducing the native predators. We know that
> was a horrible idea now and these actuons
> Are blamed for A LOT of ecological devastation around the world.
>
> I do not like that this idea is being circulated seriously again and I
> believe this idea needs to be met with a lot more caution and criticism. I
> think it is also a very important thing to consider that this idea is being
> circulated primarily by Western researchers versus researchers with
> heritage and ancestry from the actual places that coral reefs exist. In my
> view, as one of these people, this is a short sighted and lazy solution
> that can only result in a major ecological devastation - rather than
> finding solutions to make the environment more hospitable for the species
> that are supposed to be there, you are essentially advocating for turning
> our very important, productive, and necessary and tropical ecosystems into
> Florida ecosystems (ecosystems completely defined by the presence of
> devastating invasive species). This is not a solution for saving coral
> reefs. This is not a solution for preserving the ecological function of
> cora reefs. This is simply a way for us to not feel so sad about what we
> are doing to the ecosystems.
>
> Thank you,
> Contessa Ricci
>
> On Sat, Jan 27, 2024 at 6:15 AM Mikhail V Matz via Coral-List <
> coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
>
> > Hi colleagues - I have been away from this list for a while and I heard
> > there was quite a bit of confusion and negativity here regarding recent
> > article in Nature News section (
> > https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00102-y). This is about the
> > idea that we might need to import Indo-Pacific corals to rescue the
> > ecological function of Caribbean reefs.
> >
> > I’d like to explain myself - my argument is a bit more nuanced that the
> > Nature article had it.
> >
> > Here is a short thread I made about it on twitter/X:
> > https://x.com/heatshok/status/1746927500075106495?s=20
> >
> > And here is the copy of the actual presentation I gave at SICB 2024:
> >
> https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AnNOklpFIsvtIe0lh4yona8GAeGHdvBSq6Byl2_UyEo/edit?usp=sharing
> >
> > Long story short:
> > - it is not about just moving some corals over, it is about bringing a
> new
> > “super-recruiter” life history type, which gives reefs high resilience in
> > the Indo-Pacific but has never evolved in Caribbean.
> > - it is not a call to just start plopping corals from one ocean into
> > another. It is a call to carefully consider this idea and initiate
> research
> > to make sure it can be done safely and efficiently, if it ever comes to
> > that. I surely hope it won’t, but if it does, we must be ready.
> >
> > Please let me know what you think. I’d appreciate if you emailed me
> > directly to matz at utexas dot edu .
> >
> > cheers
> > Misha Matz
> >
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