Coral macro

Blue phase

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What’s down there…

Rainforest

Why I’m in grad school: conserving the above to protect the people who rely on it. From the unfortunately bleached and algae covered coral beds at South Button.

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I just like to stare at it…

Undersea oddities

A feather star hangs off a coral block. Tiny reef fish and damsel fish flit about. A cleaner wrasse streaks across your view. And all if it stands in semi-silohuette of the blue underwater sky.

I love it so.

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Scared lionfish

I'm afraid of him, yet he runs away

A lionfish caught in the open makes for more protective coral at Lighthouse Reef.

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Coral reef under threat

Sad reef

The dying Lighthouse reef of Havelock Island typifies shallow water reefs the world over. The ecosystem is collapsing.

So-called bleached coral looses its color as the symbiotic relationship with a protozoa fails. As the coral stop growing and eventually die, the myriad species that survive around them move or diminish. Frequently, it seems the corals are left to the whims of algae.

Scientists say coral bleaching is caused by a variety of factors stressing the coral (which are actually tiny creatures that build magnificent skeletons) and disrupting the symbiosis. Global warming, acidification, human waste, harmful fishing habits and more are all very real human impacts on these rain forests of the sea.

This underwater rainforest is all but gone

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Goodbye healthy reef

Deep blue Dixon's Pinnacle

About 100 feet beneath the ocean several miles off Havelock Island is a picture of what is fast disappearing: healthy reef.

Coral ecosystems — the rain forests of the ocean, as it were — are fading and collapsing in the face of global warming, coral bleaching, overfishing, agricultural runoff, human waste pollution, the list goes on.

We can congratulate ourselves for mucking about too much.

If you’re interested in knowing more, I encourage you to check out the research and conclusions from International Programme on the State of the Ocean.

I don’t mean to be preachy, but this particular slice of the environment is something I’m dedicating my life to. So, in my world view, it’s too damn important to not talk about.

More life than you can shake a stick at

Fish and more be everywhere

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Table coral nursery school

Kindergarten

I love staring at the reef. Every few seconds, it becomes more and more alive as your eyes adjust and pick up the details.

Here, some young butterfly fish or damselfish hide in a patch of table coral at Dixon’s Pinnacle. I could have easily swam right past them.

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