Scientists may have found a way to grow coral reefs 25 times faster than nature

[Tradewinds]

Did anyone else see/read the PBS article from Feb 3, 2015?

It would be wonderful if this pans out.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/scientists-try-regrow-dying-coral-reef-25-times-faster-nature/

 

[acabgd]

Great idea. We'll soon see if it works.

 

[joshky]

I'm confused though, is he exaggerating his numbers with how long those brains actually take to grow? Or are these people really this ignorant on how long it takes coral to grow? 2 years for a half dollar sized frag? 10 to 15 years for the possibly 5 inch colony? Do we hobbyists grow coral faster than mother nature???

I appreciate their work, but their timeline on growth seems way off in my personal experience.

 

[herring_fish]

Let me give you my unsophisticated guess on this.

That is pretty much what we already do. That is why we get great growth. We buy frags and marvel at their growth in the first few months or years because they are limited by the tank. What happens after 20 years? Perhaps they slow down.

What we mostly have are branching and plating corals of one type or another. Many of our corals heal, encrust (sometime down over the plug and then begin to grow structure. At that point, they grow up and/or out, making their own skeleton as they go.

That guy mentioned a brain coral the size of a SMALL CAR taking many many years.

It looks like they are being more systematic in placing corals that encrust over old SP. specific skeleton until they grow together and closed so as to look like they did before the old, larger coral died.

This is a little like taking an old pig organ, stripping off the functioning cells to leave only the cartilage like structure and rinsing them with re-circulating cells from a particular human. Under the right conditions they colonize the structure and become and new organ that will not be rejected by the recipient.
Those cells are unlikely to colonize the wrong type of structure because the branching pattern will not allow the new cells to do their job and function as they were intended. A liver will not function like a kidney. They filter in a different ways. They take in and share nutrients through different mechanisms.

Likewise, (perhaps) one particular group of cells will encrust over the right skeleton shape faster than a plug or the wrong type of coral structure. I believe that, when conditions improve, damaged areas on a sun coral will repopulate over old died skeleton that is right next to it.

 

[Reefvet]

I'm confused .... Do we hobbyists grow coral faster than mother nature???

In a word, yes.

I think you need to re-watch video.

At 2:47 he states it take 4 months to grow frag the interviewer is holding in their tanks, which would have taken as much as 2 years in the wild. That's accurate under the conditions of that reef.

The entire point of the video is that fragging speeds growth in captivity and that transplanting the frags so that they'll fuse can result in large colonies than would achieved without intervention.

They're just one project like this. There are many similar efforts all over the world.

 

[joshky]

In a word, yes.

I think you need to re-watch video.

At 2:47 he states it take 4 months to grow frag the interviewer is holding in their tanks, which would have taken as much as 2 years in the wild. That's accurate under the conditions of that reef.

The entire point of the video is that fragging speeds growth in captivity and that transplanting the frags so that they'll fuse can result in large colonies than would achieved without intervention.

They're just one project like this. There are many similar efforts all over the world.

I guess I just find it really hard to believe the growth rates are that slow in the reefs without human intervention. I personally haven't studied growth rates on the coral reefs so I can't say with certainty, but to me it almost seems like exaggerated data for shock value.

I watched the video.....

 

[Reefvet]

I guess I just find it really hard to believe the growth rates are that slow in the reefs without human intervention. I personally haven't studied growth rates on the coral reefs so I can't say with certainty, but to me it almost seems like exaggerated data for shock value.

I watched the video.....

There are many factors on that reef. Not the least of which is they're working on a reef that has had major die-off. That came from the various factors they referred to in the video, primarily environment, which hasn't changed.

So it's nothing like a controlled environment, creating ideal conditions and minus any predators, like a home reef tank.

You could almost miss the part where they talk about growing frags in a range of pH water in order to learn which corals will survive in an unnatural pH.

They do show the corals being protected from Parrotfish until they're large enough.

Have you ever been on a reef and see a Parrotfish eat coral ? I have and it's insane. They will fill their bellies until they look like they should burst and then spend a couple of days digesting the coral. Some puffers and other fish do the same thing. Those fish are still on the reef and their predation prevents many corals from re-populating.

It's not the best video. The NOAH guy is useless, sadly. And it's just a general news bite, even if it came from PBS which raises the bar a little.

 

[reefwiser]

Duh this is what we hobbyist do all the time. They are learning the ways of hobbyist and replanting the reef. Which how we as a hobby help the reef's. We spend days,weeks and months closely watch our corals. Most marine scientist never get to work closely with the corals as hobbyist to on a daily bases. We need to work with Scientists so together we can save the reefs.

 

[joshky]

There are many factors on that reef. Not the least of which is they're working on a reef that has had major die-off. That came from the various factors they referred to in the video, primarily environment, which hasn't changed.

So it's nothing like a controlled environment, creating ideal conditions and minus any predators, like a home reef tank.

You could almost miss the part where they talk about growing frags in a range of pH water in order to learn which corals will survive in an unnatural pH.

They do show the corals being protected from Parrotfish until they're large enough.

Have you ever been on a reef and see a Parrotfish eat coral ? I have and it's insane. They will fill their bellies until they look like they should burst and then spend a couple of days digesting the coral. Some puffers and other fish do the same thing. Those fish are still on the reef and their predation prevents many corals from re-populating.

It's not the best video. The NOAH guy is useless, sadly. And it's just a general news bite, even if it came from PBS which raises the bar a little.

Alright thanks for clarifying, it's actually pretty exciting to know that hobbyists have been doing something for a while that is being recognized by scientists to help restore the reefs.