The Future!!!!!!

[billsreef]

Go to the Caribean late summer, early fall when water temps are at the max. Yes, it's hurricane season, but if you don't mind a little risk with your travel plans you can get some good deals Any way, I've recorded temps of 84 done to 100 feet during that season in several Caribean areas. That's pretty close to problematic right there. I've also heard of higher in the years that those reefs had major bleaching problems.

 

[Fishboy93]

Not trying to get flamed here...just a lil upper keys reef status report...

I dove today to about 35 feet(Key Largo Reefs are quite shallow) and personally I haven't seen the reefs any better. I saw new brain corals forming on the bottom. Many different species of hard corals growing. Even off of ones that had died. The gorgonians looked fantastic. It was about 87 degrees. the damsels just had some newborns coming out.

I still believe though that we need to drastically change the way we live or the repercussions will be awful....

 

[greenbean36191]

It's important to keep in mind that looking good and actually being healthy can be two different things. Even new coral recruits may not be a sign of good health. "Shifting baseline syndrome" is a big problem in reef ecology. Someone who just started working can look at a reef today and say that it looks great and it's never looked better. Meanwhile someone who saw the same reef 40 years ago may think it looks like trash today. Our idea of what a healthy reef looks like depends a lot on what it looked like when we first saw it.

Probably one of the the prettiest reefs I've seen was the second worst health-wise. Everything there was healthy and there was tons of life, but it wasn't the life that "should" have been there. There were plenty of small fish and tons of corals, but there was no Diadema, very few large fish, and only one small live Acropora. This was in an area that should have been dominated by Acropora and clearly was in the past.

Here's an example of the kind of thing I'm talking about. This is a beautiful reef that's in abysmal health.

One of my old professors also worked on a great example. He did his work in Belize on a reef that had great coral cover and great recruitment of new corals. Almost anyone diving there would probably say it was in amazing shape. Things look different though when you realize that for the last 3000 years Acropora pretty much monopolized the reef. Suddenly 30 years ago the Acropora all died off and were completely replaced by Agaricia, which is normally only a pioneer species and a comparably poor reef builder.

 

[Fishboy93]

The reef I dove yesterday was a little deeper and more canyon like. Had more hard corals and less fans. also more gorgonians. As for larger fish I saw two med to large groupers, Adult angels, and parrotfish. The reef I dove today had some noticeable die off and looked more like what you have shown. My second dive today was on a wreck that looked alright. Only have seen one Diadema sadly this summer. The reefs are definately declining, but I still believe that there is still a chance.

 

[Scythanith]

The reefs will survive in one form or another. Look off the coast of British Columbia, BC. They are consider THE best place to scuba dive in the world. Not many reef builders there, but tons of softies! Mostly nutrient based growth, not photosynthetic in that same manner the equatorial reefs are. I think people will continue to experiment with their at home oceans until it becomes completely illegal. Price doesn't stop many people in this hobby.

Discontinue reading from here on if you don't like things going off topic or the subject of global warming.....
















There are huge reminants in fossil form of massive extinction's of whole reef structures. Guess where they can be found? Some on the top of the Rocky Mountains and some 500 meters underneath current reefs. There were huge forests covering the uppermost reaches of the Arctic circle which are now uninhabitable by all except for lichens and some cariboo. What am i getting at here...

Things change. Organisms adapt.

The forests of the world are essentially **** out of luck. Human's depend on wood and land for economic gain. Nothing will get in the way of that. Now if our only source of Calcium was from the ground up skeletons of the reefs, they'd be gone by now.

Just a little vent here. Any "environmentalist" that keeps a reef tank that isn't directly powered by renewable alternative energy is a hypocrite. Quit complaining, shut your tanks down and go stop local fisherman from dragging their anchors across the reefs, quit buying livestock which is most likely cyanide caught, and ride a bicycle to work.

Man..... I am by no means any type of professional on global climate patterns but the Earth changes all the time. Sure it's warming up! Has it happened before on this scale, yep! Lots of different organizations out there will twist the same information to suit their needs, one pro environment, the other pro economy. What can we do about it? Reduce your global footprint, simple as that. Get everyone in your family to switch to compact flourescent bulbs.

Sorry this isn't very well organized. My brain just spit this verbal diarreah up.

Please PM me with retorts.

Cheers,

 

[greenbean36191]

There are huge reminants in fossil form of massive extinction's of whole reef structures. Guess where they can be found? Some on the top of the Rocky Mountains and some 500 meters underneath current reefs. There were huge forests covering the uppermost reaches of the Arctic circle which are now uninhabitable by all except for lichens and some cariboo. What am i getting at here...

Things change. Organisms adapt.

True. The key part there though is having changes on geographic and temporal scales that make them possible to adapt to. Changes happening as widespread and fast as what most of the reefs are facing now don't fit that bill. The additive effect of multiple stressors at once makes it extremely hard to adapt to one before another does you in.

The worry isn't that change is happening. It's that lots of unprecedented changes are happening at once, happening fast, and happening over large areas.

Just a little vent here. Any "environmentalist" that keeps a reef tank that isn't directly powered by renewable alternative energy is a hypocrite. Quit complaining, shut your tanks down and go stop local fisherman from dragging their anchors across the reefs, quit buying livestock which is most likely cyanide caught, and ride a bicycle to work.

Sure there is some hypocracy in asking people to be environmentally responsible while you keep a reef, but where do you draw the line? How much do you have to do before you're no longer a hypocrite? I don't think most "environmentalists" would expect you to shun modern comforts, give up your hobbies, or sell your car and house for smaller models. All that most would ask is that you realize what impact you have and make small changes to reduce it without reducing your quality of life. It's not an all or nothing proposition.

Switching to compact fluorescents, insulating your house, keeping your tires properly inflated, walking when you can, driving a reasonably sized car when you have to drive, turning your thermostat up or down a few degrees, turning off lights when you don't need them, using alternative energy if it's an option... None of those are going to change your life. Most will save you money. All make a small difference. That difference adds up.

 

[Scythanith]

I 100% agree with the fact that time scale will directly control an organisms ability to adapt. But, if something doesn't adapt to the changing environement immediatley. It will only be a matter of time until some other organism will fill the void ecological niche.

There have been quite a few mass extinction events through out the course of Earth's known history. Cretaceous/Tertiary extinction, The extinction at the end of the Triassic, Permian triassic extinction, Late devonian extinction, and the ordovicion/Silurian extinction. All of these are believed to have happened over a quick period (100's of years).

Haahaa, so what does this go to show? Maybe it's about time for another mass extinction event? Last was 65 million years ago.

As for the hypocracy of reef keeping environmentalists. I stand by my statment. If you were truly worried about the environment I am sure you could give up a hobby. Getting to work, maybe not.

I think you may be preaching to the choir. Like I said on my previous post:

"What can we do about it? Reduce your global footprint, simple as that. Get everyone in your family to switch to compact flourescent bulbs."

I agree, do what we you can to lower unneccesary energy expendatures. The new home Wendy and I are building is being built to Canadian Zone C Energy Star standards. I have R-55 ceilings, R-30 walls, double pane argon windows, insulated steel doors, 96.6% efficient carrier furnace with HVAC, all CF lightbulbs, all natural gas furnace, water heater, stove/range, and laundry dryer. Sure it costs a lot more, but it will at least hopefully offset my need for reefing. I don't consider myself an environmentalist, but I will do what I fell comfortable doing. My house will on average be 45% more efficient than a typical house built in Canada today.

Everyone know's what could be done, it's just whether or not they choose to do anything about it.

Cheers,

Scott

 

[Rossini]

In the UK a couple of the big power companys provide electricity from wind and hydro at no extra cost. I use this. I wish more people would convert over,this would then give the government the push to get more renewable energy going (wind turbines etc). I'm sure you must have the same thing in the US.

So my reef tank has very little impact. I only buy frags,and my power comes from renewables. Although 80% of my fish are wild caught.

I'm getting really fed up with people slating people for caring about the envronment and having concern for global warming. It's starting to really anger me to be honest. There is so much information on GW,there is no excuse to be in denial. But so many people are sadly deluded or paranoid that its some kind of conspiracey theory. WAKE THE F*CK UP PEOPLE. The only conspircey was the US oil firms and a certain idiot in power paying scientists tens of 1000's of dollars to deny GW. The sooner you guys get him/them out,and get some decent guys in the better. The worlds needs/has to have the US on board to tackle this massive issue. It's the biggest issue mankind has ever had. We have got to stop wasting time.

Waits for a good slating from the rednecks. :bum:

 

[Wolverine]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10062711#post10062711 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by NY_Carp_Sticker
there should always be reefs "should" you guys have seen how fast these guys can grow, they'll just creep to colder and colder water as it becomes inhabitable, I'm sure not in the numbers they are now, but I really wouldn't be too worried about it.

There are two problems here (sorry if someone else has already discussed this). One is that, while corals can grow quickly, there are other things that grow a whole lot more quickly, like cyanobacteria and hair algae. As the cooler areas become more appropriate for coral, those algae are going to take over much more quickly than the corals can grow in.
The other problem is that the habitable bands will have much less total surface area available, so even if they do fill in with coral and a full reef ecology, it will be significantly less total biomass than we have now.
Of course, all of this ignores the issues of how fast corals can adapt to the changes and how fast their progeny can get further away from the equatorial regions.

Dave

 

[Wolverine]

Re: The Future!!!!!!

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10062654#post10062654 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by bahhareef
What do you think the future of reefkeeping will be like? If coral reefs do bleach and become naturally extinct (heaven forbid) effectively the only habitat for corals and their inhabitants will be aquariums.

I wouldn't be surprised if we get to the point where the importation is banned and the only available animals will be tank raised. In fact, I expect that this will happen sometime in my lifetime. Hopefully we'll have a much wider variety of tank-raised/aquacultured animals available when it happens. If it happens in the near future, it could be the bell tolling for the hobby.

Every once in a while one of the environmental or animal treatment groups aims their sights on us (I think misguidedly in both cases, though their hearts are in the right place), but it's never been with the full bore of their ability. They're much stronger politically than a group of hobbyists, and if they really come after us, I think we're in trouble. What would set that off? Probably a big wipe-out of one of the major reefs in the world, especially if it gets a lot of publicity.

Dave