Sea Monster

Tag: coral reefs

  • Belize 2012 field log 1: Snapping Shrimps and Hidden Sponges

    [Our team has just returned from a 10-day research trip to the Belize Barrier Reef, searching for social sponge-dwelling shrimp in a long-term study of these curious animals as models for understanding the evolution of altruism and cooperation. The New York Times “Scientist at Work” feature is posting updates from our field log. We reprint…

  • Will this be the end of the Aquarius Reef Base?

    Next week a team of aquanauts including Sylvia Earle will live and work underwater for 6 days inside “America’s Inner Space Station” aka the Aquarius Reef Base. It’s the world’s only undersea research station and its future is looking shaky – unless new funding is found the station will be closed. In an effort to…

  • Consensus statement on climate change and coral reefs

    This comes from the 12th International Coral Reef Symposium, meeting in Cairns this week. I think the statement is largely accurate, although it exaggerates threats to corals from local factors like fishing and pollution.  The second phrase of the final sentence (in bold) is demonstrably false; “A concerted effort to preserve reefs for the future…

  • New science indicates climate change is the primary threat to coral reefs

    Like so many other ecosystems, coral reefs are being greatly impacted by climate change. Greenhouse gases are trapping excess heat from the sun, and more than anything, are warming the oceans from tropical reefs to deep polar seas. Reef corals are sensitive to small amounts of warming. An increase of just a degree or two…

  • Good news for the Coral Sea

    It’s been announced that Australian waters will soon be home to the world’s second largest no-take marine reserve. Half a million square kms of the Coral Sea will be out of bounds to the oil & gas industry as well as fisheries – it will include around one third of the coral reefs in the…

  • Coral microbes – the movie!

    [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJPva6ZLuDc[/youtube]

  • Giant headbutting fish

    The world’s biggest parrotfish – the bumphead parrotfish Bolbomepoton muricatum – have been caught on camera for the first time headbutting each other. [vimeo]http://vimeo.com/43626409#[/vimeo] The finding was published in the open access PlosOne (so go have a read) and as Roldan Muñoz and his colleagues point out, the only way they got to observe this crazy behaviour…

  • Corals and their housekeeping mutualists or the importance of having a diverse group of friends

    This is a guest post by Dr Adrian Stier Coral reefs are among the most species rich ecosystems on earth, but what most people don’t know is that the majority of reef biodiversity is housed inside the reef. Indeed, in the South Pacific, a coral the size of a basketball can house over 50 different…

  • New underwater sculptures from Jason de Caires Taylor

    Underwater sculptor Jason deCaries Taylor has unveiled pictures of his latest works at the MUSA (the Museo Subacuático de Arte) in Cancun, Mexico. They include this stunning piece called Phoenix.                         As Jason says: Constructed from high strength pH-neutral cement and incorporating tensile stainless steel…

  • New evidence for catastrophic loss of coral reef sharks

    “[The] density of reef sharks has declined to 3–10% of baseline levels” This is the take-home finding from one of two new papers that help clarify just how much reef shark populations have declined. Nadon et al. 2012, Re-creating missing population baselines for Pacific reef sharks, just came out in the journal Conservation Biology. The team used a new database…