The survival of coral reefs requires integrated watershed-based management activities and marine conservation

摘要: oral reefs are the most diverse of all marine ecosystems, and they rivaled in biodiversity by few terrestrial ecosystems. They support people directly indirectly building islands atolls. protect shorelines from coastal erosion, fisheries economic cultural value, provide diving-related tourism serve as habitats for organisms that produce natural products biomedical interest. also museums planet’s wealth places incredible beauty. Despite their recognized biological, aesthetic coral being destroyed at an alarming rate throughout world. Some countries have seen 50 percent human activities past 15 years. influences acute—for example, mining limestone, dumping mine tailings on them, fishing with explosives cyanide, land reclamation. Reefs experience such insults often die; those deteriorate but survive cannot recover to original health long disturbances continue. In other more chronic than acute. assaulted muddy runoff, nutrients pesticides adjacent river catchments, overfishing global-warming effects. These affect key parameters permitting reef resilience: water substratum quality. As a result, corals fail reproduce successfully, larvae arriving pristine unable settle thrive substrata covered mud, cyanobacteria or fleshy algae. Coral populations thus reestablish themselves. Can science help save reefs? much talk about managing reefs, potential role is limited. But it important: Scientists can demonstrate processes controlling how damage them. Then, we hope, land-use managers marine-resources will be able modify behavior reduce reverse reefs. Toward this end developed large-scale model illuminating degradation predicting impact future activity.