Re:Great Barrier Reef at 'terminal stage'
by ohashi on Monday April 10, 2017 @01:06AM
(#14076184)
I saw a bleaching event in Thailand last year, it really is depressing to see. This year, the same sites have seemingly recovered and I'm really happy about that. But seeing the pictures of completely bleached white corals in the article and knowing that's probably the future for a lot of these reefs breaks my heart. Coral reefs are magical places and we're destroying them for future generations, maybe even the current one.
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Re:Great Barrier Reef at 'terminal stage'
by dingo_bat on Monday April 10, 2017 @08:37AM
(#14077956)
> Coral reefs are magical places
How so? How are they different from any other natural ecosystem?
They are one of the most biodiverse habitats, if not the most diverse, home to a vast array of often spectacular species. And unlike other highly biodiverse habitats, much of this spectacle is densely represented and constantly on show.
In a tropical rainforest, you can ramble uncomfortably through dense undergrowth for hours, hearing many animals but glimpsing few, usually from a limited range of phyla, and seeing mostly plants. On a healthy reef, drift but a few minutes through the clear, warm seawater, and the sheer abundance and variety of algae, corals, anenomes, molluscs, echinoderms, sponges and many other invertebrate phyla, as well as algae and of course fish, will be immediately apparent.