preview

How Long Is Coral Bleaching Of Coral Reefs?

Decent Essays

Usually the first thing a person thinks of when someone talks about coral reefs is the Great Barrier Reef or the movie "Finding Nemo" and how beautiful it is, with its vibrant corals and colorful fish swimming about. Coral reefs are vital to the world. Even though they only cover .1% of the ocean floor, they are home to 25% of all marine life. Home to many species of fish and acting as a nursery for little fish and also provide protection until they are big enough to venture out and protect themselves. It is a place that has a complex food chain. The coral reef also acts as a food resource for higher food chain predators like sharks and whales. The quick decline of the coral reefs is becoming an increasingly alarming situation. Coral reefs like the ones in the Caribbean are facing collapse and perhaps extinction. A recent survey shows that only 8% of the Caribbean coral reefs are showing live coral cover, compared to in the 1970s …show more content…

Less than 10% of the Caribbean reefs are showing live coral cover. (Harvey) Coral reefs can only tolerate a narrow range of temperatures. If the water around them warms by just a couple degrees and lasts more than a week, they are likely to bleach. There are a lot of causes of coral bleaching: change in ocean temperature, overexposure to sunlight, runoff and pollution, and extreme low tides. The main one is the rising ocean temperature. When there is a storm, runoff water could carry pollutants and toxic to the ocean water, causing coral that lives off-shore to bleach. Shallow coral reefs could be exposed to a lot of sunlight, causing them to bleach. And when there is low tide, coral reefs are exposed to the air, causing them to bleach. Overall, coral is very fragile and they have not mutated or evolved to improve this yet. Corals have a symbiotic relationship with the algae zooxanthellae that live in their tissue. The algae is not the primary food source for them, but also gives them their

Get Access