Reef Ramblings

It’s nice to be able to report a positive coral reef story for a change!

A recently published paper, ”Larval Connectivity in an Effective Network of Marine Protected Areas.” (Sharyn Jane Goldstien, Mark R. Christie, Brian N. Tissot, Mark A. Albins, James P. Beets, Yanli Jia, Delisse M. Ortiz, Stephen E. Thompson, Mark A. Hixon), documents that the theory behind Marine Protection Areas (MPA) have the ability to rebuild fish stocks in areas outside of reserves. This is of particular interest to aquarists as the species studied in this paper is that mainstay of the aquarium trade, Zebrasoma flavescens, the Yellow Tang.

The study looked at the nine MPAs created in 1999 off the west coast of the “big island” of Hawaii; these were created in an attempt to offset the serious decline in yellow tang populations, the mainstay of the Hawaiian aquarium industry.

Yellow Tangs were chosen for the study as they are a nonmigratory species, that lives on the reef where they settled as a post larval juvenile, and having a home range restricted to around half a mile in diameter. If these fish are capable of moving any significant distance from the home reef where they were born it could only be during their pelagic larval stage, which lasts for about two months

The study used DNA fingerprinting and statistical analysis to match juvenile fish to their parents, wherever they originated from. During field research in 2006, the scientists performed genetic and statistical analyses on 1,073 juvenile and adult fish, and found evidence that many healthy juvenile fish had spawned from parents long distances away, up to 114 miles, including some from marine protected areas.

Although the study featured a popular ornamental species in Hawaii, this work is applicable to many other ornamental and commercial food species around the world where there are MPAs and may also be used to dictate the siting of future MPAs

The findings of the study confirms part of the theory behind marine reserves that had remained unproven until now, that MPAs can help rebuild fishery stocks outside of their area. It’s already known that MPAs can result in larger fish and that a certain amount of spill over occurs when fish leave these reserves. This new study, a direct observation rather than a theoretical model, shows that fish spawned within an MPA can drift with currents and replenish fished areas long distances away, is important in showing that marine reserves work as per their intended purpose, something previously unproven.

Up to 70% of the Yellow Tangs for the aquarium industry are sourced from the Hawaiian Islands, where the collection of marine ornamentals is becoming increasingly controversial and is facing new regulations and opposition from some quarters. The results of this study may go some way to supporting the sustainability of Yellow Tang collection.

Tim Hayes

Midland Reefs

©2010

This weekend has seen two important pieces of news released on Saturday, 11 December 2010, both having an impact on the marine environment, and, in time, on the reef aquarium hobby.

2010 Meteorological Year Warmest on Record.

Firstly, NASA reported that the 2010 meteorological year, which ended on 30 November, was the warmest in NASA’s 130-year record, Over the oceans as well as on land, the average global temperature for the 12-month period that began last December was 14.65˚C. That’s 0.65˚C warmer than the average global temperature between 1951 and 1980, a period scientists use as a basis for comparison.

The 2010 meteorological year was slightly warmer than the previous warmest year, the 2005 calendar year, when the average temperature was 14.53˚C.

In 2010, temperatures measured over land alone were also the warmest ever, with instruments showing a December-November average of 14.85˚C. Combining this warming with above-average ocean temperatures led to the global average of 14.65˚C.

Cancun Climate Talks Acknowledges Temperature Rise Needs to be Limited to 2˚ C

Secondly, the UN climate talks in Cancun, Mexico, have concluded with an agreement that acknowledges the need to keep temperature rises to 2C and brings non-binding emissions cuts pledges made under the voluntary Copenhagen Accord, into the UN process.

It also includes an agreement to set up a green climate fund as part of efforts to deliver 100 billion US dollars (£60 billion) a year by 2020 to poor countries to help them cope with the impacts of global warming and develop without polluting. The proposed deal does not include a commitment to extend Kyoto beyond 2012, when it is due to expire, but it would prevent a collapse of climate change negotiations

More than 190 countries have struck an agreement at the latest round of UN climate talks that puts efforts to secure a new international deal to tackle global warming back on track. Representatives from the various countries acknowledged the agreement was not perfect, but that they supported it as progress towards a final goal.

Environmental campaigners said it threw a lifeline to efforts to get a deal to tackle climate change but there was still much work to do, in particular to close the “gigatonne gap” between the greenhouse emissions cuts countries have pledged and the reductions needed to limit temperature rises to no more than 2C.

Cancun may have saved the process but it has not yet saved the climate; with each year that passes without a globally binding agreement to cut emissions and finance poor countries’ needs to adapt to climate change and develop low-carbon economies, the impacts will become more and more severe.

This is the first time that the need for emissions to peak and decline as soon as possible has been recognised, with the target of staying within a 2C temperature rise and with an ongoing assessment of whether the level of emissions cuts needs to be higher.

But What About the Reefs?

While this holds out promise for the good of mankind, it will be of no help to the reefs.

The goal of limit global warming to 2 degrees C is too little too late, says coral expert Roberto Iglesias. “That represents the end of the coral reefs in the world,” says the Mexican scientist, who works at a marine research station in Puerto Morelos, about 20 kilometres south of Cancun.

Coral reefs host 25 percent of marine species and provide food and income to hundreds of millions of people, mostly in the developing world. They also serve as coastal protection to storm surges whipped up by hurricanes, typhoons, and Tsunamis.

Many reefs around the world have been damaged by water pollution and over fishing, leaving them vulnerable to a warming ocean that “bleaches” corals and sometimes kills them, Iglesias said.

This year, preliminary reports show global coral bleaching reached its worst level since 1998, when 16 percent of the world’s reefs were killed off, said Mark Eakin, a coral reef specialist at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). “Clearly, we are on track for this to be the second worst bleaching on record,” he said. “All we’re waiting on now is the body count.”

The 1,100-kilometer reef that runs along Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula although suffering other stresses, has been spared bleaching this year, but other parts of the Caribbean have been hit hard, including Tobago, Curacao, Panama and islands north of Venezuela. Worldwide, some of the biggest impacts were in Southeast Asia. In Indonesia’s Aceh province, surveys showed some 80 percent of the bleached corals died. In July, Malaysia closed several popular dive sites after bleaching damaged virtually all the corals in those areas. (For more, see: Global Bleaching 2010)

Bleaching occurs when warmer temperatures disturb the symbiotic relationship between the corals and the zooxanthellae, a kind of algae, living inside them. When stressed, corals expel the algae and appear white, the colour of their skeleton. Just1 or 2 degrees C above normal can be enough to cause bleaching. Corals can recover if the water returns to normal temperature and they can recruit new algae, but they’re still significantly weaker and more vulnerable to disease. If the warmer temperatures persist, the corals die.

Bleaching occurs due to natural temperature variation; both the 1998 and 2010 events were linked to the El Nino weather phenomenon. But the gradual rise of ocean temperatures means it won’t take much to push them over the edge,” Eakin said.

The World Meteorological Organization says most tropical waters already have seen surface temperatures rise by up to 0.5 C in the past 50 years. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the U.N. climate-science network, projects an increasing frequency of bleaching episodes that is very likely to further reduce both coral cover and diversity on reefs over the next few decades. Additionally many reefs have already been degraded by disease and the impact of human activities, including discharges of fertilizers and waste as well as over fishing of parrotfish and other species that help keep coral reefs healthy.

The global area covered by coral reefs has shrunk by 20 percent since 1950 and another 35 percent could disappear in the next 40 years, even without the impact of climate change, according to a report released in October by the World Meteorological Organization and the Convention on Biological Diversity.

Off the Riviera Maya coast south of Cancun, where large swaths of mangrove forests have been cut down to make room for beachfront resorts, only 15 percent of the coral reefs are alive, down from about 45 percent in 1995, said Fernando Secaira, who coordinates a Mesoamerican Reef program for the U.S.-based environmental group Nature Conservancy. The biggest problem is the rapid development, with tens of thousands of hotel rooms being added over the past decade. Fertilizers from lawns and golf courses and sewage from the developments filters through the limestone rock and is washed out onto the reef by underground rivers, altering the balance of the sensitive ecosystem. Secaira said such unhealthy reefs would find it difficult to adjust to warming waters, raising the risk they will be destroyed by bleaching or diseases. The priority for conservationists is identifying the most resilient reefs, and protecting them as climate change sets in with full force, raising temperatures and acidifying the ocean, which limits the carbonate minerals that help corals grow.

Scientists say no emissions cuts being considered by world governments will suffice to prevent that from happening. “We’re going to lose more corals and more reefs before this is all over,” said Eakin, of NOAA. “The question at this point is how many can we save.

What Does the Future Hold for the Reefs?

There is hope that some areas of reefs will survive with little in the way of losses, typically these are reefs which are already subject to wide temperature variation but although they may remain resilient to bleaching this does not take into account acidification.

There will always be reefs but they will not be the same as the reefs that we are familiar with. Expect the loss of SPS species such as Acropora, Montipora, Pocillopora, and the other similar corals. This will be one of the biggest problems to face the fisheries, as with the loss off coral cover, so we lose the environment required by many ornamental and food fish species.

Expect to lose the other stony coral species, although there is speculation that some species may adapt by abandoning skeleton building in favour of developing into new soft bodied species. Some coral scientists believe this is what happened in the past with corallimorpharians or mushroom corals.

Soft corals may survive with varying degrees of success, not being as reliant on the process of calcification as stony corals – yet it is important to remember that many soft coral do calcify, producing calcium spicules or sclerites, needle like calcium structures, which can be involved in supporting the body of the coral or as protection against predation.

Anemones may well survive, but probably only if there is an increase in available food to make up for the loss of zooxanthellae – the host anemones we associate with clownfishes are all photosynthetic and are subject to the same bleaching mechanism as corals.

To be continued (unfortunately) …

Tim Hayes

Midland Reefs

©2010

This is an important and informative article by reef scientist Charlie Veron (see bottom of page for a short biography), published yesterday on Yale Environment 360

Is the End in Sight for the World’s Coral Reefs?

Over the past decades, there have dozens of articles in the media describing dire futures for coral reefs. In the 1960s and ‘70s, we were informed that many reefs were being consumed by a voracious coral predator, the crown-of-thorns starfish. In the 1980s and ‘90s, although these starfish still reared their thorny heads from time to time, the principal threats had moved on — to sediment runoff, nutrients, overfishing, and general habitat destruction.

For me, an Australian marine scientist who has spent the past 40 years working on reefs the world over, these threats were of real concern, but their implications were limited in time or in space or both. Although crown-of-thorns starfish can certainly devastate reefs, the impacts of sediments, nutrients and habitat loss have usually been of greater concern, and I have been repeatedly shocked by the destruction I have witnessed. However, nothing comes close to the devastation waiting in the wings at the moment.

You may well feel that dire predictions about anything almost always turn out to be exaggerations. You may think there may be something in it to worry about, but it won’t be as bad as doomsayers like me are predicting. This view is understandable given that only a few decades ago I, myself, would have thought it ridiculous to imagine that reefs might have a limited lifespan on Earth as a consequence of human actions. It would have seemed preposterous that, for example, the Great Barrier Reef — the biggest structure ever made by life on Earth — could be mortally threatened by any present or foreseeable environmental change.

Yet here I am today, humbled to have spent the most productive scientific years of my life around the rich wonders of the underwater world, and utterly convinced that they will not be there for our children’s children to enjoy unless we drastically change our priorities and the way we live.

A decade ago, my increasing concern for the plight of reefs in the face of global temperature changes led me to start researching the effects of climate change on reefs, drawing on my experience in reef science, evolution, biodiversity, genetics, and conservation, as well as my profound interests in geology, palaeontology, and oceanography, not to mention the challenging task of understanding the climate science, geochemical processes, and ocean chemistry.

When I started researching my book, A Reef in Time: The Great Barrier Reef from Beginning to End (Harvard, 2008), I knew that climate change was likely to have serious consequences for coral reefs. But the big picture that gradually emerged from my integration of these disparate disciplines left me shocked to the core.

In a long period of deep personal anguish, I turned to specialists in many different fields of science to find anything that might suggest a fault in my own conclusions. But in this quest I was depressingly unsuccessful. The bottom line remains: Science argues that coral reefs can indeed be utterly trashed in the lifetime of today’s children. That certainty is what motivates me to spread this message as clearly, and accurately, as I can.

So what are the issues? Most readers will know that there have been several major episodes of mass bleaching on major reef areas worldwide over the past 20 years. In the late-1980s when the first mass bleaching occurred, there was a great deal of concern among reef scientists and conservation organizations, but the phenomenon had no clear explanation. Since then, the number and frequency of mass bleachings have increased and sparked widespread research efforts.

Corals have an intimate symbiotic relationship with single-celled algae, zooxanthellae, which live in their cells and provide the photosynthetic fuel for them to grow and reefs to form. The research showed that this relationship can be surprisingly fragile if corals are exposed to high light conditions at the same time as above-normal water temperatures, because the algae produce toxic levels of oxygen, and excessive levels of oxygen are toxic to most animal life. Under these conditions, corals must expel the zooxanthellae, bleach, and probably die or succumb to the toxin and definitely die. A tough choice, one they have not had to make at any time in their long genetic history.

We tend to think of temperature in terms of our day-to-day comfort level. We don’t have to be told that atmospheric temperature shows huge swings and variations from day to night, among seasons, and cyclically on other scales. Early critics of global warming used this variability to argue that there was no evidence for overall thermal increases. This missed the point and delayed our recognition of the true problem because atmospheric temperature is only a minor part of the Earth’s thermal picture.

By far the most important mobile heat sinks on the planet are the oceans. As the greenhouse effect from elevated CO2 has increased, the oceans have absorbed more heat. The surface layers are affected most as mixing to the depths can take hundreds of years. Large ocean masses such as the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool do not continue to warm further, but rather they broaden and deepen. Now they commonly become so large that their outer edges are pulsed onto the continental margins, where waters are warmed further. This creates the mortal dilemma for corals — to expel or not to expel their oxygen-producing zooxanthellae.

Ecosystems can recover from all sorts of abuse, and coral reefs are no exception. Good recoveries from bleaching have been observed, provided that further events do not occur while the ecosystem is re-establishing. Unfortunately, there are no signs that greenhouse gas increases are moderating, and so we can assume that the frequency and severity of bleaching events will continue to increase — on our present course, the worst bleaching year we have had to date will be an average year by 2030, and a good year by 2050. Ocean and atmospheric rises in temperature are also predicted to increase the severity of cyclones, which will add an extra burden on the recovery process.

Scientists don’t need a pocket calculator to conclude that compressing the time periods between events in this way will prevent recovery: If we do not take action, the only corals not affected by mass bleaching by 2050 will be those hiding in refuges away from strong sunlight.

But there is more bad news. A decade or so ago, we thought that mass bleaching was the most serious threat to coral reefs. How wrong we were. It is clear now that there is a much more serious crisis on the horizon — that of ocean acidification. This will not only affect coral reefs (although reefs will be hit particularly hard), but will impact all marine ecosystems. The potential consequences of ocean acidification are nothing less than catastrophic. The ultimate culprit is still CO2 but the mechanism is very different.

Normally there is a balance between CO2 in the atmosphere and its derivatives in surface waters of the ocean. As with temperature, the oceans act as a huge repository, absorbing and buffering any excess CO2 in the atmosphere. For this process to be efficient the oceans must have time for mixing to occur between its different layers, renewing the surface buffers from below. When CO2 increases too rapidly, these chemical reactions can falter, altering the balance of the buffers and gradually allowing the oceans to become less alkaline.

All organisms that produce calcium carbonate skeletons (including shells, crabs, sea urchins, corals, coralline algae, calcareous phytoplankton, and many others) depend on their ability to deposit calcium carbonate, and this process is largely controlled by the prevailing water chemistry. As alkalinity decreases, precipitation of calcium carbonate becomes more and more difficult until eventually it is inhibited altogether. The potential consequences of such acidification are nothing less than catastrophic.

In my book, I examine the events that led up to each of the five mass extinctions in Earth’s history. Corals offer a unique insight into the past, both because they have been around for most of the history of life on Earth and also because they readily fossilize. I examine the theories offered to explain these global extinctions and find that ocean acidification is the only explanation which fits the evidence well. Ocean acidification has played a major part in the marine devastations which took place in those ancient times.

A particularly galling aspect of the past four mass extinction events (very little is known about the first) is that, following them, reefs disappeared — not just for a few tens of thousands of years, but for millions of years — long after adverse climatic conditions may have returned to benign levels. One of the characteristics of acidification is that while it can be initiated by high CO2 levels over relatively short periods, there are no short-term geochemical fixes to reverse the process. Reversal can take place only through the immensely slow weathering and dissolution processes of geological time, processes that take hundreds of thousands to millions of years.

Ocean physics dictates that we will observe the effects of acidification in colder and deeper waters before it spreads to shallower tropical climes. The early stages of acidification have now been detected in the Southern Ocean and, surprisingly perhaps, in tropical corals. On our current trajectory of increasing atmospheric CO2, we can expect that by 2030 to 2050 the acidification process will be affecting all the oceans of the world to some degree. At that point, the relatively cool, deep-water tropical regions that have offered refuges to corals from temperature stress will be those most affected by acidification.

No doubt different species of coral, coralline algae, plankton, and mollusks will show different tolerances, and their capacity to calcify will decline at different rates. But as acidification progresses, they will all suffer from some form of coralline osteoporosis. The result will be that corals will no longer be able to build reefs or maintain them against the forces of erosion. What were once thriving coral gardens that supported the greatest biodiversity of the marine realm will become red-black bacterial slime, and they will stay that way.

Another concept of great importance is that of commitment — a word climatologists use only too often. Many of the consequences of our current actions cannot yet be seen, and yet the Earth is already committed to their path. This delayed reaction is due to the inertia of the oceans, both thermal and chemical. The greenhouse gases we produce today will take a number of decades (and sometimes more) to unleash their full fury, but their effects are unavoidable and unstoppable. We cannot afford to wait until the predictions of science can be totally verified, because by that time it will be too late. How many of us wish to explain to our children and children’s children that the predictions were there but we wanted confirmation?

Coral reefs speak unambiguously about climate change. They survived Ice Age sea-level changes of 120 meters or more with impunity. They once survived in a world where CO2 from volcanoes and methane was much higher than anything predicted today. But that was over 40 million years ago, and the increase took place over millions of years, not just a few decades, time enough for ocean equilibration to take place and marine life to adapt.

This is not what is happening today. Ponder these facts: The atmospheric levels of CO2 we are already committed to reach, no matter what mitigation is now implemented, have no equal over the entire longevity of the Great Barrier Reef, perhaps 25 million years. And most significantly, the rate of CO2 increase we are now experiencing has no precedent in all known geological history.

Reefs are the ocean’s canaries and we must hear their call. This call is not just for themselves, for the other great ecosystems of the ocean stand behind reefs like a row of dominoes. If coral reefs fail, the rest will follow in rapid succession, and the Sixth Mass Extinction will be upon us — and will be of our making.

J. E. N. Veron.

About the Author

Dr. J. E. N. ‘Charlie’ Veron is best known as the author of the three volume Corals of the World. He is also the senior author of the major electronic products Coral ID and Coral Geographic. The author of 100 scientific articles, including 14 books and monographs, on subjects ranging from climate change, molecular biology, palaeontology, coral identification, biogeography, coral reefs, conservation, marine science policy, marine science history, cell biology, reptilian physiology and biography.

He is former Chief Scientist of the Australian Institute of Marine Science and has been the recipient of the Darwin Medal, the Silver Jubilee Pin of the Australian Marine Sciences Association, the Australasian Science Prize, the Whitley Medal and received special mention in the Eureka Awards.

He has discovered and described 20% of all coral species of the world. He has worked in all the major coral reef regions of the world, participating in 66 expeditions and spending 7,000 hours scuba diving.

Charlie Veron has always been open to the reef aquarium community, he has given a number of presentations to hobbyist conferences and seminars around the world, taking an interest in what goes on in our aquaria.

He continues to work in many different fields although he now concentrates on conservation and the effects of climate change on coral reefs.

His latest book is A Reef in Time: The Great Barrier Reef from Beginning to End.

I had an enjoyable time attending the 1st EXOTICA Meerwasser Symposium in Vienna, Austria over the weekend 27/28^th November. I’d been invited to make a couple of presentations at the symposium, one on the Saturday afternoon and one on the Sunday morning. Over the course of the event I made plenty of new friends, many of them members of riffaquaristik.at, a very enthusiastic forum.

As my second presentation concerned the importance of trying to breed ornamental reef fishes, I was pleasantly surprised to find that many of the people from riffaquaristik.at were already actively engaged in breeding projects. There was a nice selection of captive bred organisms on display, including Dwarf seahorses, clownfishes, Banggai cardinals, Anemones, a couple of species of Shrimps, Snails, and Sun Corals, the product of sexual reproduction. One aquarist, Wolfgang Vorisek, impressed me by having successfully raised Yellow Tail Damsels, Chrysiptera parasema – quite an achievement. For a breeding report see here. Unusually, Wolfgang included a small biological filter in the larval raising tank.

Saturday, Wolfgang Vorisek to my left, then Sonja.

Display tank on forum stand, note fish cut-outs demonstrating potential eventual size.

Captive bred clowns.

Dwarf Seahorses.

Captive Bred Banggais

Captive Bred Lysmata boggesi

Busy on the Forum’s Stand

Tim with Wolfgang Suchy on the Sunday

Many thanks to Markus  Koechle, for making it all happen, and to Alexander Dobernig for organising the event in the first place. I look forward to the chance of returning to Vienna to meet up again with my new friends, and the opportunity of seeing a few aquariums and breeding set-ups.

Snow Brings German Aviation to a Standstill.

What wasn’t so enjoyable though was the travelling – going out on the Friday coincided with the first snows of the winter hence delays ending making it a twelve hour journey, arriving around 7.00 in the evening when I should have arrived at midday!

Coming back on the Monday was far worse – snow closed Düsseldorf where I was due to change, so we were diverted to Cologne/Bonn – as soon as we’d landed we were informed that the autobahn was closed and that we’d be flying back to Düsseldorf …

Sometime later I found myself queuing for two hours to get a rebooked flight for the next day, along with a hotel voucher for the night. I was one of the lucky ones, there were around three to four hundred people waiting to be sorted out by Lufthansa, some of them ended up queuing for a as much as four hours! Got to the hotel around midnight, ate my first proper food for 12 hours, and then retired to my room ready for a 5.00 am taxi back to the airport!

Of course the newly issued booking number would not work at the self-check in machine so it was back to queuing …

At least this time it was only for an hour but I was told I should pick up my suitcase from lost luggage, given the check in time for the flight I was forced to abandon my luggage to ensure that I made the flight. A week later I’m still trying to find my suitcase …

Tim Hayes

Midland Reefs

©2010

There is building evidence of further potential adverse effects on reef fish populations, as a result of climate change. A recent paper published in Global Change Biology, 2010: “Extreme climatic events reduce ocean productivity and larval supply in a tropical reef ecosystem,” Alain Lo-Yat, Stephen D. Simpson, Mark Meekan, David Lecchini, Elodie Martinez, René Galzin, describes how elevated temperatures during the El Niño event of 1997/98, resulted in a dramatic decline in young fishes.

An international team of biologists studied the recruitment of young fishes at Rangiroa, an atoll in French Polynesia, for four years correlating their results with satellite and oceanographic data. They found that the El Niño event had caused a collapse in the plankton community, leading to a near absence of young fishes.

Using nets facing out to sea on the edge of a barrier reef, the scientists were able to monitor the numbers of young fish returning to the reefs from open water over four years, a period that included the intense thirteen-month El Niño event of 1997/98. Climate scientist Elodie Martinez and marine biologists Dr Steve Simpson and Dr Mark Meekan then analysed the data, the longest time-series of its kind, to detect and explain the worrying trends.

Larval coral reef fishes disperse into open waters upon hatching, they then drift as plankton as they grow, before developing into small juvenile fishes, then returning to the reef to settle. This dispersal allows the young fishes to feed on plankton in an environment that is predator free by comparison with the reef. Although this method of reproduction and recruitment has worked well for hundreds of thousands of years, in warming seas, this dispersal into open water could become detrimental to the survival of coral reef fishes.

Dr Steve Simpson from the University of Bristol’s School of Biological Sciences said: “Near to the equator, fish arrive throughout the year to replenish adult populations. In contrast, during the El Niño event at Rangiroa, when temperatures climbed up to 3.5°C above the seasonal average, we found that the young fish virtually disappeared.”

The analysis of satellite images from around Rangiroa suggested that plankton declined dramatically during the warm waters of El Niño, consequently undernourished adults had difficulty producing offspring, whilst young fishes faced the possibility of starvation in the open waters off of the reefs. A mere one or two months after the onset of the warm conditions, the next generation of young fish were no longer arriving on reefs, so the adult stocks were no longer being replenished.

Dr Meekan said: “The events we witnessed during El Niño are a worrying sign for the future when climate change is predicted to warm ocean temperatures and may even increase the frequency of the El Niño phenomenon.” Dr Simpson warns: “Coral reef fisheries provide food and livelihoods for hundreds of millions of people throughout the world and underpin a multi-billion dollar tourism industry. Our study shows that warmer waters may leave fish stocks on reefs in serious trouble, which will have far-reaching consequences for the people around the globe who are dependent upon them.”

This also effects aquarists; the ornamental species that we keep in our aquaria share the same reproductive traits as food fishes, they hatch, disperse to open waters to lead a pelagic life, before returning to their home reefs to become the next generation of their species. As waters warm over the coming years, expect to see a reduction in the availability of many common species of marine aquarium fishes.

Tim Hayes

Midland Reefs

©2010

Organised by SAI Global, a company specializing in certification and training for organisations around the world, the course has been written by Tim Hayes, of Midland Reefs, and is based on the Sustainable Aquarium Industry Association, Code of Best Practices.

The first course takes place at Winterhill Conference Centre, Milton Keynes, on the 2^nd of March 2011.

To book a place, or for more information, please contact Rachel Woodwards at SAI Global on: 01908 249934 or email: rachel.woodwards@saiglobal.com

To see the PDF flyer: Reef Aquarium Training Course 2011-1

PET RETAILER TRAINING COURSES

REEF AQUARIUM TRAINING COURSE

Duration of course: One day course; 10:00am – 5:00pm Lunch & refreshments provided.

Lecturing: Tim Hayes; Midland Reefs / Sustainable Aquarium Industry Association (SAIA)

Dates & Venues: 2nd March 2011 Winterhill Conference Centre, Milton Keynes

COURSE CONTENTS

Introduction

Aims of the Course / A Brief History of the Aquarium Hobby

Introduction to Reef Fish, Corals, and Mobile Invertebrates.

Care in the Aquatic Shop

Housing, handling & welfare issues, space requirements, water quality parameters

Introduction of newly purchased animals, acclimation and quarantine

Community species, territorial species and biotopes

Nutrition

Wild diet versus feeding in captivity, herbivores, specialist feeders / Food quality and water pollution.

The Customer

Advising the Customer – costs of set ups, level of difficulty to maintain, degree of dedication

Equipping the customer – options available / Maintenance of the aquarium.

Maintaining Healthy Stock

Commonly encountered problems / Disease – maintaining a healthy tank

Troubleshooting the reef aquarium.

Commonly encountered problems – overstocking, environmental issues.

Health & Safety

Saltwater and electricity / Potentially dangerous livestock, / Zoonoses.

Legislation and Conservation.

CITES: Stony Corals, Giant Clams, and Sea Horses / IUCN Redbook / Captive bred animals.

Education & Training.

Resources and recommended reading.

__________________________________________________________________________

Upon completion delegates receive:

• An SAI Global Training Certificate of Attendance
• Full course booklet
• Selection of aquarium magazines

For more information or to book your place, please contact Rachel Woodwards at SAI Global on: 01908 249934 or email rachel.woodwards@saiglobal.com

A new UK print magazine, Marine Habitat, makes its debut this month.

Due out around the 15^th of December, Marine Habitat is a new and very exciting printed magazine dedicated to the marine fish keeping hobby and the ongoing support of marine conservation. Marine Habitat will be published bi-monthly and will be packed with fascinating articles written by a selection of the best marine experts from around the world.

Marine Habitat has two faces, the printed magazine and its sister online website, together aiming to provide an all round resource for readers. The magazine will be packed with articles and amazing images but sometimes there just isn’t enough room, so the website will offer additional content, in the form of extra article text, additional photos and moreover video footage to support printed articles. The website will also feature other useful resources that do not find their way into the magazine itself.

Sections within the magazine include:

• Marine Species Profiles (min 3 per issue)
• Numerous featured expert written articles
• The Gear Guide, which will look at various piece of equipment
• Myth-busters, which will seek to answer some of the myths that have continued to circulate the hobby
• And much, much more…

To find out more about this new magazine go to: Marine Habitat.

Oh, and just in case you were wondering, yes I am one of the team of contributors. Look out for my article in the first issue entitled, “Acclimation and Quarantine of New Stock – a Reappraisal.”

Tim Hayes

Midland Reefs

©2010