Will We Protect Our Majestic 23,000 Square Mile Deep-Sea Coral Reef?

FIFTY MILES OFF CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Deep beneath the crystalline blue surface of the Atlantic Ocean off the southeastern U.S. lies a virtual rain forest of coral reefs so expansive the network is believed to be the world's largest.

A 23,000-square-mile area stretching from North Carolina to Florida is just part of that entire reef tract now being proposed for protection from potential damage by deep-sea commercial fishing and energy exploration.

So far, it's been relatively untouched by man because of its largely unreachable depths, providing scientists a unique opportunity to protect an ecosystem before it's destroyed.

"Most of the time, science is trying to catch up with exploitation," said Steve Ross of the Center for Marine Science at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.

Ross is leading a four-part research cruise that began Aug. 6 aimed at studying these deep sea environments, hoping to find new species of fish, crab and corals that could lead to scientific and medical discoveries.

Environmentalists say crab pots and bottom trawling for shrimp are the most immediate threats.

Margot Stiles, a marine scientist for Oceana, an international environmental advocacy group, said other deep water reefs off the U.S. have been severely damaged by trawlers.

"In this case, we have 23,000 square miles of known deep sea corals, and it's not too late to protect them," Stiles said. "This particular reef is to the deep sea what the Great Barrier Reef is for the world."

The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council is pushing the proposal to protect the region, about the size of West Virginia, in depths down to 2,500 feet and below, creating the largest deep water coral protected area off the Atlantic Coast.

Specifics on regulations and restrictions are still being reviewed, but if approved by the U.S. Commerce Secretary, the plan could take effect by next year.

"As far as we can tell, there's relatively little damage," Ross said. "That's very different from other parts of the world. In Scotland and Ireland ... there's been significant damage mostly from fishing and now those reefs are being protected."

While fishermen have for centuries dragged up corals from the deep sea, it wasn't until the early 1900s that scientists discovered these extensive cold-water reefs existed. And it wasn't until the 1970s that researchers were able to use submersibles and cameras to reach the sea floor to document them. It had long been thought coral reefs only formed in shallow, warm waters.

Deep water reefs and pinnacles are much more slow-growing and can take several million years to form. Ross said science is only now beginning to understand these underwater "frontier zones."

Out on the research ship, scientists gather corals, sponges and fish samples by sinking deep to the ocean floor in a four-man submersible about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. The team is comprised of researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Florida Atlantic University, the U.S. Geological Survey and others.

"We've barely seen the tip of the iceberg in terms of new species out here," Ross said. "We'll find out five or 10 years from now that we made an amazing discovery and we just didn't realize it ... A lot of our pharmaceuticals come from a tropical rainforest environment. The same people are looking for these in the deep sea, and there are expectations that there will be drugs made that could potentially provide cures for some types of cancer.

"There is just a great deal of concern that once these habitats are gone, the potential for realizing those discoveries are eliminated," Ross added.

The deep water reefs also are seen as indicators of the ocean's overall health; because they are so remote, it takes longer for phenomenon like climate change to affect them.

"Science is questions, it's not answers," said Liz Baird of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, cautioning that it may be years before researchers realize the full potential of the reefs.

Most in the fishing industry agree that protecting these reefs is good for business, said Steven Wilson, owner of International Oceanic Enterprises in Alabama. Wilson has been shrimping in the Atlantic for 30 years and has been working with officials preparing the protection plan.

While law enforcement says some fishermen will drop crab pots or drag nets near fragile corals to score big catches, regardless of the damage, Wilson said it's mostly accidental.

"We can't make any money trawling over coral. In fact, we lose money," he said, noting that it destroys the nets.

Woody Moore, a commercial fishermen out of Jacksonville, Fla., has been trawling for shrimp in the Atlantic for three decades and also has been helping develop the deep reef protection proposals.

Moore puts it simply: "We don't want any closures but you gotta give them something or they'll take it all. You gotta play the game."

___

On the Net:

Daily logs and information from the research cruise:

http://fl.biology.usgs.gov/DISCOVRE/cruise(underscore)plan(underscore)2009.html

http://naturalsciences.org/microsites/education/deepsea/index.html

South Atlantic Fishery Management Council: http://www.safmc.net/

Oceana: http://www.oceana.org

Comments

[toxicbrainpoison]

07:06 AM on 08/19/2009

They want to protect it from exploitation and yet they are hinting at medical benefits. They tried that with the Amazon and look what happened.

[grateful4thedead]

09:48 PM on 08/18/2009

obama okaying loan of $2 billion to brazil for offshore drilling...seriously. it's reported in the wsj.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203863204574346610120524166.html

[Dredd]

06:51 PM on 08/18/2009

The same question in different words is "will we survive as a species", and the answer to both is "I sure hope so".

http://blogdredd.blogspot.com/2009/06/ecocosmology.html

[DougRader]

12:18 PM on 08/18/2009

As Environmental Defense Fund Chief Ocean Scientist, and the long-time chair of the panel that designed the protection program that will be finalized by the South Atlantic Council in September, let me assure you all that these world-class reefs will be protected by world-class protection that also allows non-damaging heritage fisheries to continue.
Working with Council and NOAA staff, we were able to negotiate with fishermen a set of allowable gear zones that achieve these two results.
This "win-win" is a major conservation achievement, that protects an ancient and irreplaceable reef.

[foxfury]

01:07 PM on 08/18/2009

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It sounds great, but you're gonna have to fight against a huge wave of skepticism in a system that relies so heavily on lobbyists in the legislative process.

[TrooAmerican]

11:29 AM on 08/18/2009

UMMMMMMMMMM....No.

We have a trash heap the size of texas in the pacific and instead of inventing huge open mouth trash scooping ships to gather as much of it up as possible and properly dispose of, all the powers that be are conveniently stating "its too late, its too big, nothing can be done, its over"

Odd. People can invent anything, and spend billions to lobby for unethical things they want, yet cant spend money to build machines to fix the horrendous caretaking of our planet we humans have been guilty of for centuries, but most prevalent in the past 70 yrs.

Clean up the pacific and we clean up the cancer causing fish and killing of the seas for our next generation.

[TigersEye]

03:50 PM on 08/18/2009

The Pacific "dumping ground" is horrible. I can't believe that with all our technology the best we can do is dump our trash into our oceans, especially all the plastic. We need to greatly reduce the amount of plastic we're using, the oceans and landfills are overflowing with it.