Rehabilitating Coral Reefs in Indo plus some dolphins and deserted islands...
Apparently the 1000 islands area in Indonesia an hour or two north of Jakarta by boat used to be in the top ten healthiest coral reefs in the world, well that certainly aint the case anymore....
Quote:
Originally Posted by UNESCO report
In response to the problem in 1995, UNESCO, with scientists from P30-LIPI and ITI, conducted a review of what has been happening to the Bay's coral reefs. The review repeated a similar survey which had been conducted 10 years earlier, allowing scientists from the three organisations to see how much the islands and reefs had been transformed during that period of rapid economic and industrial growth in Jakarta.
The results of the second survey indicated that the condition of the coral reefs in Pulau Seribu is continuing to decline, to the point that some islands have totally disappeared (see Fig. 1). Part of the problem of coral reef degradation is beyond our direct control, in that global warming and the El Nino effect have led to changed rainfall and runoff patterns and longer "dry-seasons" in Indonesia.
Another part of the problem, however, is not beyond our control. Many of the causes of erosion and reef degradation are related directly to human behaviour. These are the so-called ‘anthropogenic perturbations’ that affect the structure and health of the coral reef ‘community’. They include archaic waste disposal systems and unsustainable resource management practices which lead to:
- deposition of rubbish and sedimentation on the reefs,
- physical destruction of reefs by fish bombing, cyanide fishing, coral mining, and dredging, and
- decreasing water quality through industrial pollution and nutrient enrichment.
The worsening condition of coral reefs thus goes hand in hand with the unsustainable utilisation of resources by local fishermen and and specimen collectors, and by the developers of private resorts, as well as the improper or inadequate disposal of waste by industry and local government authorities.
Pulau Seribu
Anyway, it was heartening to see some groups of locals are trying to rectify the situation by rehabilitating the reefs and transplanting corals.
*keeping my rose glasses on, cos they did say that they only sell 20% of the coral that they grow and place the other 80% back into the sea, and the wouldnt lie to me, would they?*
So you start with some broken coral to use as a substrate base to glue the small corals onto...
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands20.JPG
Then you take some coral that you have been growing elsewhere and chop it into small (2 inch) pieces... notice the yellow garden shears in his hand top right.
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands22.JPG
Some quick drying cement, and decorate your dead rock....
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands23.JPG
course this being Indo one also includes a plastic name tag for each coral......
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands24.JPG
soon it will look like this...
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands25.JPG
or this
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands16.JPG
lots of other small corals that they were growing... they normally grow them in the ocean. but dragged them out to make a display for us...
https://teakdoor.com/Gallery/albums/u..._islands18.JPG
Ah well, I hope it does some good, but the cynic in me thinks that perhaps a whole lot more commercial transactions occur than they admit to, and possibly exaggerate how much rehabilitation that they do....
and the World Bank did recognize that the locals gotta make money if they are going to protect the environment....
