It’s Time to Preserve Coral Reefs
Coral reefs are some of the most
important to marine ecosystem and world’s food webs. They are home of marine
life such as crabs, shrimp, starfish, sea urchins, jellyfish, many species of
fish and various types of fungi. Also, coral reefs can reduce damages from wave
action on adjacent land. Unfortunately, today coral reefs are in crisis, they
started bleaching. Is it time for us to preserve them?
Corals are animals, because they don’t produce their own food, as plants
do. Coral reefs made up of tiny animals called “polyps”. Polyps have a strong
exoskeletons made of calcium carbonate (limestone), the main structures of a
reef. Each polyp has a ring of tentacles shaped like long arms with tips that
can sting. The healthy corals
get their beautiful colors such as red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple
from tiny algae in their tissue. These algae help corals to provide food during
photosynthesis. When seawater temperature gets too warm by global warming,
pollutions from land, hot water that releases by power plants or whatever,
algae will eject from the coral. Sooner, corals will completely turn into white
and pale. When we look at corals, we will see only structures (limestone) which
covered by thin layer tissue. This situation generally called “coral
bleaching”.
There is good news, Global Coral Reef Alliance, non-profit organization which plays an
important role in growing, managing, and protecting all marine ecosystems. They
try to save and recover coral reefs by created new innovation called “Biorock”
to re-generate the coral reefs from disease and climate changes. The biorock is
a new method that uses low voltage of electric current to grow solid limestone
rock structures in the sea and accelerate the growth of corals. It will
construct habitats for marine life and protecting the shoreline.
Coral reefs are community of marine life and various type of
micro-organism. They give us food and protect our land from wave action.
Tragically, lots of coral reefs have
been damaged by high temperature of seawater. There are
many ways to recover and
preserve our coral reefs for example, do not discarding
garbage or human waste into the beach and learn more about coral reefs. Maybe
you can help others understand how coral reef is important. However, it’s time for us to preserve them
even though the biorock was created.
