Diving is a popular vacation adventure. Divers set their sights on the beautiful coral reefs found in the Caribbean islands. Jellyfish, oysters, clams, turtles, sea worms and other creatures use coral reefs for food and shelter. You typically find coral reefs in warm, clear, and shallow waters.
This means even the timid vacationer can enjoy their beauty.
Coral reefs give economic and pleasure-loving benefits to vacationing divers, but coral reefs can tolerate only a narrow range of environmental conditions. The harsh and excessive use by vacationers causes much damage to the reefs.
Hurricanes, and other natural events also do untold damage. Remember Hurricane Frances in September 2004? This massive storm packed winds of 105 mph (165 kph) — wrecking homes, boats and other property inland. Imagine Frances sweeping across the sea — battling huge waves of water. What support, then, do coral beds have against such force? The ocean floor told the story: tweeny-weeny bits of organisms littered from these sensitive reefs. In addition, corals are also prone to disease and bleaching.
Consider these facts about coral reefs:
- There are three basic kinds of coral reefs in the Caribbean: fringing reefs, barrier reefs and atolls.
- Fringing reefs are coral reefs that grow in shallow waters and border the coast closely or are separated from it by a narrow stretch of water.
- Barrier reefs are reefs that are separated from land by a lagoon.
- Atolls are annular reefs that develop at or near the surface of the sea when islands that are surrounded by reefs subside.
- Polyps are tiny organisms that make up corals.
- A polyp is made up of two cell layers: the epidermis and the gastrodermis.
- Corals are of two types: perforate and imperforate.
- Perforate corals have porous skeletons with connections between the polyps through the skeleton.
- Imperforate corals have solid skeletons.
- The “fire coral” is orange-yellow in color and doesn’t have any pores. It does have visible stinging structures which can be painful to touch.
- Coral bleaching is the whitening of coral colonies because of algae from the tissues of polyps.
- Corals display sexual and asexual reproduction.
- Vacationers take coral souvenirs home — removing many healthy corals.
Source: The Coral Reef Ecology Project: For more information about Caribbean coral reefs, visit the Coral Reef Ecology Project.
