Artificial Coral Reefs to fund kids swim lessons!

Greetings donor family, and happy new year!

Since we send these reports out every 3 months, I don't have any major news for you, but here are a few updates!

We have continued pushing ahead with the treatment of Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease (SCTLD) throughout the BVI. In the past 5 weeks we have unfortunately spotted it for the 1st time in the Horseshoe Reef of Anegada which is the largest reef in the BVI, and one of the largest barrier reefs in the Caribbean.  There are certain areas that seem to have been heavily affected and others completely unaffected.

The affected areas seem to jump around quite a bit leading us to believe that there are currents at play that we aren't totally aware of, but we are hoping to study this as well.  Additionally, reef cleaning fish such as Parrot Fish may be transporting the disease, so there are many factors in why it may be more prevalent in some areas than others.  While we sadly can't save the entire reef with our team or resources, we have picked several areas that contain very large Stony Corals, such as big beautiful Brain Corals that we have been monitoring and treating to ensure that some of the most impressive ones are saved. 

In addition to SCTLD, we have been monitoring our artificial reef dive sites.  Both the Willy T and Shark Airplanes are doing great, but the airplanes recently required some maintenance to secure the wings for a while longer!  We have also noticed some juvenile corals growing on the planes which indicates a recent coral spawning event nearby.  As a side-note to this, I have included a link to a video of nighttime coral spawning that we recently captured which is really beautiful if you want to take a look.

Lastly, we have just pulled our shark-tag recievers out of the water.  They are currently in a soap bath to get the algae off before we pull the card out and download the data this week.  We will include those findings in our next report and hopefully have more data on that then.

And finally, we have applied for our own 501c3 in the US, so be on the lookout for "Beyond The Reef International" soon!

Links:

• Nighttime Coral Spawning

Since our last update, Beyond The reef has continued to remove siginifgant amounts of abandoned fishing debris (such as nets, ropes, pots and other trash) from the BVI, but since I wrote more about those in the last report, I thought I would focus this one on Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease. 

Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease (SCTLD) is a lethal disease that affects more than 20 species of stony corals (or hard corals) throughout the Caribbean.  This disease was first noticed in Florida in 2014, and has since continued to spread, reaching the BVI's in 2020. Unlike other coral diseases, SCTLD is fast spreading and once infected, coral colonies can be 100% dead in just a few weeks (depending on size of coral colony). Although it was first spotted in the BVI less than 2 years ago, it is now present throughout the territory.  

Since Stony Corals are slow growing and form the building blocks of a reef system, their rapid loss will be felt widespread as reef systems play a vital role in coastal defence, tourism and fisheries stock (important habitat and shelter).

Luckily, a specially bioengineered antibiotic paste has been created that can be applied to corals to stop the disease and save the remaining live tissue. It has proven to be over 90% effective!  It is very labor intensive process and requires physically applying it to each coral, but it is currently the best known solution for mitigating the spread. 

Over the last year Beyond the Reef has been working with the Ministry of Natural Resources, National Parks Trust of the Virgin Islands and BVI Scuba Operators to tackle SCTLD in the BVI.  

How have we been involved?

• One of the main strike teams going out to treat corals, maintain and monitor the affected sites.
• Assisting the Government’s marine biologist to train more strike team divers on how to apply the treatment.
• Mapping and monitoring the frontline of the disease as it spreads.
• Raising awareness in the territory of the protocols that can assist with minimising the potential mechanism that spread the disease.

 Thank you to Laura Arton of Beyond The Reef who has been spearheading this initiative and Tim Jackson for the photos.