{"id":251248,"date":"2023-04-05T10:16:06","date_gmt":"2023-04-05T08:16:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=251248"},"modified":"2023-04-05T10:16:09","modified_gmt":"2023-04-05T08:16:09","slug":"bellies-full-of-coral","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=251248","title":{"rendered":"Bellies Full of Coral"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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from Jennifer Marohasy<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

April 5, 2023\u00a0By\u00a0jennifer<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I spent some of last weekend at the Great Barrier Reef, with my daughter sliding off a boat called\u00a0Reef Encounter<\/a>\u00a0moored variously at Norman and Saxon reefs to the northeast of Cairns. The sun was shining, the water was crystal clear and so warm \u2013 a delicious 29 degrees Celsius<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Boarding the boat,\u00a0Reef Experience<\/em>, from which we were transferred to\u00a0Reef Encounter<\/em>; photographed by Tobi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The corals were mostly various shades of beige, which is the colour of healthy corals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Caroline swimming down to the turtle at 8 metres. Photograph by Tobi on Scuba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A close-up of the turtle by Caroline. Photographed with a TG6 Olympus camera.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The fish were much more brightly coloured than the corals, and so cheeky. A big difference between wandering through a forest versus snorkelling over corals is that the fish are often \u2018in your face\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A clown fish photographed by Caroline on the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Clown fish will greet you head on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Caroline about 5 metres down with the clowns, photographed by me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Trigger fish are usually territorial and quite shy. Except at Norman reef, even the Trigger fish came over to greet me on Saturday morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A Trigger fish lying over soft corals at Norman Reef photographed by me with a TG6 Olympus camera.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As I swam away the Trigger fish left the corals and followed me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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My daughter Caroline was my free diving buddy for the few days we spent in and out of the water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Caroline under the water with her TG6 Olympus camera.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Me and can you see the parrots to the left, under the water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Caroline\u2019s favourites are the parrot fish: brightly coloured and with a beak (instead of teeth) that they use to various bite into little corals or scrape from the surface of large bolder corals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A Parrot fish photographed by Caroline on the weekend at Saxon reef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Parrot fish bit chunks out of live coral. Photograph by Caroline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A coral colony freshly munched on by Parrot fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A Porites (Bolder coral) that has been scraped by the beak of a Parrot fish. Photographed by Caroline on the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A Bumphead parrot fish will feed on about 5 tonnes of live coral in a single year. They often hang around in groups of about 30, with that one cluster all up consuming more coral than the entire live export coral trade<\/a> takes each year from the Great Barrier Reef (100 tonnes versus 150 tonnes). In short, these fish have bellies full of coral \u2013 lots of coral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve watched them, not last weekend, but at Bougainville Reef, far to the northeast, like buffalo across an open plain: kicking up the dust \u2013 except it was sand. And eating the grass \u2013 except it was coral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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These Bumphead parrots were photographed by Tobi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We live in an age that tends to promote empathy for victims above all else, so I am surprised there are not stories cancelling Parrot fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worldwide, there are some 130 species of corallivorous fishes (fishes that consume live coral) from 11 different families, with Butterflyfishes (family Chaetodontidae) accounting for approximately half of all of these.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A butterfly fish photographed by Caroline at Saxon Reef on the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I have been visiting the coral reefs off Cairns for about 53 years now, since I was seven years old. Despite the claims they are dead and dying, I mostly still find healthy corals, cheeky fish, crystal clear warm water, blue skies and happy divers. It is a travesty that these reefs are so maligned by the righteous activists that hate coal mines. They exploit the concept of coral reef as victim to promote anxiety amongst children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I was second last out of the water most afternoons just on sunset. This \u2018above water\u2019 photograph was taken by Caroline also on her Olympus TG6.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Another underwater photograph by Caroline at Saxon reef on the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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TG6 Olympus cameras can take closeups as well as wide angle photographs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tobi took this photograph, at the weekend under the water. What a perfect coral, so far untouched by the Parrots that swim about munching and scraping corals at the Great Barrier Reef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Notes about the reef mafia and funding to save what doesn\u2019t need saving:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Feeding the Fishes, A$1 Billion<\/a><\/blockquote>