{"id":317396,"date":"2024-04-11T08:21:29","date_gmt":"2024-04-11T06:21:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=317396"},"modified":"2024-04-11T08:21:31","modified_gmt":"2024-04-11T06:21:31","slug":"part-3-new-growth-central-great-barrier-reef-april-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=317396","title":{"rendered":"Part 3.\u00a0 New Growth \u2013 Central Great Barrier Reef, April 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Jennifer Marohasy<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00a0By\u00a0jennifer<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There might be 3,000 coral reefs but what makes a special reef, what makes John Brewer Reef the jewel in the crown considering the central region of the Great Barrier Reef \u2013 something of greater value amongst other valuable things?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This coral reef to the north-east of Townsville was once home to a floating hotel<\/a>, that was back in the 1980s.   More recently, and somewhat more modestly, John Brewer has been given its own Museum of Underwater Art<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hanging baskets were installed into this underwater museum, and they are now chandeliers.  That is how I describe the bouquets of coral, that you can see in my feature photograph at the top of this post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thankfully the MOUA and its chandeliers were not damaged by the cyclone, being at some depth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I first visited this coral reef on 10th<\/sup> April 2022, exactly two years ago tomorrow.   My buddy on scuba was Leonard Lim, and he took the most exquisite photographs<\/a> of these huge plate corals.   They have since been smashed up by TC Kirrily, into what Stuart Ireland now describes as Bull-in-a-China-Shop Alley<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have witnessed a coral reef go from healthy to algae.  Not to the zooxanthellae-type algae that live within the coral polyps, but to macro-algae that grow over the corals, smothering them.   It was like being in a coral graveyard: seeing the outline of once healthy corals overlaid with dark slim.   That is NOT John Brewer Reef, I am describing an inshore coral reef, not far off-shore from the north Queensland town of Bowen following Tropical Cyclone Debbie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I first visited John Brewer Reef after Tropical Cyclone Kirrily my stomach churned, wondering if this jewel-in-the-crown would become so infested with algae the corals would all be smothered.   Diving the reef again last Thursday, ten weeks after TC Kirrily, I can see that there is something different and special about this location.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are large schools of algal-eating fish passing through, mowing the algae as one might mow grass.   And so, from the pieces of broken coral that have fallen from the reef crest, there is opportunity for new growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was the most wonderful thing that I saw on Thursday: new polyps pushing out from broken pieces of Acropora coral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
New growth from broken pieces of coral, amongst the rubble. Photographed by Stuart Ireland at John Brewer Reef on Thursday 4th April, 2024.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

***********<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So much thanks to\u00a0Adrenalin Dive<\/a>\u00a0for getting us safely so far off-shore, and to the\u00a0Institute of Public Affairs<\/a>\u00a0for funding this return visit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There might be 3,000 coral reefs but what makes a special reef, what makes John Brewer Reef the jewel in the crown considering the central region of the Great Barrier Reef \u2013 something of greater value amongst other valuable things?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":317397,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"There might be 3,000 coral reefs but what makes a special reef, what makes John Brewer Reef the jewel in the crown considering the central region of the Great Barrier Reef \u2013 something of greater value amongst other valuable things?","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691820648,691818100,691828089],"class_list":["post-317396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-coral-reefs","tag-great-barrier-reef","tag-tropical-cyclone","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/0Chandaliers-UWR05330.jpg?fit=2048%2C1152&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1kzi","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":290752,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=290752","url_meta":{"origin":317396,"position":0},"title":"Skeptics visit the poster-child of severely bleached reefs, and it\u2019s just fine 18 months later\u2026","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"12\/10\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"It\u2019s not an accident that\u00a0\u00a097% of Australians don\u2019t know the Great Barrier Reef is in record good health.","rel":"","context":"In \"Great Barrier Reef\"","block_context":{"text":"Great Barrier Reef","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=great-barrier-reef"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/0wp2616347.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/0wp2616347.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/0wp2616347.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/0wp2616347.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/0wp2616347.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":258256,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=258256","url_meta":{"origin":317396,"position":1},"title":"Coral Snapshot 2022-23, & All the Unanswered Questions","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"05\/20\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Full marks to David Mills, writing in the Courier Mail, for asking why the government tends to bury good news reports about the Great Barrier Reef.","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/0JB-April2022-_LEO7407.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/0JB-April2022-_LEO7407.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/0JB-April2022-_LEO7407.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/0JB-April2022-_LEO7407.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/0JB-April2022-_LEO7407.jpeg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":335060,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=335060","url_meta":{"origin":317396,"position":2},"title":"Monitoring to Avoid Cyclone Damage \u2013 Denial. 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Do you think I could find it? Some journalists have a tendency to extrapolate from the specific to the general. 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