A healthy coral reef system is like a well-managed city. Each resident fish has a job in maintaining the reef: some nibble away at seaweed threatening to smother the coral, while others crunch through bits of coral, making space for new polyps. In turn, the reef provides food and a refuge where fish can sleep, reproduce, and hide from predators. These relationships are symbiotic: the fish help the reef, and the reef helps the fish.
But when fish disappear from a coral reef due to fishing or pollution, the system is thrown out of balance, and a reef may deteriorate to the point of collapse, especially when coral bleaching and other climate change-induced factors are thrown into the mix. This is exactly what’s happening to the coral reefs in West Hawai‘i, the western shoreline of Hawai‘i’s Big Island known as the Kona coast, according to a new study.
https://news-mongabay-com.cdn.amppr...half-their-fish-to-pollution-and-fishing/amp/
But when fish disappear from a coral reef due to fishing or pollution, the system is thrown out of balance, and a reef may deteriorate to the point of collapse, especially when coral bleaching and other climate change-induced factors are thrown into the mix. This is exactly what’s happening to the coral reefs in West Hawai‘i, the western shoreline of Hawai‘i’s Big Island known as the Kona coast, according to a new study.
https://news-mongabay-com.cdn.amppr...half-their-fish-to-pollution-and-fishing/amp/