Corals exhibiting the same behaviors as in previous mass extinctions

[Ardeus]

Evolutionary Traits that Enable Scleractinian Corals to Survive Mass Extinction Events - Scientific Reports

Scleractinian “stony” corals are major habitat engineers, whose skeletons form the framework for the highly diverse, yet increasingly threatened, coral reef ecosystem. Fossil coral skeletons also present a rich record that enables paleontological analysis of coral origins, tracing them back to...

www.nature.com

Very interesting stuff, especially taking into account that corals are survivors of previous mass extinctions.

"When we finally put all this together and saw the result, for me it was that moment when the hair on the back of your neck stands up," said marine biologist David Gruber, from The City University of New York, to Newsweek. "It was like, Oh my goodness, [the corals] are doing exactly what they did back then."

"Researchers who monitored coral spawning in the Red Sea for four years found that males and females were acting erratically and missing each other's spawning events, leading to fewer juvenile coral, which paves the way toward extinction, as Earth.com reported."

"The scientists looked at the traits of corals that survived the last major extinction event. They found that the colorful, wavy corals that attract scuba divers did not last. The ones that did survive are the ones that form small colonies and seek out deep water, which are the same ones showing signs of thriving today, as Newsweek reported."

 

[Victor_C3]

Interest and alarming read.

There are many examples of rapid regional and like cal improvements to habitats and the environment when we just stop messing with them for a few decades. I’ll f we could just keep our hands out of portions of the reefs and oceans for a while, things will rapidly improve.

I read a study a number of years ago where they restricted fishing activities in a series of several square mile areas. Around each of these areas, in the matter of a few years, fishing yields and the health greatly improved. The populations grew in the protected areas and spilled over into the non-protected areas - just like copepod populations in our aquarium refugium.

 

[Ardeus]

For me the idea that corals have the necessary tools to come back after we are done with our plague phase is a really comforting thought.

They are now one of the most immediately threatened habitats, but at the same time, one the most resilient in the long term.