A Reef Grows in Brooklyn
December 1, 2011
Slow-growing and highly sensitive to environmental conditions, corals are not easy to produce. But at the New York Aquarium’s Coral Lab, cultivating vibrant pink bird’s nest, Xenias, and tubanarias to create the stunning reef exhibits of Glover’s Reef and Conservation Hall is well worth the effort.
Coral reefs are vital to the health of marine life. They provide shelter and food for countless marine species and help maintain a balanced ocean ecosystem. By displaying these corals, we are not only educating our guests about the need to save reefs, we are also eliminating the need to take corals from the ocean.
The Coral Lab is a fully functioning laboratory that houses 16 tanks of growing corals. Aquarium staff have grown approximately 30 species of hard and soft corals in the lab, and transferred hundreds of individual corals to exhibits.
Growing corals is an intricate process. They start out as tiny fragments, pieces taken from existing corals in the aquarium exhibits. Aquarium staff place the baby corals inside tanks suitable for their size, then add filtered water and just the right mix of salt and calcium—an ingredient essential to keeping the hard corals strong. Lighting is adjusted to match the spectrum of natural sunlight. Coral species vary in how much of these elements they require, and are slow-growing. Some can take 2–4 years to mature.
In the field, WCS maintains the Glover’s Reef Marine Research Station in Belize, a base for studying many aspects of reef systems, including coral diversity, bleaching, and the abundance of fish using and keeping the reef alive.
Nearly one-third of the world’s coral reefs have been lost due to climate change, unsustainable fishing practices, and unchecked coastal development. Some estimates predict a complete loss of coral reefs by 2050 if tangible action on the ground is not taken now. In response, WCS is conserving a range of seascapes encompassing 90 percent of all coral diversity on the planet, from Fiji in the Indo-Pacific’s Coral Triangle to Madagascar in the western Indian Ocean to Belize in the Caribbean.
The re-opening of Conservation Hall and Glover’s Reef was the first main component of WCS’s A SEA CHANGE initiative, a 10-year aquarium transformation plan announced in 2009. WCS’s New York Seascape program, part of A SEA CHANGE, is designed to restore healthy populations of local marine species and protect New York City’s waters, vital to wildlife and key to the city’s economic and cultural strength. There are coral reef systems within NYC waters that are also in need of protection.
The next big phase of A SEA CHANGE is the groundbreaking for the Ocean Wonders: Sharks! building, which is scheduled to take place in the fall of 2012.
