Coral reefs are dynamic ecosystems that currently face endangerment and extinction from the effects of climate change. Restoration projects aim to assist in the recovery of these fragile ecosystems and enhance their resiliency. Because no formal statistical review of the effects of coral reef restor...

Acropora cervicornis is a key Caribbean species, both in structural and functional terms. It has suffered an important population loss since the 1980s and exhibited no signs of recovery in the following three generations. Hence, it is classified as a Critically Endangered Species. Its fast growth ra...

The Reef Restoration Program initiated by Oceanus, A.C supported by MARFund, SUMMIT Foundation and other partners is focused on strengthening resilience and adaptation potential of coral reefs to promote recovery of associated species of fish and invertebrates. The Program involves the transplant of...

In February 2018, an outbreak of coral disease with multiple pathologies was observed at the Killer Pillar dive site in the West Bay Marine Park off Seven Mile Beach, Grand Cayman. By June 2018, seven individual colonies of Dendrogyra cylindrus were infected by a combination of black-band and white-...

Heirs To Our Oceans is not just a global movement empowering youth to protect their oceans and waters for their generation, it is a representative of how the education system must change to prepare our kids as they will inherit the problems our oceans face including the coral crisis. 14 year old Cha...

The widespread bleaching event in 1998 caused significant disturbance to coral reefs within the Western Indian Ocean, resulting in up to 95% coral mortality within the Seychelles. In 2011, a large-scale coral reef restoration project was implemented to facilitate reef recovery and enhance ecosystem ...

The mass mortality of Diadema antillarum throughout the Caribbean in 1983-4 resulted in decreased herbivory and an increase in abundance of macroalgae on coral reefs in the region. This project intends to increase population densities of Diadema antillarum on reefs in Puerto Rico by releasing lab cu...

Reefs and associated ecosystems serve as barriers, buffers, and breakwaters from rising seas, swell, and storm surge. Until recently, it was not possible to put a value on the flood protection benefits from these nature based solutions. This is changing rapidly, however, and recent studies are showi...

Healthy coral reefs provide coastal protection and natural defenses against climatic extremes. Coral reefs provide up to $30 billion to the global economy, with $9 billion made up by the coastal protection benefits they afford. Recent numerical modelling studies have shown that reefs can reduce wave...

With the proliferation of local and regional coral propagation and reef restoration programs around the world, there is an increasing need to develop uniform, consistent guidelines to ascertain the status of these efforts that are initiated with differing levels of expertise and a wide range of prog...

The success of restoration efforts is usually measured on the basis of coral survival and growth rates, but that approach may be improved by taking in consideration specific evaluations of the ecological role that transplanted colonies play in the reef. Corals are ecological engineers and offer shel...

Coral restoration is gaining increasing attention as a reef management strategy to address dramatic declines in coral cover worldwide. However, there is often a mismatch between the objectives of coral restoration programs and measures used to assess their effectiveness. Here, we used ten indicators...

Staghorn coral, Acropora cervicornis, is a threatened species that has declined more than 90% throughout the Caribbean since the late 1970s due to mortality from disease, hurricanes, bleaching, and predation. Outplanting of nursery-reared corals has become an established technique to enhance A. cerv...

Marine cloud brightening is an intervention which could potentially mitigate bleaching of heat stressed coral reefs. The proposal is that providing additional cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) in the form of nano sized salt crystals derived from evaporated sea water droplets to the marine boundary lay...

Primary and secondary restoration actions applied on a damage coral reef by ship grounding at Tanchacte Reef in Quintana Roo, Mexico. Coral reefs damaged by ship grounding reduces the resilience of these ecosystems and their natural recovery can take several decades if direct, active and immediate r...

Scientists and reef practitioners have been scrambling to discover new techniques to combat global coral degradation. Coral restoration is still a developing field, and many innovations and improvements are necessary for long-term success and conservation. The growing attention towards restoration h...

Photomosaics can be a useful scientific tool for efficiently and accurately analyzing large numbers of coral outplants. Coral Restoration Foundation, Inc. (CRF) has developed cost-effective, in-house procedures for creating large-scale (~2,000 sq meters) reef photomosaics of reefs for the purposes o...

Active restoration to mitigate declines in coral cover is an essential component of coral conservation and management plans. However, the availability of monitoring data and success criteria is limited and often leads to criticism of restoration projects. Expanding an evaluation tool developed by Li...

Iberostar is a Spanish based luxury hotel group with over 100 hotels focused in Europe and the Caribbean. With more than 80% of our hotels on the beachfront, we have always applied a policy of sustainable and responsible management with the environments in which we develop our activity, because we u...

Coral reefs provide critical services to human communities worldwide such as: fisheries, costal protection and cultural benefits. In Dominical Republic (DR), as in all tropical parts over the world, the coral cover and these services are diminishing due to local and global threats; and now, we know ...

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has used a range of coral restoration techniques over the last 25 years. Restoration efforts have focused on injuries associated with ship groundings and anchoring incidents. Lessons learned have helped refine both the technical aspects and...

The staghorn coral (Acropora cervicornis), a branching Caribbean coral, contributes to reef ecosystems by adding structural complexity. Structurally complex reefs provide increased fish habitat and support greater fish diversity compared to reefs with less complex substrate. A. cervicornis has de...

Degradation of coral reefs around the world has increased in recent years; causing its loss of structure and functionality. Therefore, ecological restoration actions have begun to be implemented to recover these characteristics, as well as the environmental services that they provide. However, there...

For 10 years we have been conducting experimental coral restoration effort in the Bahamas through direct transplantation and outplanting of from nurseries using Acropora spp. and other species. An important part of these efforts from their start has been the development of a hierarchical monitoring ...

The goal of coral reef restoration is not only to enhance coral populations, but also to recover and sustain the diverse fish communities that rely on reef habitat and ecosystem services. The sequence in which species colonize new habitat is often an important determinant of long-term community stru...