Bahamas Blog

Could the Baker's Bay development, by the Discovery Land Company in Guana Cay, be more harmful to the reefs in Abaco than a Tsunami would be? Maybe, according to researchers from north Queensland's James Cook University (JCU).

Working with Indonesian ecologists, the researchers found that humans have made more of an impact on coral reefs in Indonesia's Aceh province than the devastating Boxing Day tsunami.

The findings, published a few days ago in the international science magazine Current Biology, found "chronic human misuse" had far greater repercussions for reefs closest to the epicentre of the Sumatra-Andanaman earthquake, which triggered the killer wave on Boxing Day last year.

The team visited the region within three months of the tsunami, surveying 200 km of coastline over three weeks.

The reefs they examined had been tremendously abused prior to the tsunami, including destructive human practices such as dynamite and cyanide fishing, and to land runoff from fertilisers and sediment, which has turned once vibrant coral colonies into "graveyards".

The scientists estimated humans were responsible for 80 per cent of the damage to 49 coral reefs in the study site, while the tsunami was thought to have caused as little as five to 10 per cent.

The Save Guana Cay Reef people sometimes sound like troublemakers, and indeed they are when they attack web sites and spam people who do not see things their way (which they have done). But everybody ignored the little boy who cried "wolf" too. I hear that didn't work out too well for the village.