Date: Wed, 4 Mar 1998 06:33:11 -1000 From: "J. Charles Delbeek" Subject: Gidday Mate ! (fwd) This message is [forwarded] from... Bundaberg, Australia. J. Charles Delbeek M.Sc. Aquarium Biologist Waikiki Aquarium ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 3 Mar 1998 20:46:37 -1000 From: Jack Hayes > The coral reef here is a bloody disaster. What isn't dead is bleached so white from loss of algae that I think much of it will starve before it comes good. The sea temp reached 33 c at 15 meters depth at four mile reef last month. We are getting Southeasters now bringing in cooler water but it is still very hot. This is unprecedented. No one can remember anything like this happening before. Dead and rooting sarcophytons litter the spaces between the hard coral beds. The Dendro's in the river mouth have survived but the inshore reef ones have all disappeared. There is a great increase in coral trout numbers for some reason but they have decimated the juvenile fish population. The spear fishermen are the only ones to benefit. I expect that it will be well into winter before the coral is back to anything like it was. The bleaching is all over the barrier reef I believe. My tank did get a bit hot causing the death of a leathery sarco and all bar one of my Dendros has died of starvation. However it still looks a picture and its fundamental biology seems to be working very well. I have a pure white very short polyp goniopora in there now and its beautiful. It looks like a miniature snow covered mountain range.