NOAA Coral Reef Watch releases coral bleaching warnings for Mar 09

NOAA's Coral Reef Watch has released projections for the next few months, painting a very bleak picture of widespread coral bleaching all over many of the important areas for fish aggregation and spawning. They also affect many popular dive areas as well.

http://coralreefwatch.noaa.gov/satellite/b...mar_weekly.html

Thanks for the update Drew, we have been watching the reefs very carefully and have seen no effect yet, fingers crossed that the reefs in the Pacific do not suffer too much. We are constantly monitoring temp down here.

Sadly, the way the forecast models are shaping up it looks like we are in for a really hot summer in Queensland.

In addition to the experimental NOAA bleaching forecast system there is also an Australian Bureau of Meteorology forecast system called POAMA; links for each of these systems can be found here: http://www.gbrmpa.gov.au/corp_site/key_iss...ching_forecasts

For those that are interested or in the neighbourhood you can find a whole bunch of resources on coral bleaching here: http://www.gbrmpa.gov.au/corp_site/key_issues/climate_change

The 2008 - 09 current conditions reports for the GBR can be found here: http://www.gbrmpa.gov.au/corp_site/key_iss..._status_2008-09

A rain dance is clearly in order........ Bring on the monsoon.....

Roger