The Great Barrier Reef

The Great Barrier Reef is one of the most beautiful features on the planet. It is a 1,400-mile network of reefs off the coast of Australia. The reef is so immense, you can actually see this structure from space. Corals have been around for 500 million years. The Great Barrier Reef is relatively young at only about 500,000 years old with the newest formations being only 8,000 years old.

Recently, there has been talk about the reef dying. But this is nothing more than a hoax. The Great Barrier Reef is still very much alive, although it still in a great deal of stress. What's to blame for this stress? Prolonged elevated oceanic temperatures which can lead to bleaching of the corals. Bleaching occurs when prolonged high temperatures cause coral to expel their symbiotic algae (this alga actually lives inside of the coral's tissue developing a mutualistic relationship) turning them into snow-white skeletons. Corals can recover from this over time but some simply die. Divers on the Great Barrier Reef have spotted large areas with degraded coral, with some divers reporting the smell of rotting coral when they emerge from the water.

The Great Barrier Reef is very much alive and scientists are predicting they will be until the year 2050. This hoax brought attention to a scientific marvel. Hopefully, in the near future, we can reverse the effects of coral bleaching and bring the dying parts back to full vitality. The pictures below depict just a small fragment of the impressively large scale beauty of what is.. the Great Barrier Reef. 

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