-: Good evening and welcome.
We're pleased to have you join us
for our annual Seaside Chat Speaker Series
about ocean topics associated
with Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary,
and the Gulf of Mexico.
This year, we were also part
of the National Marine Sanctuaries Webinar Series,
hosted by NOAA's Office of National Marine Sanctuaries
and we're part of the one NOAA Science Seminar Series.
During the presentation,
all attendees will be in listen-only mode.
You are welcome to type questions for the presenter
into the question box in the bottom of the control panel
on the right-hand side of your screen.
This is the same area you can let us know
about any technical issues you may be having.
We will be monitoring incoming questions
and technical issues,
and we'll respond to them as soon as we can.
We are recording this session
and we'll post the recording
to the National Marine Sanctuaries
and Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary websites.
We will notify registered participants via email
when these recordings are made available.
My name is Kelly Drinnen, I'm an outreach specialist
with Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary,
and I'll be facilitating today's webinar
from Dickinson, Texas.
Leslie Whaylen Clift, our constituency affairs coordinator
is also joining us from Galveston, Texas.
Leslie will be helping me
with the backend administration of this webinar.
NOAA manages a system of marine protected areas
called National Marine Sanctuaries
that are found throughout the coastal US.
National Marine Sanctuaries are special ocean areas
set aside by Congress to better understand
and protect for future generations.
They're like national parks and national forests,
yet underwater.
the National Marine Sanctuary System
consists of 15 Marine protected areas
that encompass more than 600,000 square miles
of marine and Great Lakes waters
from Washington state to the Florida Keys
and from Lake Huron to American Samoa.
The system includes 14 National Marine Sanctuaries
and the Papahanaumokuakea
and Rose Atoll Marine National Monuments.
The NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries
is mandated to conduct research, monitoring,
resource protection, education, outreach,
and of course, management of America's underwater treasures
to preserve them for future generations.
Reasons for designation
can include special conservation value,
recreation value, cultural, heritage,
archeological, historical, and aesthetic qualities
in our oceans of the United States and its territories.
National Marine Centers are also living classrooms
where people can see, touch and learn
about the nation's Great Lakes and ocean treasures.
Today's Seaside Chat Series is hosted
by Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary,
the only National Marine Sanctuary in the Gulf of Mexico.
This sanctuary consists of three banks
or small underwater mountains that are home
to some of the healthiest coral reefs in the world,
an amazing algal sponge community
and deep reef habitats
featuring an abundance of black coral.
In January of this year,
the sanctuary also published a final rule for expansion,
which will add portions of another 14 reefs and banks
to the sanctuary.
Today's presentation is about
Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary,
over 700 miles to the East
of Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary.
Over the last 40 years, coral reefs in the Florida Keys,
like many reefs worldwide, have suffered dramatic declines.
Nearly 90% of the live corals that once dominated the reefs
have been lost.
An emergency action is required
to change the trajectory
of the health of the coral reefs in the Keys.
NOAA and its partners have developed an ambitious approach
to restore corals
at seven each ecologically significant sites
in the Florida Keys.
Today, we welcome Sarah Fangman, Sanctuary Superintendent
of Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary
to describe the Mission: Iconic Reefs Initiatives,
and talk about the exciting advancements
in restoration science
and practice that support the mission.
As superintendent of Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary,
Sarah Fangman is responsible for leadership,
vision and strategic direction,
overseeing a staff of more than 35 employees and affiliates.
Fangman came to the Florida Keys in 2017,
with 19 years of experience
working for the National Marine Sanctuary System--
most recently, as superintendent
of Gray's Reef National Marine Sanctuary from 2014 to 2017.
She was the program coordinator
of the Southeast Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean region
from 2005 to 2014,
and served as the research coordinator
for Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary
from 1998 to 2005.
Through her work with the National Marine Sanctuary System,
Fangman has conducted more than 600 scuba dives
in the Florida Keys,
obtained a US Coast Guard, 100-ton masters captain's license
and became a certified submersible pilot.
Fangman first came to NOAA in 1996
as a presidential management fellow,
where she was the special assistant
to the deputy director
of the Northwest Fishery Science Center.
She holds a master's degree in Marine affairs
from the University of Washington.
At this time, I'd like to welcome Sarah Fangman
and hand over the screen control.
Welcome, Sarah.
There you go, okay.
(laughing)
-: I've done this before, I swear.
(laughing)
Good evening everyone.
Thank you, I appreciate it.
And you're seeing my slides, yes.
I think so.
Okay.
So I first wanna thank everyone for tuning in this evening.
I know that there are plenty of things
you could be doing with your evening,
and I am very grateful
that you chose to come and join us and listen to this talk
about the Florida Keys and the work that we're doing
to try to help protect this special place.
And I'm going to talk about an ambitious plan
that we have developed here in the Florida Keys.
But before I start with that,
I just want to tell you a little bit about myself.
My first experience with a coral reef
actually occurred when I was quite young,
and I certainly didn't expect
to have a magical experience like this.
I grew up about as far from a coral reef
as you possibly can in the continental United States.
I grew up in Minnesota.
And if you are fortunate and you live in Minnesota,
in the winter time, you escape.
And so one winter in the late 1970s,
my family escaped to Grand Cayman.
And as you can see from this photograph,
I strapped a mask on my face, stuck a snorkel in my mouth
and was in that water for the entire vacation.
And not surprisingly, became absolutely mesmerized
by the magical world that I had the opportunity to explore.
So I can assure you that back then,
had anyone suggested to me
that I would make a career one day
and one day be the superintendent
of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary,
I would never have believed it.
But I am very, very glad that I have ended up where I am.
So tonight I wanna talk about three things.
I wanna just touch on call decline in the Keys,
because that's really obviously the important background
for why we need to do restoration.
I'm gonna talk about this mission
we're referring to as Mission: Iconic Reefs.
And then I'm also gonna talk about
another important initiative we're working on down here
called that we refer to as our Restoration Blueprint.
So it will come as no surprise to anyone in this audience
that coral reefs and Kelly said it,
coral reefs in Florida have been declining for decades.
And there are a number of reasons for this.
Temperature stress, water quality issues,
major storm events, fisheries, overfishing,
lots of causes for those declines.
And they have been happening, like I said for decades.
This is true of a lot of reefs around the world.
Fortunately, the Flower Garden Banks
National Marine Sanctuary
is still in a really great condition by comparison,
but here in Florida, we've really seen significant decreases
in our reef system.
Unfortunately, in the last about six years,
on top of all those other struggles
that our corals have faced, we have been experiencing
an unprecedented disease event here in Florida.
We were first, this as Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease,
and it is unlike any disease event
that has occurred anywhere in the world.
And it is, as you can see from this slide,
affecting a number of different coral species.
And this started in 2014 and has been further decreasing
the corals that we have here.
So I mentioned, this is an unprecedented event.
It's very unique.
Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease is unusual
for a number of reasons.
First of all, as I mentioned,
it started a number of years ago, actually in 2014
off of Miami Key Biscayne area
and it is still affecting our corals.
That's highly unusual to have a disease event
that lasts that long.
Typically, disease events might flare up
and then within a relatively short period of time,
they dissipate.
This disease event has persisted since 2014.
It's also unique because of the number of species
that are affected by this disease event.
Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
affects about half of the stony corals
on the Florida reef tract.
Once affected, it can run through that coral
very, very quickly, which is also unusual.
More often, disease events when they affect a coral,
they can kind of have a slow burn if you will.
And in a number of species,
unfortunately, if they succumb
to Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease,
it's like a death sentence.
So for some of the species affected,
it is essentially they cannot survive it.
So really significant incident
that we've been dealing with for several years.
And we've been undertaking
a lot of different responses to this disease event,
including things like trying to do interventions,
applying antibiotics on disease corals,
actually rescuing corals and pulling healthy corals
off the reef and holding them in safe keeping
in zoos and aquaria around the country.
In fact, some of the corals
from the Florida reef tract are in Texas.
And so there's lots of things we've been doing
in response to Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.
One of the things that we are also doing
in response to Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
is restoration.
I'm gonna focus the rest of my comments on that.
So fortunately for us, restoration has been taking place
in the Florida Keys for quite some time, over 15 years.
And so there's a tremendous amount of work
that has been done here,
really pioneered in the Florida Keys.
And we stand on the shoulders of that.
I would describe as heroic work.
And so we really have an advantage in that regard.
And I'm going to pause here
because we have a question for you all.
Kelly. -: Yes we do.
And here is that question.
We're trying to post the question.
Here it is.
There we go.
If reef restoration started 15 years ago,
why do we need a new initiative?
Your choices are,
restoration is not keeping up with the decline.
Natural recovery is not fast enough.
The Keys community wanted a solution or all of the above.
Please feel free to vote at this time,
and we will leave the voting open for a while
until we see a good percentage of people participating.
We've got about 70% of the people have voted at this point.
Come on, let's get up to 80, 90%.
Come on, everybody.
What do you think?
Why if reef restoration started 15 years ago,
do we have a new initiative starting now?
Okay, I'm gonna close the poll in about three seconds.
Alrighty, and here are the results.
It looks like most people answered all of the above.
In fact, 92% of our participants
selected all of the above, Sarah.
-: That is fantastic.
What a brilliant audience, because all of the above
is in fact the correct answer.
So as I noted, we have been doing restoration
in the Florida Keys for quite some time,
and it has been really successful at the local level.
So at the small scale.
And as you have gathered, the issues that are raised
are facing here in the Florida Keys are at a large scale.
And so we have been doing really important dedicated work
to try to do restoration in the Florida Keys
for some time now.
However, it's just not keeping up
and it's not at an ecological scale,
a scale that can really contribute ecologically.
The other challenge with restoration
and why we desperately need it here now
is that natural recovery is not fast enough.
If we could magically tonight, eliminate the challenges
that have gotten us here in the first place.
So clean up the water quality, eliminate future hurricanes.
If we could not have any more temperature stress,
no more over-fishing.
If we could do all of that tonight,
natural recovery would not happen fast enough,
given the low levels of corals that we have here
to get back to those services that we really need.
And furthermore, in certain species,
the declines have reached a point
at which natural recovery is not even possible.
And that's because in some cases,
they are broadcast spawners.
So male corals release sperm,
female corals release eggs.
They have to find one another.
And if there are so few corals left
and they're so far apart,
those eggs and sperm cannot find one another
and they can not successfully reproduce.
And so that is the situation we have here.
So natural recovery is not fast enough
and in some cases, it can't even happen.
So we really believe that we cannot afford
to let these declines continue
without taking on a really ambitious program
to turn things around.
We desperately need these resources
because our reefs here in Florida
provide an incredible service
in terms of the coastal protection.
We're very low lying here in the Florida Keys.
And so we need these reefs for protection,
we need them for tourism, we need them for fisheries,
we need them for our community.
And so we absolutely needed to act.
Well of course, reef managers, reef biologists
were not the only people that were looking for a solution.
We heard loud and clear from the community,
recognizing these declines,
recognizing the urgency of the situation,
we had all sorts of people coming to us,
looking for a solution.
Everything from elected officials,
you see the guy in the center,
that's Florida Senator Marco Rubio.
He's very, very concerned
about what's happening in Florida's reefs
and interested in sharing some solutions
that he can try to help support and get behind.
But it also was members of the community
all the way from very young people.
And I wanna explain this photograph
that's on the right side of the slide.
What you're seeing here is a young diver,
about 16 years old, Marcella Munoz.
She was being interviewed for a documentary
about a diving program that she's a part of
here in the Florida Keys called "Dive Into Life."
And as it happens, they were for a place
to do this video or filming, and so we offered our facility.
And so it was a Sunday.
I came in, let them do the filming.
I opened the doors.
So I got to sit there and listen to Marcella be interviewed
about her diving career.
She started diving two years before this video was created.
And I listened to her tell stories.
In the two years that she had been diving
in the Florida Keys, Marcella was describing
seeing the corals decline.
In just two years, this young new diver
could tell stories about decline in our reefs.
I will tell you that as the superintendent
of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary,
that was like a dagger to my heart
to hear a young person tell that story.
But it was also incredibly inspiring.
To me it said, we have got to do better.
We have got to do better so that we can help this ecosystem
turn things around.
So listening to that young person
was really powerful and important to me personally.
Time for another question, Kelly.
Kelly: And here we are poll question number two.
So knowing that the Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
is out there, why start restoration efforts now
while there's this serious
coral disease problem on the reef?
Choices are, we like challenges,
not all corals are affected by the disease
or restoration efforts could cure the disease.
Place your votes now.
Looks like we have about 50% of people have voted so far.
There's two answers that are taking
most of the attention right now, Sarah.
Let's see, we're up to 76%.
This is your chance to vote, folks.
You got about 10 more seconds.
And we're gonna close the poll in three, two, one.
Alrighty.
So Sarah, it looks like most of our folks selected,
not all corals are affected by the disease about 56%.
But 42% also thought
restoration efforts could cure the disease.
And a couple people thought we just like challenges.
(laughing)
-: Well, we do like a challenge,
but I'd rather not have this particular challenge, honestly.
So the correct answer I would say is related to that.
Well, I'll just say that we think that
and it's a question we get all the time.
Why would you consider doing restoration
until you solve the problems that got you here
in the first place?
You cure that disease, you fix water quality issues,
you address temperature stress,
and you eliminate the next hurricane.
A reasonable question.
My answer to that is that we must undertake restoration
despite those challenges, because if we don't,
it will be too late.
If we wait to solve all of those problems,
it may be too late.
And not all the corals on the Florida reef tract
are susceptible to Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.
So those are the corals
we can start our restoration efforts with.
We can start with the coral species
that are not susceptible,
and we can start with the corals of susceptible species
that have been resilient
despite Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.
Furthermore, there are really exciting advances
that are happening
in the science of reef restoration right now.
We're seeing a lot of really encouraging things happen.
This is a relatively new field
and there is a lot going on.
So for example, some of the corals
that have been out planted are beginning to reproduce.
They're spawning on their own.
That's exactly what we want to have happen.
We don't want to be in the business
of forever planting corals on these reefs.
We want to plant them to the point
where they can self sustain.
We don't wanna do this forever
and we're starting to see that happening,
so that's really, really exciting.
We're also, as I noted wanting to make sure
that as we do this, we're using really resilient corals
and we're encouraging a lot of diversity.
And so toward that end, scientists are making sure
that they're using a lot of different genome types.
And so for example, with Acropora cervicornis,
I'm not sure if you can see my icon here,
but on the left side of the slide,
there are some corals with little white tips.
Those are Acropora cervicornis
and those species we're doing exchanges
among restoration practitioners.
So that they're getting a lot of genetic diversity
in the corals that they are growing
so that when we outplant,
they have the best chance
of having a hardy mixture of corals out there.
Some that may be more strong
when it comes to temperature stress,
others that may be more resistant to disease, et cetera.
We need that diversity on our reefs.
We're also doing rescue of wild Acropora palmata.
So the larger again,
I don't know if you can see my mouse moving around,
but there's another coral species on this slide
in the top right.
Those we're collecting little snips
from out in the wild and bringing that back in
and mixing those genotypes
into what we're growing in the nurseries.
And so all of that is to try to make sure
that we've got a really diverse pool.
We're also working with new species
and developing techniques to produce and grow in nurseries,
new species.
Typically, we've been working with the two corals
that I just mentioned, the Acroporas,
but we're starting to develop the tools and techniques
for additional species.
So that's really exciting.
And then lastly, there's a lot of advancement happening
in terms of production and outplanting techniques.
This can be really slow and laborious work.
To take a single cutting from one of these corals
and plant each and every one, glue it to the sea floor
is very time consuming, very labor intensive work.
And so practitioners are developing techniques
that can do this much, much faster.
And so we'll just be able to do a lot more outplanting.
So really important, exciting work.
And so with that context in mind,
we've got a massive disease event going on.
We've got all kinds of problems
that have been happening on our reefs for decades.
We've got a lot of people
interested in seeing something happen
and there's a lot of good advancements that are occurring.
So with that in mind,
we launched the Mission: Iconic Reefs Initiative,
which we felt was long overdue, frankly,
to try to, again, turn things around
here in the Florida Keys.
So now it's time to get into a little bit of the details.
What is Mission: Iconic Reefs?
So you see here on the slide,
the gray blob at the top of the slide
is the bottom of the state of Florida.
And so it's sort of the Everglades and Miami
and then you see the Florida Keys in light gray,
down through the foot.
The seven Iconic Reef sites are the stars on the slide here.
You can see that they represent locations
throughout the entire Keys.
We selected places that were as the name would suggest,
historically iconic, places that people thought of
as really beautiful reefs historically,
places that reefs have thrived,
places where we know that given the chance,
a reef system can be really healthy here.
So these were the seven locations that we identified.
So Mission: Iconic Reefs
is not just about planting more corals
than we've planted before.
It's definitely that and it's more.
So what makes Mission: Iconic Reefs
kind of the next level of restoration in the Florida Keys?
Well, okay.
So what we're looking at here is a map
of one of the seven iconic reef sites.
This is Sombrero Reef.
And it's sort of an aerial image
and the different colors represent
different parts of the reef.
So what we have done is we have gone in
and identified different sub habitats
within each of the seven Iconic Reef sites.
So each color represents a different sub habitat.
So the sort of magenta color that's at the top of that reef
is a shallow reef crest.
That's a specific sub habitat at Sombrero Reef.
And then it works all the way down through the depth
as it gets deeper down to the fore-reef terrace.
Why is it important to distinguish these sub habitats
at each of our seven Iconic Reef sites?
Well, because what was expected to grow there
is not the same thing at every part of that reef.
So each of those colors
represents a different type of habitat,
and therefore a different coral community
that would naturally grow at that spot.
And so what we wanted to do is really calculate
how much area of a given Iconic Reef site
is these different habitat types.
So what percent or what amount of area
is shallow reef crest?
What amount of area is reef crest,
the spur and groove and fore-reef?
Once we calculate that, then we can determine,
under normal conditions,
we would see a different community of corals
living in the fore-reef
as compared to the shallow reef crest.
And so then we can do math and calculate,
okay, what do we wanna outplant there,
how much is it gonna take,
so how much do we need to put in our nursery?
So very intensive planning process
went into preparing for this mission.
And so we've got these targets,
different species assemblages, different parts of that reef,
so that we can determine what we need to outplant.
And again, as I mentioned,
not just about planting more corals,
although that's part of it.
Much of what makes Mission: Iconic Reefs unusual
is that we are also going to do
a lot more stewardship at these sites.
So let me explain what I mean by that.
So because our coal reefs have declined
to the point where there's only 2% coral cover,
meaning only 2% of available habitat is corals.
A lot of other species of course take advantage of that.
And so they move right in.
So for our corals to come back and thrive,
we need to make space for them.
So we've got to go out and remove some of the things
that have overtaken the habitat
that the corals would live on.
So that's part of what we need to do.
We need to go out and get this place ready.
Then we add all the new corals as I noted,
different assemblages,
depending where you are on a given reef, but that's not it.
Turns out that corals are not the only thing
that are out of balance on our reefs.
Also declining in recent years,
well, in recent decades I should say, are grazers.
So some of the species that are neighbors to our corals
that provide a service to those corals,
they provide a grazing service
to keep the algae from overgrowing the corals,
or from overgrowing all the habitat.
So urchins, for example, and crabs,
they will be a part of Mission: Iconic Reefs.
They will be part of what we outplant onto this reef
so that we can make sure that those corals
have the friendly neighbors that they need to survive.
We will also be doing much more attentive stewardship
and maintenance, monitoring, and then adapting.
Imagine you plant a garden in the spring
in your backyard
and you just put those plants in the ground
and you leave them and you never do anything else.
Well, that garden may do okay,
but it would probably do better
if you go out there regularly and perhaps pull some weeds,
maybe remove some invasive species,
give it a little extra water here and there,
fertilize, whatever.
Same general concept with Mission: Iconic Reefs,
we plan to continue to go out
and tend the garden of corals that we have planted
and make sure that we are adjusting
and adapting accordingly as we learn.
So ambition.
I've mentioned that repeatedly.
Our coral cover as Kelly mentioned in the beginning
has declined dramatically.
We are probably at about 2% coral cover
at these Mission: Iconic Reef sites.
That's really low folks.
That's really low. When we launched
this Mission: Iconic Reefs in December of 2019,
that was our estimate.
So what you see on the far right side of this slide
is our goal and that's 25% coral cover.
We believe that if we can achieve that,
these corals will be able to be self-sustaining.
And not only that, they can spill over
and seed areas outside the Mission: Iconic Reef sites.
Because again, we don't wanna be in the business
of planting coral forever.
We want that coral to self-sustain.
And so our goal will be to get it up to 25%
and you can see we've kind of mapped out different phases
that will get us there,
starting with the coral species
that we already have in production. The Acroporids
that are not susceptible to Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.
That's our immediate really intensive push with those.
And then with time, we add more species,
we add the grazers and ultimately hopefully,
and you can see the timeline on this slide
this is about 2035 is our target.
We could speed that up as advances come into the picture,
as more techniques are developed to do things faster.
It could speed up.
It could slow down if we get hit
by another hurricane at a certain spot.
So that is our estimate and our hope.
So this is, I think you'll understand
although some of the statistics on this slide
may hit at home, a very ambitious effort.
But we don't wanna just restore these sites
and sort of tell everyone,
"Okay, off limits.
"Can't go there."
This is not meant to be a museum
or a place people can't visit.
We want people to come, see these places,
enjoy these places, and help support these efforts.
And as you can see, this is a lot of work.
three million square feet of restoration,
which represents since that's probably hard to picture.
It's hard for me to picture.
15 times more restoration than we are doing today.
And as I mentioned, we also did some calculations.
How many corals will this be?
Well, probably about a half a million new corals,
so a lot of work.
We've raised significant funds
to support this effort already.
Those just represent NOAA funds
and National Marine Sanctuary Foundation,
our nonprofit partner.
Other partners in this are also raising funds.
So I'm really encouraged and hopeful
that we are going to have some important success here.
So I'm going to pause for another poll.
I think this is our last one.
Kelly: Yes it is.
Here's the last question for you all.
Mission: Iconic Reefs is similar
to other restoration efforts, except in the scale.
Is this true or false?
Place your answers now.
Sounds like we're at the races.
And it's kind of neck and neck right now
between the two responses.
We've got 65% having voted at this point.
Moving along.
There's somebody sneaking out in the lead,
but I won't give it away just yet.
Got about 15 seconds left to vote.
Do you think Mission: Iconic Reefs
is similar to other restoration efforts
except for the scale?
Yes or no?
True or false?
Okay, we're gonna close the poll and here are the results.
59% say true.
It is similar except in scale
and 41% say false.
-: Interesting, interesting.
Well, it's a tricky question
because it is definitely, definitely different
from any previous restoration efforts in scale,
but it also is beyond previous restoration efforts
because we are doing things like outplanting crabs,
Diadema, doing a lot more prep work, monitoring, et cetera.
So it is like other efforts, only a lot bigger
and we're building on the work
and the advances of other projects.
So speaking of work of others,
I must acknowledge that this plan is being supported
by a lot of amazing partners.
And so you see on the slide here-
Kelly: I not sure they can see your slide.
I'm still seeing the poll at my end
and I've closed the polls,
so I'm not sure why it's still sitting there.
Can you look at your audience?
-: I'm not sure either.
Kelly: Can you look at your audience view
or are you showing that your screen is showing?
-: Nope, I'm seeing the poll also.
I don't have any control over that, unfortunately.
So I'll keep talking while you're figuring that out,
because I can describe the partners
that are key in this effort.
It is NOAA of course launched it,
but the work of the Coral Restoration Foundation,
Mote Marine Lab has been really critical.
Those are the organizations
that have been pioneering restoration here.
We're also working with the State of Florida.
I mentioned earlier
the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation.
We're also working with an organization called Reef Renewal.
The University of Florida has been involved
Florida Aquarium, The Nature Conservancy.
So these are some of the key originating partners in this,
but as this mission has continued,
we have seen more and more people coming to support it.
And Kelly, I still see just the poll,
so I'm not quite sure what to...
I'm gonna keep going. -: Yes, please.
I'm not sure what's going on either.
-: Okay.
So again, our intent here is to try to turn things around
at these seven sites in the Florida Keys.
And unfortunately right now, some of these sites
are kind of known as the poster children for reef decline.
Cariesfort Reef, for example,
is often used as the before beautiful coral reef.
After, not so great.
And so our hope is that we can take action
and these sites, these iconic sites
can once again be some of the most beautiful places.
And people like Marcella
who are starting their diving career
under these circumstances can, when they're my age,
when she's my age, she can tell the story
and bear witness to these things turning around.
She can describe how these reefs were once again,
restored and healthy, thriving, and resilient.
That is my hope.
Now, I'm still seeing the poll Kelly,
but I'm gonna keep on keeping on,
unless you tell me otherwise.
Kelly: I'm gonna pull the presentation from you to me,
and then give it back to you and see if that solves it.
-: Sure.
Well, I'll keep talking while you're doing that though.
And so I don't wanna leave people with the notion
that all we plan to do here in the Florida Keys
to address the problems
that we're dealing with are outplanting.
We're just, there we go.
Yay, it's working.
Thank you.
We recognize that and I don't want people to think
we're just gonna engineer our way out of this problem.
That is not our intention.
We still need to pay serious attention
to the issues that got us here.
The really serious challenges like climate change,
water quality issues.
Those have to continue to be addressed
and we can do things locally
that can help protect these precious reefs.
The ones that are left need extra special attention.
And so we believe that is important
to not only do these ambitious restoration activities,
but also support local activities
that can protect these reefs.
So like the photographs you're seeing here,
we have a mooring buoy system here in the Florida Keys
that keeps 500 of these out in the sanctuary.
Imagine if for the last 30 years,
we did not have those mooring buoys there
and people were dropping their anchors
at all of those locations,
what that would have done to the reefs.
So we can continue to maintain
and encourage people to use that system.
We can continue to educate snorkelers, divers, fishermen
on sustainable activities that they can do
so they can enjoy these resources,
but not contribute to their declines.
Boater education, really important.
It's really hard to navigate around here
because these waters are really challenging.
And so we've got a boater education class,
we've got outreach activities,
Marine debris cleanup.
All of these things are things that we can do locally
that can help these corals that are out there
have less stress.
Less stress means better corals.
And so with that in mind, the sanctuary launched
a comprehensive management plan review
to look at all of the things that we are doing,
what do we need to do differently
to continue to try to take steps to protect these resources
much like Kelly mentioned at the beginning
that Flower Garden Banks has undertaken a process
to do something similar in the Gulf of Mexico
and huge congratulations to you all
for achieving expansion and more protections
in the Gulf of Mexico.
That's just fantastic.
We have been trying to do something similar,
which is to look at how we're managing the Florida Keys.
And we refer to this as our Restoration Blueprint.
I'm not gonna talk about this in great detail,
but I did just wanna mention it
because the last thing I'd want you to think
is that the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary
is just trying to rebuild the reef and do nothing else.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
We are also trying to examine all of the things that we do
in management of the sanctuary.
Do we need to change the boundary of the sanctuary
to add protection?
Do we need to change the regulations
that apply within the entire sanctuary
to add protections?
We have a very extensive system of zones
here in the Florida Keys.
Do we need to add new zones?
Do we need to change the regulations in those zones?
So that has been an ongoing process.
Got a lot of public input on that.
We're gonna be releasing the draft rule
in the summer, this coming summer,
looking for more public input.
I wanna just mention a couple of things that we anticipate
within the draft rule
in keeping with this notion of resiliency and restoration.
We, as I mentioned, we still have corals out there
that despite everything are managing to thrive and survive.
So we need to make sure
we're protecting those special places within the sanctuary.
And so we have proposed new sanctuary preservation areas,
this type of zone we have in the Keys
to protect some of these really healthy
and resilient reef spaces.
And we are proposing adding some new, relatively small zones
to support the restoration efforts
that I've been talking about.
So these would be special zones
where restoration nursery activities can take place.
So practitioners can have a protected area
where they can grow up the corals
that can eventually be outplanted onto the reef.
So in addition to our ambitious plan
with Mission: Iconic Reefs,
we are also undertaking a lot of different activities
to try to help give these reefs
the best chance that they can
to have a brighter better future.
And with that, I am finished, Kelly
and happy to take any questions.
Kelly: Thank you.
It looks like we have about 15 minutes
for questions and answers.
Folks, if you haven't already,
please put your questions into the question box
in the control panel.
And if you wanna see it bigger, so you can type better.
If you click a little box with an arrow in it
up in the gray bar of the question box,
it'll open it up and make it bigger on your screen.
We will go ahead
and start reading some questions out to Sarah
and if you, you can continue to put questions in
and we will monitor from there.
Depending on the number of questions that we have,
when we run out of time,
we may attempt to get them answered after the webinar ends
and then email out the responses.
But we'll have to see what kind of quantity of questions
we're looking at.
We've also provided some links throughout this process
in the chat box and in response to questions
that have already been asked.
So some of this information can be found
at those great links from the Florida Keys website.
There's stuff about the Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
and the Florida Keys coral restoration efforts,
the Mission: Iconic Reefs.
So we've put some web links out there for you already.
Okay.
So starting with the first question, Sarah,
how do you know your efforts aren't helping
at an ecological level?
-: Great question.
That's a great question.
So with regard to the restoration activities,
we anticipate, and in fact,
it's funny because today we were having a conversation
about this very thing,
because we've established 12 to 18-month goals
for this mission and we're having a discussion
about how challenging it can be to measure success.
And so I didn't go into this in great detail,
but one of the things about Mission: Iconic Reefs
that I think is a step forward
as compared to the restoration efforts
that have happened to date
is we intend to do a lot more monitoring.
Typically, practitioners have just not had the capacity
to do really extensive monitoring of these outplants.
So they might do it every six months at first,
and then the next year.
But what we intend to do is really intensive monitoring
so that we can go back out there and ascertain,
are these coral surviving and how many are surviving?
And then what kind of community impacts are you seeing?
In other words, are the fish returning?
What else is happening?
Because we know that these corals
provide a service themselves.
I talked about the services
that some of their neighbors provide in terms of grazing,
but the corals provide habitat.
So will we see a change in the community?
Are other fish coming back?
Are there more fish?
So we're gonna be doing a lot of monitoring
so that we can measure that.
And right now, this process being at the very beginning,
we've got a team that is establishing,
what is that monitoring strategy gonna look like?
How are we gonna do it?
What are we gonna measure
so that we can answer those types of questions?
'Cause I'm telling you,
the amount of effort that's getting invested in this,
we absolutely need to be able to be accountable.
We need to be able to speak to the benefits
that we're having, the effects that we're having,
and then adapt.
I also quickly mentioned adaptive management.
We want to learn from what we're seeing.
If we're not seeing the kind of success that we expect,
or we're seeing a lot of mortality at a certain site,
we need to be able to answer the question
of why is that happening
and what do we need to do differently?
I hope that answers the question.
Kelly: Alrighty, next question.
Will you address the need for people in farms
to stop using pesticides and the overuse of nitrogen
that is draining into rivers, lakes and oceans?
-: Thank you.
And that speaks to what we call enabling conditions.
That is part of what got us to this place
in the first place.
Water quality issues here in the Florida Keys
are really significant
and we've done a lot here in the Florida Keys
to address both local sources of water quality problems.
Early on, a lot of the Florida Keys was on a septic system
and a lot of money was invested
to get a sewage system in this entire community,
which was a huge investment, a lot of commitment
and a reflection of an understanding
that that was affecting our reef system.
So there's a lot of good work that's been done.
That said, we are at the end of a lot of water flow
that comes through South Florida.
And there's a lot of work that needs to be done
to clean that up, to make sure that we have
adequate amount of water flowing through the Everglades
that it's timed, so that it's the right quantity,
the right timing and good quality.
And so there's a lot of work being done on that
and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary,
and our partners with these other organizations,
the State of Florida,
we're all really trying to make progress on that,
recognizing that we will have to continue
to be in the business of doing restoration
until we can create a system
where it's healthy enough
so that these corals can thrive on their own.
So again, really important.
Thank you for the question, because it's really important
that we not just focus
on restoration restoration restoration.
We've got to address these other chronic problems
that are causing the system to decline in the first place.
Kelly: Great, next question.
Are you planning to use artificial reefs
to increase coral reef area?
(laughing)
-: Well, that is quite a controversial question.
So some of you in the audience
may know that here in the Florida Keys,
we have a lot of artificial reefs.
We have a lot of shipwrecks that occurred by accident.
These, as I mentioned are treacherous waters.
There's been a long seafaring history here in the Keys
and so we have a lot of shipwrecks
that occurred naturally.
And there are a number of intentionally sunk vessels
in the Florida Keys.
Some that are quite large
and some of you may have heard of,
the Spiegel Grove, the Vandenberg,
they're very, very large vessels that were sunk
to provide fishing and diving opportunities.
My preference, our preference is to create natural habitats.
I recognize that there are benefits to diving opportunities
and fishing opportunities
by adding that kind of feature in the sanctuary.
However, it is not a naturally regenerating thing.
So you put a shipwreck down
and that shipwreck is just gonna be the shipwreck.
It's not gonna seed anything around it.
So the benefits will not be expanded.
Whereas if you focus your attention and energies
on natural restoration,
that can have long-term and expanding benefits,
and that's what we really wanna see more of.
So there are always people that are coming to us
wanting to propose new artificial reef habitats
in the Florida Keys.
And our job is to look at those and consider them,
but I will tell you that our focus
is on natural reef restoration.
Kelly: Thank you.
I'm gonna kind of cluster a couple others together
that all have to do with building more resilient corals.
So have you characterized particular distinctions
in the resilient corals versus the susceptible ones?
Does this involve genetic modification
or traditional plant hybridization techniques?
And if there are, is genetic modification,
will you be putting GMOs on the reef?
-: So great question.
We are so fortunate to have incredible partners
in this initiative.
Specifically Mote Marine Lab,
which has a facility here in the Keys
has done incredible research on genetics
and has tested different coral genotypes
in terms of their capacity to resist temperature stress,
their capacity to resist disease and other stresses.
The mother load would be to find basically,
an uber hardy coral
that is both resistant to diseases and temperature stress.
I'm not sure that we're there yet,
but they're definitely conducting
important scientific research
to understand which coral genotypes
have what kind of resistance and using that
to potentially explore, are there certain genotypes
that are gonna be able to withstand, perhaps both.
Now that said, it's so important that we have diversity
because we may find the uber resistant coral
that can handle current conditions, current stresses,
current disease outbreaks,
and then there's some next Coronavirus-type thing
that hits the reef tract.
So there's gotta be diversity.
We can't just, we have to be really careful
about the outplanting.
And that's why I mentioned quickly
that the practitioners are doing
a lot of exchanges among themselves.
So they wanna make sure that we don't have monoculture here.
So I hope I answered that question.
Kelly, was there more to it?
I feel like I didn't quite get
all of the aspects of the question.
I know there's other, sorry,
let me just quickly acknowledge
that there's other institutions in addition to Mote
that are doing research and including the Florida Aquarium.
So there's really great research
and that's really, really important consideration.
And we're also making sure that when one organization say
Coral Restoration Foundation takes a segment
of Sombrero Reef for example, to outplant,
making sure that we're intermingling different genotypes
around and we're being very, very thoughtful and careful
about where we're placing the corals,
making sure we're intermingling them, if that makes sense.
Kelly: I think that covers it.
Can you comment on ocean warming
and acidification effects on this project?
-: Yep, and I'll be frank,
we received criticism for launching this mission
because of those issues.
And there are people out there, very respected scientists
and who I think have a lot of experience
and should be listened to,
who are concerned that doing this kind of work
in the midst of continued temperature stress,
ocean chemistry changes, increasing intensity
and frequency of storms is a fool's errand.
And that we should not be doing this kind of work
under those circumstances.
And you heard me say before,
I don't believe we have the luxury of waiting.
I think we have to do both.
I think we have to take on those challenges.
We've got to address temperature stress.
We've got to address continued water quality issues here
and we have to give this system a chance.
We've got to help this system along
while we're fixing those things.
I wish we could only focus on one problem
and solve them sequentially.
That would be just delightful,
but it's not our reality in my opinion.
I think we have to take it on simultaneously.
Kelly: Fair enough.
Are the seven sites all-
-: 'Cause we like a challenge.
(laughing)
Kelly: I'm gonna preface this.
This will be the last question for right now with a caveat.
We've told people this is an hour program,
so we will wrap it up
and I have to go through some closing things
for everybody's benefit, but then Sarah had said
she would be willing to stay on
and answer a few more questions after.
So once I finish the wrap up after this question,
if you are interested in staying on,
we will give Sarah maybe another 10, 15 minutes
that she can continue to answer questions
for anyone who wishes to stay.
But we wanna honor the fact that we advertised this
as a one-hour program.
So this question, Sarah will be the last one
before I wrap things up, and then we can go onto overtime
if people are willing.
This question, are the seven sites
all impacted by the disease,
or are there any control sites in the sanctuary
that aren't impacted yet?
-: Great question.
The seven sites are all in areas
that the disease is occurring.
In Florida, the only place
that Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
has not yet been confirmed.
Now, I will caveat that.
COVID has decreased the amount of diving that's happening,
but we have not confirmed that Stony Coral Tissue Loss
has reached the Tortugas.
And we're really hoping that that remains the case.
Sadly however, Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
is now not just in Florida.
So I'm showing a slide here
that shows you where in the wider Caribbean
that we are seeing now, Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.
And so you can see on the table,
there's different years.
It started in Florida in 2014, and you can see in 2018,
there was the first sighting
outside of the state of Florida
and over the last three years,
there has been continued increase
in occurrence of Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease
throughout the Caribbean.
So very, very concerning.
I'm hoping that the Tortugas can hold out.
Only place in Florida that we know of
that may still be disease free, but as you can see,
it's now not just in Florida, unfortunately.
Thank you for your question.
-: Thank you, Sarah.
So as I said, we're gonna wrap things up here
and then if you want to stay on,
Sarah said she'd stay on for a little while
and answer a few more questions.
So at this time, thank you for attending
the Seaside Chats presentation
on Mission: Iconic Reefs.
I guess I should show my screen at this point.
There we go.
Is it up there yet?
There we go.
This is the first in a series of four presentations
that we're offering this month
and we invite you to register for the next three chats
by visiting us on the web at flowergarden.noaa.gov
and Leslie will be putting that address
back down into the chat box for you as well.
So you don't necessarily
have to copy it off the slide right here.
We promise, all of our topics
will be just as engaging and informative.
So next week we invite you for Manta Rays:
The Mysterious Giants in Our Backyard,
followed by how our Gulf coast reefs are weathering storms,
and last but not least, Remarkable Algae.
It's turning out to be a really key part
of all these really cool, deep reef areas
that we've explored in the Flower Gardens
and in the new expansion area.
So that should be really interesting on February 24th.
If you have any questions about the Seaside Chats,
or this presentation,
we welcome your feedback and questions.
You can submit your input
by replying to the follow-up email you'll receive
or by emailing us directly at flowergarden@noaa.gov.
Today's presentation has also been part
of the National Marine Sanctuaries Webinar Series.
And while Seaside Chats last just one month,
our National Marine Webinar Series
continues throughout the entire year
to provide educators with educational
and scientific expertise, resources, and training
to support ocean and climate literacy in the classroom.
So we know there's a bunch of you educators out there.
Be sure to check the website for recordings of past webinars
and a schedule of what's to come.
As a reminder, we will also share this recording
on the National Marine Sanctuaries website
and on the Flower Garden Banks
National Marine Sanctuary website.
Following this webinar,
all attendees will receive a PDF copy
of a certificate of attendance
that provides documentation
for one hour professional development
for today's presentation.
For those of you who are educators or otherwise,
just proof of participation.
There will be a short evaluation
that asks questions for you to answer,
following today's presentation.
Please complete this survey
immediately after signing off the webinar
and we think it'll take you about three minutes to do so.
We greatly appreciate all of your feedback,
anything you were willing to share with us
about this experience.
Now, we also wanna point out
that we have two handouts available
for the educators participating today.
Of course, anyone is welcome to look,
but these are two lesson plans.
One is from Florida Keys and focuses on reef restoration.
And the other is from the Flower Garden Banks
and focuses on reef monitoring.
And hopefully, both of these will be things
to help you teach about these topics in your classroom.
Thanks again to Sarah Fangman for a great presentation
about Mission: Iconic Reefs
and the comprehensive restoration activities
taking place in the Florida Keys.
Thanks to all of you for taking the time to join us,
and this concludes the main portion of our webinar.
At this time, if you would like to stick with us,
we welcome you to do so,
and we will run a few more questions by Sarah.
Sarah, if you'd like to come back on camera,
I think our audience would like to see you answering.
Thank you.
And let's see.
Where did we leave off with the question?
There's so many questions here, Sarah.
It's just unbelievable.
We've tried to filter through them
and manage as many as we can.
Let's see.
Question a couple times from different people
about how invasive species
might be affecting things in this plan.
-: Great question.
So we have one of the most well-known invasive species
that we have here in the Florida Keys
is of course the lionfish
and I love that photograph of you Kelly with a lionfish.
And so part of our strategy
is the stewardship portion of Mission: Iconic Reefs
will include removing invasive species
at these iconic reef sites in a more intensive effort
than perhaps we have the luxury of doing normally.
We also see there's some corallivores
that eat some of these coral species.
So we'll probably be removing those.
They're not invasive, but they can be very voracious
on these young corals,
and prevent them potentially from thriving.
So we'll be making sure
that they're not just taking out the outplants that we put.
We believe part of the reason why we see those snails
being successful at consuming what we're outplanting
is the amount of coral food, if you will,
that's out there for them is so low
that they just sort of all hop on what's available.
And so as we see these corals start to come back
and the coral cover return to closer to normal levels,
the hope would be that the balance
would once again be restored.
But right now they kind of outnumber the coral,
and so practitioners outplant coral
and it can just be like a buffet.
And so we've got to do a little bit of that
to make sure that.
So it's a little bit of we'll getting in there
and kind of messing with the system a little bit,
but I think it is something we need to do
to let that system return
to some sort of normal equilibrium, if you will.
So invasive species removal is absolutely gonna be
a part of, and nuisance species.
So not necessarily invasive, but species that are providing
are kind of out of balance, nuisance,
will also be a part of our monitoring
and stewardship strategy.
Kelly: Well, we've had at least two people
ask this question that I've found so far.
Since the Flower Gardens
is known for massive amounts of coral reproduction,
is there any chance that Flower Garden Banks corals
could be used to help the Florida Keys?
-: That's a really good question too.
And at this point, we are not exploring
that kind of quite that drastic of a step.
It's definitely something that people have considered.
Can we move corals around at that scale?
I mean, I think you said it was 700 miles away.
Is that what you said, Kelly?
I can't remember what the distance is.
But at this time, we're being more careful.
Go ahead. -: I think it was 790.
-: Okay, a long way away.
And so at this point, we're pretty much sticking with,
if we're doing any movement of corals,
we're staying here in the Keys
and in fact, in some cases, even more constraints than that.
So at this time we're not considering
something quite that drastic.
Hopefully we won't need to.
Hopefully we'll be able to work with what we have here.
But it's an interesting question.
Kelly: Okay, how about
well, this one goes into a different angle.
Did we learn any lessons
from ship grounding site restoration projects?
-: Also a really, really good question.
Yes, thank you for asking that.
The Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary,
the restoration work that we have primarily
gotten involved in, much of what I've been talking about
has been done by practitioner partners,
not necessarily by the sanctuary ourself.
The restoration work
that the sanctuary has been more involved in
has been in response to an incident.
So a large vessel grounding, for example.
And absolutely, we have learned a lot of lessons
about a lot of different aspects about restoration.
Some of that because that's a mechanical insult,
if you will.
So something came and just broke the reef into bits.
Some of what we did
was just put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
So figuring out ways to successfully
glue that reef back together so that it could survive
and then learning things like,
how long can a coral be overturned
with the live tissue in the sand
and still be put back together and survive.
So a lot of the sanctuary's restoration experience
is in response to that kind of incident
where big vessels have hit the reef.
Fortunately, that hasn't happened lately.
(indistinct)
(laughing)
Kelly: All right, I'm scrolling through here
and trying to find, go back to one that I saw before.
Will the comprehensive management plan
also incorporate a comprehensive education
and communications plan to the general public.
-: Absolutely, that is such an important part.
In fact, during the public comment period
from the first version of the Restoration Blueprint,
which we released in August of 2019,
we had extensive public comment and we heard loud and clear
from the community in the Florida Keys
that they believed that in addition to water quality,
water quality was probably number one,
but close behind that was education and outreach.
We have millions of people that come to the Florida Keys
to enjoy these amazing resources.
It's spectacular here.
And I know I've described a lot of decline in our reefs
but it's still really beautiful
and there's a lot of amazing resources here to enjoy.
And so people recognize that we've got to make sure
that these people that come here to visit and enjoy,
and frankly, the locals too,
we need to make sure people understand
how we can enjoy these resources sustainably.
How we can go out and enjoy diving,
fishing, sailing, boating,
and do it in a way that has the least possible
potential negative impact.
And so absolutely our strategy includes
important outreach and education activities.
Thanks for bringing that up.
Kelly: You're welcome.
Can you talk more about improvements
in outplanting techniques
to match the scale of this project?
-: Yeah, yeah.
One of the things that we're looking at,
it's kind of interesting, and that is,
you might've noticed
if you're not familiar with restoration,
you might not have fully known what you're looking at.
But one of the ways
that these corals are grown in the nursery
is they've got these, what we call trees.
And so they're vertical in the water column
and they've got branches if you will.
They're made usually of PVC,
but the PVC pipes have little bits of coral
hanging off from them.
They have learned that growing those corals
happens more quickly and effectively
when the corals are suspended in the water columns,
a lot of reasons for that.
But what they then do
is cut off cutting little clips of them,
of the corals that they're growing on the trees
and carry them in a basket out to the reef
and glue them down.
That's very time consuming.
So what they're starting to do is grow them on hemp ropes.
So those corals grow on a rope and then they take that rope,
the entire rope, and it could have 100 corals on it.
A bunch of corals instead of doing one by one by one,
gluing each little coral fragment on the sea floor,
they take that rope and they lay it down on the reef,
so it was growing up in the water column,
we lay it down with all its corals
and those corals will naturally adhere to the sea floor.
And so they can adhere some of it,
but then they will continue to adhere to the sea floor,
that hemp rope will disappear because it will biodegrade.
So that makes it so much faster
than taking each and every single little coral
and gluing it down, which is certainly a labor of love,
not particularly efficient.
So this is an example of one technique
that's being developed to help really speed up that process.
Kelly: Okay, we're gonna take two more questions.
One, we're getting a lot of questions
about the Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.
You gotta keep all those things in the right order.
Can you talk a little bit more
about how it's affecting other areas beyond the Florida Keys
and what kinds of things you've been trying
to try and defeat this thing.
-: Great question also.
So as I mentioned, we have a massive effort
that has been underway
since this disease was really recognized
and started flaring up in 2014.
And there's been a tremendous amount of research done
to try to understand it.
Techniques tried to intervene,
but the problem is once again,
it's a scale and labor intensity issue.
So one of the intervention techniques that we have learned
can be effective is applying antibiotics with a paste
directly onto the tissue of the coral, the disease margin.
So the disease, you may remember
the pictures I showed of the diseased corals.
They can have a little spot, a blotch is how it might start.
And so if you apply a paste with antibiotics in that paste
on that margin, it can help to slow
or even stop the disease from progressing.
So that's great.
But imagine how much time that takes.
Imagine how many corals there are in the Florida Keys.
Imagine it's affecting half of the species here.
To do that on every single coral,
and by the way, you might've also noticed
some of those pictures of the diseased corals,
there's all kinds of blotches.
And so these, again, dedicated,
so dedicated researchers that are doing this,
go out and laboriously, they cut a trench with a tool,
they make a, basically a firebreak around the disease tissue
and then they apply that paste.
I mean, can you imagine how much time that takes?
So it's just not possible for us to do that
for every affected coral.
So we're focusing that on the really susceptible species.
We're focusing that on some of the big mamas,
the ones that are gonna be the most reproductive.
So we're trying to be strategic about the corals
that we're trying to save,
knowing that we can't save them all.
The other thing I'll quickly mention that we're doing
in terms of response is the rescue effort.
And I mentioned this briefly before,
but I think it's worth repeating because it's, to me
pretty mind blowing.
But essentially we're creating a Noah's Ark
of Florida Keys corals.
We are actively going out
and when we first started thinking about this,
I'm telling you, it was kind of mind blowing
to be a reef manager and think,
we're gonna go and remove corals.
I mean, how many of you have been taught,
don't even touch a coral?
We'll take a a chisel to it and pull it off the reef
was just sort of hard to imagine.
But it was something we were forced to do
because we recognize this disease
was moving through the Florida Keys.
And as I mentioned, some of these species
are 100% mortality if they get it.
And so we had to get ahead of that,
collect some of those
so that we have some remaining examples of these species
so that we could put them into zoos and aquarium.
In some cases,
species that have never been held in captivity.
So these practitioners were learning
how to keep these things alive and hold them in captivity
so that we could hope to one day put them back on the reef
so we wouldn't lose them entirely as a result of this.
So that's a massive effort, really incredible partners,
zoos and aquaria across the country
that are supporting that effort
because they believe in the importance
of preserving the reef tract in Florida.
So huge shout out to all of them.
Kelly: And one last question.
I think this is a great one to close on.
A lot of people are asking, how can they get involved?
How can they help with restoration efforts?
How can they volunteer?
Are there internships?
All these different kinds of questions.
-: Great.
So absolutely we need all the help we can get.
Everything else COVID is putting
a little bit of a wrinkle on that,
so many of the volunteer opportunities have been curtailed,
but have patience.
You saw that this is a 20 plus year project,
so even if we can't take you as a volunteer tomorrow,
there will be plenty for you to do.
We are developing stewardship programs
that will involve volunteers.
So that if you are a diver or snorkeler even,
you can help support us and help get out on these spots
potentially and help us do this important work.
If that's not your thing
and if you live in Minnesota, like I did,
you can support these organizations.
So as I mentioned, the Mote Marine Lab,
Coral Restoration Foundation,
National Marine Sanctuary Foundation, Reef Renewal.
Go to our website and you can see who's involved in,
if you wanna support them, writing letters
or getting involved in what they're doing,
they are the heroes of this effort
and they are always looking for ways
for people to get involved
and there's lots of information on their websites.
So I guess I would start with that.
And then just speaking out,
telling people in your community,
telling legislators that these places matter
and that we need to do something to protect them.
That's really, really important.
As you saw in one of the slides,
a senator from the state of Florida
is paying attention to this.
So he knows that people care about this.
Hopefully, that will continue to encourage
his support for this kind of work.
Kelly: Thank you, Sarah.
I believe that wraps it up for tonight.
There were still a few other questions
and we may see if we can answer those in the week to come,
but we really appreciate your willingness to stay after
and continue answering questions.
We still have over 100 people online
through the additional Q&A.
-: Wow, thank you.
Kelly: So thank you such for your participation.
Everyone out there, thank you so much for joining us.
We hope we will continue to see you
over the next three weeks to come
for the other three Seaside Chats,
and we appreciate all of your interest in everything
that this National Marine Sanctuary Program is doing.
Thank you everyone.
Have a good evening.
-: Thank you.
Bye now.