Wild Tobago

Our corals are the canaries in the coalmine of climate change. Dr Anjani Ganase is warning of the disease that can wipe out our impressive boulder brain corals.   Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease (SCTLD) is officially in the Southern Caribbean. Curaçao, Bonaire, Venezuela and even Grenada have reported outbreaks. It is only a matter of time until SCTLD reaches Trinidad and Tobago, and we are not ready.   Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease (SCTLD) was first recorded in Grenada in 2015 with many confirmed sightings in 2018 and 2019. Bonaire and Venezuela made observations at the end of 2022, while Curaçao observed in the beginning of 2023. Within a single year, many of the reefs of Bonaire and Curaçao have suffered mass die off of their precious brain corals. The rate of mortality is much higher than any previous disease outbreak encountered on Caribbean corals. White-band disease killed over 80 % of the Acropora corals (two species) found throughout the Caribbean within a d...

Are corals doomed? They seem to be under attack from more and different maladies that are the result of worsening environmental conditions. Dr Anjani Ganase shares information about what to look for when you dive Tobago’s reefs The Stony Coral Tissue Loss is best explained through its descriptive name. It first appeared in the Caribbean in the Florida Keys in 2014, on a coral reef that was being impacted by a port-dredging project (Jackson and Prentice 2019). Since then, the disease has spread to at least eight other countries, including Mexico, Jamaica and with the latest occurrence in St Kitts and Nevis in August of this year (Kramer et al 2019). As the disease progresses through the Lesser Antilles and towards Trinidad and Tobago, we need to the understand the devastating impacts of the disease, and what scientists are doing in the attempt to curb the spread. The giant brain coral in Speyside is one of the species of coral that is highly susceptible to the Stony Coral ...