Megatourism, intensive fishing, and sewage, sewage, sewage

To help save the reefs of Florida (U.S.), get active with these groups:

Caribbean Marine Research Center

Clean Islands International, Inc.

Coral Reef Coalition

Environmental Defense Fund

Environmental Solutions International

Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary

Ocean Watch Foundation

Reef Environmental Education Foundation

ReefKeeper International

Reef Relief

The Nature Conservancy

Tourist Rap: Team OCEAN volunteers act as floating information booths for tourists in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary; last year FKNMS logged over 22,000 volunteer hours.

Some 90 percent of Florida's coral reefs are believed to be dead or dying. Poor freshwater management practices, a population that's quadrupled since 1930, sedimentation, and 3 million-plus tourists per year all are contributing to the die-off. So is pollution from boating, agricultural runoff, and leaching of septic systems, as organic wastes flood to the sea through Florida's myriad artificial waterways. Recreational fishing is the area's primary tourist-related boating activity, and commercial fishing its fourth-largest industry overall; both have large impacts on coral reefs.

Oddly enough, some of the best research on Florida corals comes from the University of Georgia, whose scientists have found a 276 percent increase in coral diseases due to fungi and other organisms in the past year. Meanwhile, the home-team University of Miami has been busy smacking its research vessels into reefs like some academic Joe Hazelwood; in November 1997 it agreed to pay a total of $3.7 million to help restore Looe Key, damaged in 1994 when a school research ship ran aground there.

One research boat is pretty minor compared to the other big ships that have bumbled into Broward County reefs in recent years, including a 506-foot cargo ship in 1994, a freighter driven ashore during a February 1998 storm, a 348-foot Panamanian vessel that washed ashore a month later, and incredibly, a 360-foot nuclear-powered sub, the U.S.S. Memphis, in February 1993. Even small ships can cause disproportionate damage: In January 1998 a 50-foot commercial fishing boat ran aground at Rock Key National Marine Sanctuary, leaving a "trail of destruction" along a swath of the protected area's elkhorn and fire coral.

Florida conservationists have their hands full, but they're winning some battles. In late 1997, U.S. District Judge Joan Lenard fined two cruise-ship operators, Ulysses Cruises Inc. (since bought by Cruise Holdings) and Seaway Maritime Co., a total of half a million dollars for dumping oil and plastic garbage bags near the Florida Keys and Puerto Rico, with $275,000 of Ulysses's fines going to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for restoration of coral reefs and other marine life. In the Keys, an ordinance restricting the use of phosphate detergents recently went into effect; it's expected to cut in half phosphate pollution from septic systems, a major cause of coral-threatening algal blooms. Key West dive operators started Reef Relief to get ship anchors off the reefs; dive shops and conservationists collaborate on Adopt-A-Reef cleanups that have netted tons of trash since 1994; and NOAA's Team OCEAN project puts volunteers on the water to educate dive tourists on busy weekends.

Of course, there's always room for more marine protected areas, and it's not just enviros who are calling for protection: In February 1998, the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council said it would ask the National Marine Fisheries Service to expand protections for the Oculina Bank, a rare deep-water coral reef off the Indian River whose coral heads have been damaged by trawlers netting rock shrimp and scallops.