Eva Laxo, volunteer coordinator for Mote Marine Laboratories in the Upper Keys, joined Good Morning Keys on Keys Talk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s going on in the lab.
What is the Bleach Watch program?
Laxo said, “I took over the Florida Keys Bleach Watch Citizen Science program recently. This is an absolutely excellent way to get involved in reef monitoring and citizen science. So right now, we’re actively looking for more volunteers to help monitor reef health throughout the summer. So if you’re already ever out on the water, if you’re diving, if you’re snorkeling, if you’re fishing, if you’re boating, if you have eyes on the reef at all, you can help us protect our beautiful Florida coral reef tract simply by reporting what you’re seeing through a very simple Google form. So it’s not a big commitment from your side. It just takes a little bit of training in person or online and then a brief Google form. So our volunteers are really Mote’s eyes on the water, so they report, and you would report signs of coral bleaching, or hopefully the lack thereof along the reef, as well as environmental conditions that you’re observing while you’re out there enjoying the ocean already. It just gives us real time information and helps us inform our restoration. So it’s really, really helpful. If you’re already out there, if you can just send me some information, that would be fantastic.”
Changes in the bleaching over time is what needs to be known.
Laxo said, “If you’re interested in getting involved, and you start seeing those signs of bleaching, those corals turning bright white, as the water is getting a little hotter. I’m out there. I feel the water getting hotter. I feel the air getting hotter. And so if you’re interested in getting involved, I have some trainings coming up. I have a training tomorrow in Summerland Key, another in Marathon, one in Islamorada, and two in Key Largo, all in the next month. So they’re packed in there. Hopefully I get to see some of you all there, but we can meet in person and talk all things corals and bleach. It’s just about an hour. You just need to bring yourself, maybe a notepad, if you’re interested in taking some notes. We’ll have some fun merch to purchase if you’re interested, but just yourself in your brain.”
The information is compiled with NOAA remote sensing to tell the researchers how we’re doing with the reef and how they can possibly respond.
Laxo said, “Our reefs support our marine life, our tourism economy, our fisheries, so much of the things that we do down here rely on our coral reefs. So that’s why Mote is here. We are here, protecting our reefs, restoring our reefs, and you all can be a really, really helpful part of that by just reporting on the conditions of the reefs for us, we’re able to go out there and hopefully do some mitigation, do some restoration, take care of the reefs as they take care of us.”
Bleaching has gotten more severe, especially since the 1980s.
Laxo said, “Since the 1980s we’ve lost quite a few of our corals. We’re facing functional extinction here in the Keys. So that’s why it’s so important to maintain and take care of the corals that we still have out there, and come and learn about what to look for so you can start reporting.”
The bleaching has to do with symbiotic algae.
Laxo said, “You have a symbiotic algae called zooxanthellae that lives inside of those coral tissues, so corals themselves are translucent when they have that really helpful symbiotic allergy, it photosynthesizes gives the coral all of their energy as well as their color. In the summer months, as the water temperatures increase, especially when you come to like El Nino years and kind of specialized years when the summer months get a little bit even hotter than we’re used to, those corals have a response. They expel their zooxanthellae and belly and they turn bright white. So if you see a coral on the reef and it’s bright white, that doesn’t necessarily mean that that coral is dead. It means it’s stressed out. It’s expelled its zooxanthellae and now it is relying solely on its ability to feed with its tentacles. So that’s a really important moment for us to know that that coral, it’s not quite dead yet. It’s not covered in algae. It has been broken down. But if there’s a way to kind of mitigate the stressor facing that coral reef, it’s important to do so in the first two weeks. We have an amazing team of scientists that work all around the world on really, really important and really diverse topics in marine science, culminating in healthy seas for the planet and for humans.”
Tours of the lab are open in Summerland Key.
Laxo said, “If you’ve been hoping to go see our largest facility here in the Florida Keys, it is open for tours again, which is great news. And if you’re interested in getting involved in a more regular capacity as a land based restoration nursery volunteer, you can work with myself. You can just go on our website. If you’d like to get even more involved, you can come and work with me in person.”
For more information, click here: https://mote.org/