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What Will Happen to Marine Life if All the Coral Reefs on Earth Are Lost?

If coral reefs were to disappear overnight, life would slowly lose its ecological balance and eventually die out.
PUBLISHED 1 DAY AGO
A coral reef teeming with life under the sea. (Representative Cover Image Source: Pexels | Tom Fisk)
A coral reef teeming with life under the sea. (Representative Cover Image Source: Pexels | Tom Fisk)

Deep inside the crystal blue waters of oceans, where schools of fishes glide, glowing jellyfish pulsate, and giant turtles paddle their limbs, the floor is usually matted in corals. Called the “rainforests of the oceans,” corals are colorful water animals that are permanently fixed in one place. While these corals have algae to derive essential nutrition and reproduce, climate change is slowly causing them to eject their algae, lose color, and even die. About half of the world's coral reefs have already disappeared due to global warming and overfishing. A 2019 video by What If (@whatifscienceshow) brilliantly explains what would happen if all coral reefs disappeared from Earth’s oceans. Life would collapse, in simple words.

A rich marine ecosystem with coral reefs brimming with life. (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Francesco Ungaro)
A rich marine ecosystem with coral reefs brimming with life. (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Francesco Ungaro)

“Like all living things, they die,” the narrator said in the video while explaining that corals, called polyps, are marine invertebrates made of calcium carbonate that create colonies on the limestone mats of former colonies. National Geographic explains that their size may vary from that of a pinhead to larger than a basketball. Each polyp consists of a soft, saclike body topped with stinging tentacles that release limestone secretions. The video described that the warmer the waters get, the sooner these corals die out as it takes a temperature rise of just 1 degree Celsius to “upset corals and make them turn white.”

Beautiful red-orange coral reef sitting in the underwater (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Photo by Francesco Ungaro)
Beautiful red-orange coral reef sitting in the underwater (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Francesco Ungaro)

If corals disappeared overnight, over a quarter of the marine population, including two million species, would come under threat. “For many species in the oceans, corals are the only safe habitat. A lot of them will be lost for good,” they explained. Another impact the disappearance of corals would wreak on the marine life would be murky waters. Since corals filter out and clean the waters, losing them would imply letting creatures like sea turtles and dolphins wander in unclean waters. They will eventually die due to a lack of freshwater fish.

Sea turtle swimming atop a coral (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Photo by Belle Co)
Sea turtle swimming atop a coral (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Belle Co)

The Reef-World Foundation reveals that the loss of coral reefs would result in the habitat loss of as many as 25% of marine creatures. "For these creatures, the reef provides essential food, shelter, and the spawning grounds needed for their species’ survival," they explain. As a result, the coastal fishing industries would collapse, leading to the loss of jobs for people for whom fishing is the primary means of livelihood. The coastal tourism industry, which makes an estimated $36 billion in revenue each year, would also suffer great losses. The entire arena made up of hospitality workers, streetside vendors, and tourism operators would be at the edge of losing their main source of income.

A fisherman flinging his fishing net into the air (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Quang Nguyen Vinh)
A fisherman flinging his fishing net into the air (Representative Image Source: Pexels | Quang Nguyen Vinh)

Not just marine life and the fishing industry, dying corals would also lead to floodwaters rushing out of the searing oceans and destroying homes, as corals act as “natural buffers” against erosion, storms, hurricanes, and floods. People living in these areas would be forced to flee from their homes and eventually, cities would start disappearing from the planet. This will be followed by a severe food crisis. The tourism industry would also suffer huge losses as snorkelers and divers would have nothing to relish inside the deep waters. As the color that makes the underwater world mysterious and enigmatic is bleached out, humans will have nothing to behold or rely on. When corals die, the life of this colorful planet won’t prevail either.



 

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