Would you like to see us in person? Then come along, attend the Duikvaker on the 2nd and 3rd of February in Houten, Holland. Hear Willem’s first-hand experiences of placing an artificial reef underwater, and meet marine ecologist Ingrid.

There is, of course, the possibility for children to participate in the workshop “Design a New House For Fishing.” In this way they can not only learn about, but contribute to the protection and restoration of coral reefs. The workshop Coral Gardening is organized by Inge Aarden. We also have special games and activities that teach the kids about the cooperative ecosystem that is a coral reef, how all the animals work together. In addition, we also have the Coral Experience, with…..

We would be delighted to talk with you, to discuss coral conservation, and to see what the chances of recovery are and how you can contribute. We will also give a lecture about the exiting new developments in the rehabilitation of coral reefs.

Visit Duikvaker for a captivating trip underwater! Or register at www.coralgardening.org for more information about coral reefs, and our restoration methods.

Do you want to be part of a new reef yourself? It is possible to sponsor your own reef, or to take part in our next statues on Bangka Island.

The post Dive into the wonderful world of coral appeared first on CoralGardening.

It would be nice to make a statue during the weeks that we are here. The scrap metal consists of a galvanized gas pipes, rebar, and a small iron oxygen tank. A simple question that posed an interesting challenge for us; what could we make? The tank was the key, it gave the inspiration to create a diver. After an extensive brainstorming session, the first design was sketched on paper.

In order to get the dimensions of the diver right, we used Veran as a model. However, due to all the current discussion in society around gender identification, we decided to make the dive gender neutral.

We set out in good spirits to build our diver, however, soon we found that it was not so simple as we had hoped. The gas pipes were very difficult to bend into a desired shape, and welding two different metals together in an art unto itself. After practicing and consulting digitally with our welding specialists in the Netherlands, we mastered this aspect of welding, even with the wrong electrodes!

On Coral Day the diver was revealed to the public. An unexpected bit of testing and quality control took place, usually it is the children who climb all over our artificial reefs, but this time it was an Indonesian woman who knew a good bench when she saw one.

The children loved being the “dive buddy” of the diver; wearing their self-painted traditional diving goggles, they lay on the table next to the diver, dreaming of adventures in the underwater world. And so a name for our diver became quickly apparent: “Buddy.”

After Coral Day Buddy is baptized in the sea. With neither theory, nor diving lessons, it went into the water and found a nice spot on the reef in front of the Mimpi Indah Resort. Buddy has a basket in its hands, to show that they are always tending to the coral, coral gardening. Buddy swims from the Domus Hippocampi, placed on Coral Day 2018, to the pyramids the had been sunk the year prior.

As usual, we plant various coral on Buddy in the subsequent dives. We notice that several fish have already taken up residence in Buddy’s base. Every time we meet Buddy, we check to see if the fish are still there, and if more are moving in, the population increases in just a matter of days. Such an fascinating sight!

I wish I could peer into the future. How will Buddy look in 5 years, in 10? Next year in mid-May, we will return to Bangka to start repairing the damaged reef by building a new reef and transplant coral on it.

The post CoralGardening expands appeared first on CoralGardening.

The festival is organized by Suara Pulau in order to increase awareness of the importance of coral reefs. Every year a new section of artificial reef is placed. This year the reef is the “The Domus Hippocampi,” it is designed by Teguh Ostenrik, a famous Indonesian artist. It is built by Yaysan Terumbu Rupa (YTR) with the help of donations from many sponsors. When we arrived on Banka Island, The Domus stands prominently on land, ready and waiting. A few days prior to Coral Day a team from YTR arrives to do the final preparations to deploy The Domus on Coral Day itself.

The YTR team consists of volunteers, who may or may not have experience with the installation of artificial reefs. This makes it very important to create a solid and effective plan to sink The Domus before we proceed. Because we also have broad experience and input, the meetings are conducted in three languages: Indonesian, English, and Sign Language. It is funny and interesting to see how all of the knowledge of the various volunteers is integrated and used. Ultimately a belay method is chosen to lower the reef onto the ocean floor. Belaying is the same technique climbers use to go up and down on a rope.

The Domus consists of 3 parts, and is 23 meters long. It will be anchored using 12 blocks made of concrete and stone. The blocks were specially made using ideas and methods we devised in order to make them a more attractive and hospitable habitat to new coral recruits. The blocks are placed on their locations before Coral Day, so that we get gain experience using the belay method. This is not as easy as it looks! The blocks are small, but rather heavy. The first blocks go down uncontrolled, luckily we are able to learn from our mistakes, and with some revised techniques the following blocks go down smoothly.

There are about 200 guests on Coral Day. The various sponsors are present, and so is the head of the district of North Minahasa, Vonny Panambunan. There are speeches and a ceremony where The Domus Hippocampi is blessed. This consists of a traditional dance and throwing coloured powders and water into the air. This is great fun, and all the children are splashed with colour and they look painted afterward.

When all the ceremonies are over, it is time to place the first of the 3 Domus sections into the water. First it is made to float with the aid of air-filled jerry cans, then it is towed to the location over the seabed with the unified strength of a team of divers. Finally it is slowly lowered into position. We have learned much from the lowering of the anchor blocks, and the first Domus section goes down in a graceful and controlled manner. We coordinate underwater operations and place the structure on exactly on the spot we chose. When the section is in place, it is time to add the coral to the artificial reef. Veran gave the volunteers a crash course in attaching corals to the structure, and assists Teguh in placing the first piece of coral. The other two sections of The Domus Hippocampi are placed on the next day.

It has been a beautiful day! We want to thank everyone who has contributed to making this day possible! Especially Ulva Takke, from Suara Pulau, for organizing the event. Mimpi Indah Resort for the accomondation and the great food. Also the entire team of the Yayasan Terumbu Rupa foundation (YTR) for the construction of the artificial reef and their great teamwork during the installation of the reef. All of the sponsors and of course Teguh Ostenrik for the design of The Domus Hippocampi. Thank you all so very much!

An impression of Coral Day made by Virginia Veronica Gerungan

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In order to increase our knowledge, we have invited Nicole Helglason of ReefDivers.io to give a presentation to us and also to the Volunteers of Suara Pulau (the NGO that placed the Pyramids here on Bangka Island). Nicole is a specialist in the field of coral identification, she assists various coral rehabilitation projects around the world, and she has developed a teaching method to impart this knowledge gracefully unto others.

In the morning Nicole starts with her presentation “See The Reef with New Eyes” which is about how one can recognize the different species of coral. Coral is divided into different classes, called genus, and each genus can contain dozens or even a hundred different species. Each individual coral can have different forms and colors, which can make identification especially difficult. For example: one coral species can grow in a branching form (such as the branches of a tree), a tabular form (as a table), or encrusting (over an object), depending on conditions such as depth, temperature, and sunlight exposure. The presentation is a brief summary covering the basics of recognizing and identifying coral, the official course takes a number of days to complete. After the presentation we went diving on the pyramids and the surrounding area. Nicole is pleasantly surprised by the amount of healthy coral around the reef damaged by dynamite fishing.

In the afternoon we dive at the rehabilitation and education project of Murex, another resort on the island. They specifically seek out coral species that are threatened, and when they find one they will split fragments off of the mother coral and place them onto a table in their nursery, once the corals are large enough they are placed back on the natural reef.

Today I learned something new: mimic anemones are not coral, they are an anemone that can appear to be coral, in fact they are nearly indistinguishable from coral. During the night, however, it becomes apparent that the anemone is not coral, it looks rather different. Now here is a question: are you going for a night dive, or are you going to look at the stars instead?

Nicole, thanks for the instructive day!

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A volunteer will tell you all the ins and outs of the work CoralGardening is doing and why this is necessary.

The Lush is a store only selling animal friendly and environmental friendly products, which are mostly free of packaging. We are very much in support of this and are happy to tell our story of contributing to a better world. We will be present from 10.30 until 17 o’clock, will we see you there?

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GBCC is the Global Biodiversity Conservation Conference organised by the University of Life Sciences in Prague. It was held for the 5th time, previous conferences were besides in Prague also at collaborating universities in Mexico (2016) and Indonesia (2014).

There were 225 participants, mainly Czech students and university staff, as well as several Czech Conservation Organizations. The international participants where mainly from Mexico and 11 of the 24 speakers were from abroad. One speaker from Slovakia was likely to be the oldest and most opinionated participant, he was not shy and challenged speakers after each presentation, in Slovak… luckily, he did not have any questions for me

The presentation of CoralGardening was remarkable in the sense that it was one of the few about marine conservation. A lot of topics were about forest conservation and terrestrial wildlife. The themes of this year’s GBCC were really interesting: day 1 was about human transformation of ecosystems and its effect on biodiversity (in temperate and tropical regions); day 2 was about wildlife crime; and modern technologies in biodiversity conservation (remote sensing, drones, telemetry, night vision camera’s). Although the 3D printing of an artificial coral reef would have well fitted the latter theme, CoralGardening was invited to give a presentation in the afternoon at the 1st day, as part of the theme human transformation of tropical ecosystems. The invitation came from a network contact of Veran, and I was asked to go in her place.

For me an honour and very nice to do, as I have some experience in speaking and attending conferences with my background in applied science and tropical marine ecology. Besides representing the work of CoralGardening I included a summary of scientific knowledge on coral restoration techniques based on lessons learnt of other projects worldwide. My aim was to get in touch and share knowledge with other participants of GBCC, by addressing our own research projects and the research questions and needs we have. As mentioned there were few marine conservationists, one speaker was working with turtles in Cape Verde. I did establish contacts with Czech people who apply genetics in their work, which is definitely a hot topic and more and more applied in conservation projects to give insight in the DNA of an individual, which provides information about population structure or species evolution. In coral restoration it is promoted as a means to establish a resilient artificial reef which has genetic variability. This makes a coral reef more resilient to threats than a monoculture, as one genotype will be more resistant to for example disease than another. The DNA of the photosynthetic algae (zooxanthellae) living in the tissue of coral polyps is also important, as it determines their resilience to the major global threat: coral bleaching. Although it is not at all easy nor cheap to establish genetic research, it is worthwhile to investigate and consider incorporating genetic sampling in the mobile lab project of CoralGardening.

For me it was inspiring to attend this conference and to dive into scientific papers. If you are interested to learn more, please have a look at the program and presentations at the GBCC website.

Ingrid van Beek

Photo’s GBCC

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This year in July I went back to finish the project.
Constructing the giant steel hands wasn’t always easy. Working with very limited resources, in temperatures well above 30 degrees and mother nature who made welding impossible with heavy rain.

Photo’s Carla August

But when we, with the help of many people, finally had the hands in place on the bottom and during my safety stop with Frank back to the surface, I looking down to see those giant hands standing in the CoralGarden, the reward couldn’t be any greater!

Photo Lee Jellyman

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Border Sessions invites you to co-create the upcoming 7th edition. Over 20 labs, a conference with 40+ sessions, a hackathon, a dinner and much more… We prepare this together with you. Send the organization your profile to start the conversation.

On June 15th, CoralGardening will participate in the Coral Reef Engineering Lab, where two of our questions will be presented to all kinds of experts in order to find a solution together. Do you want to use your creativity to restore coral reefs? Come and join us.

It is no mystery that coral reefs are under great threat. The global decline of coral reefs puts the food and income source, as well as the coastal protection of hundreds of thousands of people at risk. Our mission is to turn the tide. We would like to challenge people from all different fields and backgrounds to join our Coral Reef Engineering Lab and find innovative and groundbreaking solutions for the deterioration of coral reefs worldwide. We believe that by combining the power of diversity we can couple old ideas to new insights, form novel alliances overnight and tackle the coral reef issue in a non-conventional way.

During the lab we challenge you to step into a real-life case to find solutions for coral reefs. All ideas that are formed during the workshop will be taken into consideration for real-life implementation. So are you an artist, ecologist, engineer, architect, banker, farmer, teacher, in short, a human being? And would you like to use your creativity and knowledge for the protection of one of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet? We challenge you to submerge yourself in the colorful world of coral reefs and join our mission!

We are challenging all kinds of experts to invent a new way to create artificial reefs.

The post We challenge you to participate in the Coral Reef Engineering Lab appeared first on CoralGardening.

The forecast for the coming decades is very somber. If we predict the future, based on current scientific data, more animal species will die. Not only animal species, but also entire habitats are threatened. One of the most endangered areas are coral reefs, with all the marine life that lives in it. Due to climate change, the temperature on earth rises, which will make the seawater warmer. Coral is sensitive to a few degrees rise.

An increase of 2 degrees Celsius can be deadly to coral. Compare this to a human, who has an average temperature of 37 degree Celsius. If your temperature rises to 39 degrees you are sick and have a fever. If this is temporary, you will survive, but if it takes a long time, you may die.
Due to warmer seawater temperatures, coral will bleach. You can compare this to fever in humans. If the situation does not take to long and the temperature drops, then the coral can survive and get its color back. If the temperature stays too high, the coral will die. The warmer seawater has already caused mortality. Over the last few decades, there have been more mass bleaching events than over centuries before. Over the last 30 years, about half of the corals worldwide have died.

When you know that only one quarter percent (0.25%) of the ocean floor is covered with coral, while a quarter (25%) of all marine life is directly dependent on the reefs, you realize that coral reefs have an essential function in keeping the ocean healthy.
If the current water temperature rising continues, the expectation is that more corals die, the entire Great Barrier Reef will disappear in the next two decades. Nobody knows what the effects of the collapse of such an important ecosystem are. The combination of temperature rise and the fact that we empty the ocean with overfishing, make some scientists predict that there will only be jellyfish in the ocean in 30 years. This has disastrous consequences for human beings, because one thing is certain: without a healthy ocean, no healthy life on earth!

Be the change you want to see and inspire others.

The first simple action you can take for a healthy ocean is to eat less fish. Nobody stops fishing until you stop eating fish. Every plate counts. Imagine we all stop eating fish in the same week, the ocean will be left in peace for one week.

The second action is to reduce your CO2 emissions. Take on the challenge to start with one thing and do the footprint challenge.

More info about corals and how a bleaching event was captured on camera, see the beautiful film Chasing Coral.

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On June 30, there was the monthly EcoDay on Koh Tao and CoralGardening took this opportunity to put two new statues down underwater, with the volunteers who made it. There were two groups for the two statues, one with scuba divers led by Charlotte and Emiel and one with freedivers led by Vera. Me myself had taken the job of supplying the materials from the boat to the divers. Fortunately, I could just take part in assembling under water, by filling the flower with the ballast and placing the top on one of the flowers. The assembling of a flower by the freedivers was a new experience for me and many of us. Also because it is the first time an artificial reef has been created, put down and assembled by freedivers.

During their presence on Koh Tao, Frank and Vera are experimenting with materials. In addition to the concrete mache developed by CoralGardening in 2015, we have also made flowers consisting of metal and sisal. In my opinion the concrete-mache flowers are more beautiful to see, but they are also harder to plant coral on, an important thing. With the ropes, it is easier to open the rope and place the coral between the fibers and then close the rope so that it holds the coral. They also experiment with a full metal flower. This new flower has the great advantage that these are much easier to connect to Bob’s Coral Aid.

After this successful placement, we organized a “CoralGardening only” construction morning. With the five of us (me, Frank, Vera, Emiel and Charlotte) we made various leafs, with Charlotte learning to weld. This was a very charming face. Later during my holiday we did this again, by that time Charlotte was already back in the Netherlands. I was able to discover my own welding qualities and was not dissatisfied with the result, and even the critical Vera could live with the final product.

Charlotte gets a lecture from Emiel.

I also learned to weld.

And yes, now you have flowers underwater so then you need some coral on it. One week after the placement we went to the CoralGarden by longtail, twice in one week with the CoralGardening crew. We collect broken pieces of coral from the sandy bottom, that are still alive and place it on the flowers. Half of the corals we put on the rope flower and the rest on the concrete flowers. It proved to be true that correct coral placement is a skill. It is important that the coral is firmly connected so that it can attach itself to the substrate, the flowers in this case.

Finally, the building of the flowers and planting coral on it, is great fun to do. But it must also be maintained and of course it has to be monitored if it is growing well. We returned with the longtail and we strengthened the foundations of one of the flowers and we cleaned the concrete mache leaf from the algae that growth on it. We also did a baseline measurement of the size of the coral and the degree of bleaching. Now I’m curious about the results in a half year. And oh yes, I have learned something new: diving slates FLOAT. When you are at eleven meters and you are focussed on measuring, and when you look up to see your notes floating to the surface. My reaction was not something recommended by dive instructors, but I could finish my notes at least.

Summarizing, it was a great and productive holiday and it gave me a good feeling about the project.

Arjan Blaauw

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