Great Barrier Reef

Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest reef system, situated off Queensland, Australia, and one of the natural wonders of the world. It is a complex of 2,900 individual coral reefs, islands, and lagoons that stretches for over 1,900 kilometres (1,200 mls.). The full extent of the reef was first recognized in 1770 by Captain James Cook when on his first voyage he found himself trapped inside the outer reef and was unable to reach the safety of the open sea. Currently managed as a national park, it is home for about 350 species of hard coral as well as vast numbers of fish and invertebrates like worms, shellfish, and echinoderms. It also harbours species that are very dangerous to man, including the three species of cone shell (Conus spp.), two species of stone fish (Synanceja spp.), the blue-ringed octopus (Hapalochlaena maculosa), a relative of squid, and the sea wasp (Chironex fleckeri), a box jellyfish.

Like all reefs, the Great Barrier Reef is under pressure from environmental issues. Nutrient runoff from the land has increased fourfold since Europeans colonized the area, pressures from commercial fisheries are increasing inexorably, and the waxing of tourism is threatening the near pristine reefs the tourists flock to see. There have been population outbursts of the echinoderm, the crown of thorns starfish (Acanthaster planci) which eats the soft tissue of the coral, but more serious were two major coral bleaching events between 1999 and 2003 as a result of anomalously warm water temperatures possibly resulting from climate change.www.gbrmpa.gov.au/ M. V. Angel