Few Florida Staghorn Corals Survived 2023 Bleaching; Many That Remain In Path Of Federal Dredging Project

Beneath the surface of one of South Florida’s busiest maritime hubs, Port Everglades, scientists found 10 million corals thriving in and around the main channel traversed daily by cargo and cruise ships, now threatened by a major federal dredging project. The discovery, detailed in a new scientific analysis by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the Shedd Aquarium, shows that coral populations near the port in Fort Lauderdale have persisted, and in some cases grown over the past decade, even as most reefs across Florida have collapsed from disease, coastal development and rising ocean temperatures.

“There are still a lot of corals out there, and they need to be protected,” said Ross Cunning, a research biologist at the Chicago-based Shedd Aquarium who co-authored the study. Thousands of them are endangered staghorn corals—fast-growing reef builders that create habitat for marine life and help protect coastlines from storm surge. According to another recent study, also co-authored by Cunning, staghorn corals have all but vanished elsewhere in the region and are considered functionally extinct.

Most were wiped out in the Florida Keys and Dry Tortugas during a marine heat wave in 2023 when prolonged high temperatures triggered the ninth mass coral bleaching event on Florida’s coral reef, forcing the corals to expel the algae that fuels them and turn white. For more than 40 consecutive days, ocean temperatures exceeded 85 degrees Fahrenheit, exposing reefs to heat stress two to four times greater than in all prior years on record, the study found. The millions of corals documented in the analysis by NOAA Fisheries and the Shedd Aquarium lie in, or near, the path of a proposed federal dredging project. The plan, known as the Port Everglades Navigation Improvements Project, is a major federal initiative, led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, aimed at deepening and widening the port’s shipping channels to accommodate newer cargo ships and bulk carriers that transport raw materials, including oil, gas, coal and grain.

If approved, federal scientists and local conservation groups warn the construction could cause unprecedented damage to corals within the channel and beyond. “The project would result in the largest impact to coral reefs permitted in U.S. history,” Andy Strelcheck, NOAA Fisheries’ Southeast regional administrator, wrote in a letter to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, obtained by Inside Climate News.

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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/04012026/florida-port-everglades-dredging-project-could-damaga-corals/