Playing Matchmaker for Corals

Improving the success of sexual reproduction is another tool for restoring the world’s coral reefs. Read about a project working on this method in Florida and the Caribbean. 

Planting Coral Reefs

 The Coral Restoration Foundation in Florida heads up a massive outplanting project to help save coral reefs. This piece for The Revelator explains how volunteers are integral to the effort. 

Coral Reefs in Crisis

 First in a series about efforts to restore coral reefs in Florida and the Caribbean. This one looks at seascape genomics as a restoration tool and a controversial idea: controlled invasion. Read more here. 

Gulf of Mexico coral reefs threatened

Warming waters threaten coral reefs in the Gulf of Mexico's Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary, which have escaped most damage so far. Read more here. 

Helping Coral Deal with Climate Change

As sea temperatures continue to rise due to climate change, coral reefs around the planet have experienced repeated bouts of mass bleaching. Marine biologists from around the world are studying various ways reef-building corals might be able to acclimatize or adapt to climate change. Read more here. 

Coral restoration in Florida

Marine photographer Brandon Cole and I produced this photo essay exploring efforts to protect at-risk coral reefs off Florida’s Atlantic coast for Yale Climate Connections. 

The Gulf of Mexico

11 things you might not know about this body of water, also known as The American Sea. Some cool facts and some alarming ones. Read it here. 

Coral reef ecosystems in trouble

Coral reefs cover less than 1 percent of the Earth’s surface yet feed and shelter a significant amount of marine life and provide food, coastal protection, and livelihoods for millions of people. Read about the state of the world's coral reefs in this PBS Nature Blog post. Spoiler alert: it isn't pretty. 

Get into Citizen Science

Citizen science programs mobilize people from all walks of life to contribute to scientific research. Read how scientists tap the power of the public and ways you can contribute to research and conservation.

What Killed the Corals?

Scientists continue to search for the causes of a mysterious die-off event on the East Bank of the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary in July, 2016. Figuring it out could help protect these reefs in the Gulf of Mexico from future events. Read more here.

World Heritage Status Protects Dive Sites

A number of stellar scuba diving sites around the planet have been inscribed on the UNESCO
World Heritage Site list. Read what that means and why it matters in my piece for Alert Diver Magazine.

Manta Ray on Australia's Ningaloo Reef, a marine World Heritage Site.

Coral reefs from Texas to Townsville socked by climate change

A pair of stories for Texas Climate News looking at global bleaching events and the effects on reefs around the world, especially the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary and the Great Barrier Reef.

Dive the Texas Caribbean

The Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary, 100 miles off the Texas coast, protects 56 square miles of thriving coral reef ecosystems. See it via a liveaboard dive boat.

Coral bleaching is bad. Really bad.

The longest global coral bleaching event has already affected some 90 percent of the Great Barrier Reef and shows no signs of slowing down. Read the alarming facts in my piece for Mental Floss.
Photo credit: XL Catlin Seaview Survey.

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Marine Protected Areas that Work

Not all marine protected areas work. Those that do have five characteristics. Read more in my article for Sport Diver.

Saving Cuba's Marine Treasures

Cuba's marine environment remains relatively pristine. Scientists and conservationists are working to keep it that way. Read more in my piece for Alert Diver Magazine.

Cabo Pulmo in Sport Diver

Cabo Pulmo, Baja California Sur is one of my favorite places in the world (you may have noticed I write about it whenever I can). Locals there have protected their coral reefs for more than a decade, with stunning results, scientifically documented. My piece about it for Sport Diver is now online.

Annual coral spawning

I spent five days diving at the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary, with scientists and students from the Harte Research Institute, to observe the annual coral spawn. Read the piece I wrote about it for Nature News.