A volunteer helps tie down coral into cookies that are contructed out of cement. This is the first step in the regeneration process. Jules Page

BY SHAINA LEVEE

Starting July 1st, the Bay Island Utila implemented the Coral Gardens Initiative, a project which helps maintain and regenerate coral reefs. The Bay Island Conservation Association is working in cooperation with Counterpart International and Honduras’ Ministry of Tourism.

The project involves a comprehensive workshop in which the local community and other volunteers are taught how to restore damaged reefs. According to Counterpart International’s website, the concept is defined by marine biologist Austin Bowden-Kerby and “is based on proven low-tech reef restoration methods that have been developed and tested in the Pacific over the last decade.”
Dying corals have the ability to be planted and regenerated.

Currently, the project is in its test stage. A few branches of corals have been planted into the restoration site and will be observed for the next six months.

“This is like a baby step right now,” said Patrick Flynn who has been working with the project since it first began. If the test works, the project will seek further sponsors and will be given more time, he said.

“Right now the reefs are approximately 25 percent alive to what they were in the past,” said Flynn. “Without the reefs, there will be no divers.”

Utila is primarily a fishing and tourist economy. The coral reef is necessary in order for both aspects of the economy to survive. According to a handbook for coral reef managers written by Bowden, corals are important to fishing communities because they provide homes for fish, lobsters, and other important species. They are also attractive to visitors of the island, thus promoting tourism.

Jules Page, a volunteer with the project and diver with Utila Dive Center, said “nowadays the fish are not getting as large.” This is a worldwide problem that is attributed to over-fishing and not maintaining the coral reefs, she said.

According to the handbook, corals have been killed due to over-fishing of groupers, which feed on reef fish; lobsters and other species which are detrimental to the preservation of the reefs.

The first step in the project consisted of a seminar which explained how to choose, handle and plant coral properly. “The workshop was very hands-on with intricate detail for it to be done correctly,” said Rose Gabourel, a volunteer on the project. “The coral is very delicate.” Gabourel measures weekly improvements and growth for the project.

The corals chosen to be regenerated in Utila are primarily “stag horn”, “yellow finger”, and “elk horn” corals. Once the dying corals have been selected, the dead part of the coral is cut off. This can only be done by certified persons; Bowden was the only one with a certification.

The corals are next tied down into cement-shaped “cookies” in the water. Corals regenerate on rock and other similar materials. The cookies are attached to mesh tables and are left in the restoration site for observation.

The handbook states that coral planting “should become part of an overall resource management plan developed and approved by the reef owning community, the fishers, and local and national government.”

According to Gunter Kordovsky, a volunteer on the project, the future for the Coral Gardens Initiative is great because it could open new sources of income for the islanders. “We could make a coral garden,” he said. “There are all kinds of possibilities.”

Jim Engle, owner of Utila lodge/resort and the Bay Islands College of Diving, said that this is a “good start for many projects that need to be done on the reef to ensure tourism for tomorrow.” Engle has been on the island for twelve years and has watched the reef deteriorate.
“It’s gotten a lot worse,” he said.

Steven Fox, proprietor and instructor of Deep Blue Divers, said that the coral reefs are necessary for Utila. “Without diving, the island has nothing,” he said. “If (the coral reef) dies, this island would die.”