Conservation and Threats of Fire Corals

Conservation and threats of fire corals

Fire corals face the many threats impacting coral reefs globally, including poor land management practices releasing more sediment, nutrients, and pollutants into the oceans and stressing the fragile reef ecosystem.

Overfishing has ‘knock-on’ effects and fishing using destructive methods physically devastates the reef. A further potential threat is the increase of coral bleaching events, as a result of global climate change.

Most fire coral species have brittle skeletons that can easily be broken, for example, during storms, or by divers when diving for leisure, or when collecting fish for the aquarium trade. For instance, the yellowtail damselfish (Chrysiptera parasema) tends to dwell close to the branching fire coral colonies, and retreats into its branches when threatened. In Brazil, fire coral colonies are extensively damaged when harvesting the yellowtail damselfish, as the corals are often deliberately smashed and fishes hiding among the branches are ‘shaken out’ into plastic bags.