Three-year-old Kasey Cross got a closer look at living
coral polyps yesterday at the Waikiki Aquarium's new
coral exhibit, which officially opens Thursday.
Aquarium builds sea
lore, protection
with coralThe animals' brilliance, fragility
By Lori Tighe
and our dependence on them are
shared in a new exhibit
Star-BulletinCorals are the bricks of the reefs, and they create the white sandy beaches so loved in Hawaii.
Yet this sea animal remains a mystery to a surprising number of people, said Waikiki Aquarium Director Bruce Carlson, at yesterday's advance opening of the new exhibit, "Corals Are Alive!"
The lure of understanding the sea continues to attract an estimated 350,000 tourists and residents a year to the Waikiki Aquarium, even as tourism in Hawaii continues to decline.
"We've been pleasantly surprised at how steady visitors remain," Carlson said. "We believe it's because the aquarium is a quality attraction and it's economical."
In fact, the only negative heard from visitors is that the aquarium is too small, Carlson said. This sentiment, like the corals of the ocean, continues to lay the bricks for a new state-of-the-art aquarium in Kakaako Waterfront Park, planned to be three times bigger than the current digs.
"The Waikiki Aquarium is the gem of Kapiolani Park, but the Kakaako Aquarium could be the jewel of the waterfront and quite significant," Carlson said.
As the Kakaako facility materializes in five years, the Waikiki Aquarium must continue to tap into visitors' curiosity about the sea.
The significance of Waikiki Aquarium's latest exhibit is that once people understand corals, they can help protect reefs, Carlson said.
Corals are animals because they lack chloroplasts, which help turn sunlight into plant food, said Charles Delbeek, aquarium biologist.
The corals live in a symbiotic relationship with algae plants which give corals their brilliant red, blue, green and yellow colors. The coral produces waste in the form of ammonia, a source of nitrogen, which the algae absorb like a fertilizer. In return, the algae takes sunlight and makes sugars, which feed the coral, Delbeek said.
The coral shapes -- fans, brains, stalagmites, boulders -- are actually skeletons. The animal that lives on the coral surface is as thin as two pieces of notebook paper.
Some corals grow a few centimeters a year, while others grow a few millimeters a year. Some corals have been in Hawaiian waters since explorer James Cook arrived.
"They're a fragile resource and should be protected because our economy depends on it," Delbeek said.
Corals are the backbone of fisheries and tourism, he said. And they also preserve beaches, acting as natural sea walls.
Threats to corals include boat anchors and groundings, careless divers, chemical spills, runoff from golf courses that use a lot of fertilizers, and land deforestation, Delbeek said.
When trees are chopped en masse, rain washes soil into the ocean, clouding the water and blocking sunlight. Dirt settles on the corals, smothering them, he said.
"Deforestation and road building have been real problems on Guam," he said. "They wiped out a lot of reefs there."
