What is the Great Barrier Reef?
The great barrier reef is the only living organic collective visible from the earth's orbit. The Great Barrier Reef is located off the east coast of Australia and is a popular tourist attraction.
The reef is scattered with beautiful islands, marine life and coral cays that cover more than 30,000 square kilometres. The Great Barrier reef was declared a World Heritage area in 1981 and was added to the National heritage list quite recently in 2007. It is the largest UNESCO heritage area in the world. The Great Barrier Reef is the largest collection of reefs in the world. It is comprised of over 3000 reefs ranging from 1 hectare to 10,000 in size. Increased pollution and sustained damge is a result of human activity and has made the Great Barrier Reef suffer. The protecting of this natural wonder has fallen into the hands of the Marine Park Authority and many rules have introduced to protect this beautiful site.
The great barrier reef is forming a natural break water for the coast of Queensland. The great barrier reef is separated from the mainland by a shallow lagoon, from sixteen to one hundred and one kilometres wide. In some places the reef is more than one hundred and twenty two metres thick.
The Coral:
Coral is the many organic building source of the great barrier reef making up all the reefs and cays. Coral is the basis for the rich source of life and habitat in the Great barrier Reef. Coral is comprised of individual polyps which are tiny living creatures which join together to make a colony. Coral thirves in relatively shallow and warm water where strong currents are minimal. Salty water, plenty of light and a low amount of nutrients is the ideal habitat for coral. There is a very diverse variety of coral some who have short life times, others who grow slowly and live to be hundreds of years old. The main attraction of coral is its vibrant colours, the colours are created by algae. However, only live coral is coloured whereas dead coral is bleached and white. Coral has also brought many ships to a watery end including the great ship of Captain Cook, the Endeavour.
The Great barrier reef as a Habitat:
The reef is abundant in life, from whales to dolphins, from dugongs to sea turtles, plankton, algae and over 1500 species of fish. In additon to this, there are 4000 different types of mollusc and ovber 200 species of bird life find thier home or food in this great reef.
The Great Barrier Reef as a Tourist Attraction:
The great barrier reef generates Australia almost 2 billion dollars due to tourist attraction, because almost 2 million people visit the great barrier reef per year. The greater part of the reef is in the Marine National Park and is under national protection. For example, Fishing is restricted to only particular abundant species. Tourism and Human activity have a negative impact on the reef due to broken coral, dropped anchors, fuel drops and other sorts of pollution, e.g littering.