Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument
| Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument | |||
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| Location: | US Virgin Islands , United States | ||
| Specialty: | Coral reef off the island of St. John | ||
| Next city: | Charlotte Amalie | ||
| Surface: | 51.4 km² | ||
| Founding: | January 17, 2001 | ||
Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument is a national monument- type nature reserve in the US Virgin Islands . It protects the coral reefs off the eastern tip of St. John Island in the immediate vicinity of the Virgin Islands National Park . The National Monument includes the seabed off the east of the island within the three-mile zone and a narrow strip of coast from Hurricane Hole around the East End to Haulover Bay .
The sanctuary was established by President Bill Clinton in his last days of office by unilateral decision and without consultation of the US Congress in order to put under permanent protection the parts of the coral ring around the island of St. John that were left out when the national park was founded. It is co-administered by the National Park Service of the national park and has no structures of its own.
Ecosystem
The coral reefs of the US Virgin Islands were hit by a massive coral bleaching outbreak in 2005 . The coral reefs in the national park and the national monument decreased by around 60%. Subsequent investigations by the USGS in 2009 surprisingly found previously unknown coral occurrences in the Hurricane Hole area. The corals there colonize the tree trunks of the permanently flooded parts of the mangroves on the coast. It is the first record of corals in mangrove forests.
In the newly discovered occurrences, around 30 of the 45 coral species in the Virgin Islands have so far been identified, which represents an extraordinary biodiversity in a small area. The populations are mostly small and young, but some are so extensive that they must have existed before the coral bleaching of 2005. The areas are also home to an unusually large number of sponges and a diverse fish fauna.
Web links
- National Park Service: Virgin Islands Coral Reef National Monument (official site; English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ann B. Tihansky, Caroline S. Rogers: Discovering the Secret Gardens in the Mangroves of St. John, US Virgin Islands . In: Sound Waves , April 2010, USGS