Great Barrier Reef
The Great Barrier Reef is the largest coral reef formed by billions of polyps. The reef area is colossal - 348,698 km2, spread from the tropic of Capricorn to the Strait of Torres. The reef is 30 km from the coast of Australia and, moving south, moves 300 km from the coast.
Almost the entire reef is located under water and is shown only during low tides. In order to protect the Great Barrier Reef from excessive human impact, in the form of tourism and fishing, they organized in 1979 a Marine National Park on an area of 50,000 km2. In this region, tourism brings the main income - up to $ 3 billion a year. According to the latest data, the Great Barrier Reef since 1985 has lost almost half of the coral polyps. And the fault of this is the natural situation. Indeed, for growth, corals need a temperature not lower than 18 ° C, and the water must have a certain coefficient of salinity, because the reef ends near New Guinea, since there the Fly River carries a lot of fresh water into the ocean.
The skeleton for the Barrier Reef was set by hard corals made of mushroom corals, brain corals and deer horns". The reef is heterogeneous consists of almost 3,000 reefs, ranging in size from 0.01 km2 up to 100 km2. In total, the Great Barrier Reef combines almost four hundred varieties of coral, but even persistent ones cannot resist their natural enemy - the sea star "terny crown".
More than one and a half thousand species of fish have taken refuge on the Great Barrier Reef. Among them, the largest fish is a whale shark, parrot fish, butterfly fish, backwood, and dolphins. In June-August, there is a reproduction of kittens-horbachi. On the islands of the Southern Reef, sea turtles found suitable conditions for breeding, in addition to them, octopuses and squid are found in these waters, as well as a large number of crustaceans: lobsters, crabs, lobsters, shrimps. Here one of the most dangerous animals lives - a blue-tailed octopus. If you disturb him, he can easily kill a person, because there is no antidote to his poison. The poison of the octopus paralyzes the whole person, and he dies from cardiac arrest. But this effect is temporary, so you need to ventilate the lungs until the toxin is completely eliminated, even if it seems that the person is dead.
On the islands of the Great Barrier Reef there are almost 250 representatives of birds. Among them there are many phaetons, petrels, paints, silly, cattle, eagles.
The barrier reef attracts many tourists, but they can visit only some sections of the reef and its islands. Minerals are prohibited throughout the reef, and underwater hunting is also not possible. When immersed in water, you can’t touch the reefs, but local caretakers will tell how to enjoy diving.
