Coral disease’s spread to reef worries experts

MIAMI — A mysterious disease hammering Florida’s dwindling reefs was found for the first time this week in the Lower Keys, alarming scientists who have used epoxy Band-Aids, amputated sick coral and even set up underwater “fire breaks” in a four-year battle to contain the outbreak.

Mote Marine Laboratory researchers working with state and federal investigators discovered the infected coral during a routine dive to collect samples, said biologist Erinn Muller, who heads Mote’s coral health program.

The discovery off Looe Key, south of Big Pine in part of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, puts in jeopardy the southern end of the world’s third-largest barrier reef. It’s also more bad news for a reef that has lost half its coral over the last two centuries.

“It is just heartbreaking for us because it’s such an iconic reef,” Muller said. “I can’t sleep at night because I think about it and what else can we do.”

The disease, which now stands as the longest and largest infection for coral anywhere, jumped a gap in the 360-mile long reef tract at the Seven Mile Bridge, a point scientists had hoped would provide a natural obstacle. It first appeared off Virginia Key in 2014 and began spreading north, south and west. But until November 2017, it appeared to stop at the east end of the famous Keys bridge, Muller said.

Scientist believe the disease is likely caused by a bacterial infection carried by currents, but little else is known.

When coral began falling sick near Virginia Key, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was in the midst of dredging Government Cut. Miami-Dade County also has a massive sewage outfall pipe nearby. It’s not clear whether either triggered the disease or contributed to the spread on already stressed coral, which also endured back-toback warm summers beginning in 2014.

Brain and large boulder coral, the tract’s biggest reef builders, appear to be more susceptible, but scientists aren’t sure why, Muller said. They’ve tried a number of ways to treat it — cutting out sick coral, applying chlorine-laced epoxy as a Band-Aid to create an antiseptic barrier and carving out fire breaks around reefs.

But coral continue to die at an alarming rate.