Sponge and Coral Destruction
Half of the globally unique glass sponge reefs in Canada's North Pacific waters have been destroyed. Most of the destruction has been the result of bottom trawling, a fishing method whereby a net is dragged along the seafloor, which breaks and kills the fragile glass reefs.
Glass Sponge Reefs before and after being trawled.
Damaged reefs will be extremely slow to recover (if they can recover at all). Formal protection from bottom trawling enacted in 2002 has protected the reefs from further damage
These sponge reefs have survived 9,000 years in the Hecate Strait. Marine protected area designation should help them recover and survive another 9,000 years.
Deep-sea corals, which play a similar ecological role to sponge reefs, are also vulnerable to damage in Canada's North Pacific waters. During just eight years (1996-2002), about 295 tonnes of cold-water corals and sponges were observed as bycatch in British Columbia’s groundfish bottom trawl fishery1. The federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans’s scientists recognize deep-sea corals’ ecological importance, fragility, and slow recovery. Despite this knowledge, and despite knowing that certain fisheries are the primary threat to deep-sea corals, there are no measures in place to protect the deep-sea corals of Canada's North Pacific waters from human impacts.
See the map of important coral and sponge areas, produced by the Living Oceans Society.
Sources:
1. Jeff Ardron and Glen Jamieson. 2006. Reducing Bycatch of Corals and Sponges in British Columbia’s Groundfish Trawl Fishery through Trawl Fishery Closures. Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat Research Document – 2006/061.
