Texas Coral Reefs

Foreword

ix T he coastal waters of Texas have their charms, with green marshes, sandy beaches, and bordering forests that are vital havens for migrating birds and other wildlife, as well as for millions of people who are attracted to the ineffable lure of the sea. But coral reefs? Who knew that Texas is blessed with coral reefs that host clouds of brilliant tropical reef fish, big barracuda , giant sponges, crimson starfish, mammoth mantas, and hundreds of hammerhead sharks? For several decades, savvy divers, marine scientists, offshore oil workers, and fishermen willing to venture south of Texas shores have been tuned in to one of the ocean’s best kept secrets: the northern Gulf of Mexico’s undersea range of coral-crowned minimountains referred to by geologists as “topographic highs.” Now the world can share the view and become intimately, if vicariously, acquainted with the amazingly rich diversity of life that prospers in the clear, warm, sapphire waters offshore in the northern Gulf, thanks to Jesse Cancelmo and his luxuriously beautiful volume celebrating the submerged blue face of Texas. I was amazed and more than a little skeptical when I first heard from scuba divers in 1972 about the existence of an area referred to as the Texas “Flower Gardens.” I had spent twenty years exploring the coastal waters of the Gulf of Mexico and had dived the reefs of the Florida Keys, ventured among the Ten Thousand Islands northward to Tampa Bay and beyond into Florida’s Big Bend region, Foreword x foreword where marshes and sea grass meadows extend seaward for many miles. With Navy divers from Panama City and researchers from Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, I had spent hundreds of hours submerged, exploring rocky outcrops, jetties, and parts of the Gulf’s growing “steel archipelago” of offshore oil rigs. Nothing along the shores of the northern Gulf appeared suitable for coral reefs, largely owing to the flow of freshwater and many tons of sediment flowing from the Mississippi and numerous other rivers, as well as near-shore temperatures that in summer range hotter than corals generally can endure to much cooler than is hospitable for them in the winter. The nearest reefs to Texas, I thought, were those in Mexico, hundreds of miles to the south. I had not reckoned on the now well-known Loop Current that streams northward between Yucatan and Cuba far into the Gulf, sweeping clear, warm water loaded with tropical marinelife in a wide swath across the northern Gulf, before bending south along the west Florida coast, exiting through the Florida Strait, and joining the powerful Gulf Stream bordering eastern Florida and the Bahamas. Given the Loop Current’s character and its pathway, it is no wonder that the offshore reefs of Texas look like a healthy slice of the Caribbean! The definitive 1954 reference for the region, the Fishery Bulletin 89, “Gulf of Mexico, Its Origin, Waters and Marine Life,” notes the existence of “numerous submerged hills rising above the seafloor near the outer edge of the continental shelf” in the northern Gulf, and remarks that “corals have been dredged from the tops of a few of these knobs or domes,” but no photographs demonstrate the findings, and underwater photography generally was then in the pioneering stages of development. My own attempts to document the nature of life in the Gulf in the 1970s are replete with blurry black-and-white images, coupled with tantalizing notes about a “Caribbean influence” possibly reaching much farther north than had previously been suspected. In striking contrast, consider the images and findings in this volume. From close encounters with jawfish two inches long to fortyfoot whale sharks, Cancelmo shares his view—and insights—into the true nature of what the creatures who live in the Gulf have known all along. The arc of undersea islands a hundred or so miles xi foreword offshore in the northern Gulf harbor a wealth of life that is both beautiful and critical to maintaining the vitality of the waters of this part of the ocean. Reviewing this book caused me to reflect on my first glimpse of the Flower Gardens in 1990, an official “site visit” while serving as Chief Scientist of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Underwater one hundred miles south of Galveston, the culminating joy of years of anticipation came in a rush—but with it, a sobering jolt of reality. Protected for...