Talk:Great Barrier Reef

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To-do list for Great Barrier Reef: edit · history · watch · refresh
  • Find more information about Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander use, management, and association with the GBR. - probably very difficult.
    • Add more stuff on human history on the GBR in general.
  • More stuff on the ecosystem and ecology. [1] (nb. out of date.)
    • Put more information on the different corals and sea-life. See [2]
  • Look into the scientific literature on the GBR. Coral Reefs, Marine Biology [3]
  • Put more information on the actual geography (different areas etc.).
  • Mention research into biological compounds found on the reef eg. sunscreen. [4] - research organisations that study the GBR.
  • Plug the gap in the geological history of the GBR between 10 million years ago and half a million years ago. - seems all that really happened was sedimentation.
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Contents

[edit] Britannica highlight

An article entitled Great Barrier Reef appeared at britannica.com as a Britannica highlight on 30 May 2005. See [5]. Courtland 17:03, 2005 May 30 (UTC)

[edit] Pop Culture section?

I think it would be fun to list movies, books, and TV shows that take place in the Great Barrier Reef. Finding Nemo is the first thing that comes to mind. 68.103.154.11 04:11, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Passed GA

Congratulations to editors of this article its now attain GA status. Please continue to expand the two stub sections Gnangarra 11:39, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Conflicting numbers on size of GBR...

Fodor's reference [6] puts the number of reefs at 3,000 and islands at 900, which has been in the article for some time. However, the CRC Reef Research Centre [7] puts the numbers at 2,900 reefs and 618 islands. I'm inclined to think the latter are better numbers than a travel guide. Also, the marine park authority states that the GBR is up to 18 million years old [8], while the CRC Reef Centre says 500,000 years old. [9] What do people suggest we use? --MattWright (talk) 00:26, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the source of the size confusion is between the Reef itself and the larger Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. I'd want to try and double-check the CRC figures with another academic source, if possible - most literature on the GBR seems to be on its health, not its size or its age/geological composition. As for the age confusion, due to fluctuating sea levels, the Reef has grown at different times - it could just be that the Marine Park Authority drilled down further. Can you locate any academic sources on either of these matters, at all? I'm willing to try and help, but I'm not very knowledgeable on what journals to go to. While I'm here, can I just please make a request to keep the article to Australian English? Thanks :) - Malkinann 00:52, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Sorry about the English changes, it's just natural for me when writing to use US English, but I am fine with it being corrected. I actually don't always know how to write in Australian English, so hopefully you will understand. I certainly didn't change any of that on purpose. One change you made, however, was adding Torres Strait Islanders under Human use of the Great Barrier Reef. They are already included under the term Indigenous Australians according to that page, so I don't know why we are singling that group out? --MattWright (talk) 01:40, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

No worries.  :) I must have gotten confused between "Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander", as used by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, and "Indigenous Australian" (also used by the ABS), which does seem to cover both. Whoops. - Malkinann 03:47, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Here's a comparitive map of the Great Barrier Reef, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, and the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area. -Malkinann 22:19, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Do you know what the usage restrictions on this are? Is it a public domain document like a map produced by the U.S. federal government would be? --MattWright (talk) 22:25, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
I'm guessing not - in general, the Australian Government keeps its copyright. I can't find a Terms of Use on ReefED (which is run by the GBRMPA), but on the main GBRMPA site it says "The information contained within this website is copyright. You may download, display, print and reproduce this material in unaltered form only (retaining this notice) for your personal, non-commercial use or use within your organisation. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 all other rights are reserved." -Malkinann 22:29, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, sounds like we can't use it. Bummer. --MattWright (talk) 23:33, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
We can use it as a source for the size confusion, though. (the key gives areas for the GBRWHA and GBRMP). If anyone wants further infos, they can go to the source.-Malkinann 23:46, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

The size confusion is between the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, which is 345 500 km squared, and the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area, which is 348 000 km squared, with 2900 reefs. However, this doesn't include the reefs found in the Torres Strait, which is estimated at an area of 37 000 km squared and with a possible 750 reefs and shoals. (Hopley et al., 2007, pp.1) Now I'm just unsure how to work that in to the article. -Malkinann 21:47, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Human use

I keep on finding that the 'human use' section is retitled to 'Indigenous Australians'. Please don't do this - if you can find more information on Indigenous Australian use and association with the GBR, please feel free to expand it into a sub-section of 'human use'. As it is, 'human use' covers both Indigenous Australian use (poorly, I'll admit) and European and current usages of the Reef. - Malkinann 11:07, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Royal Commissions - Help!

I'm going to need some help finding out anything more about the Royal Commissions on oil and the GBR. As they were from 1970-1975, there's not much on the web, and it looks like it'd be in the National Archives... Are there any things that have analysis of Royal Commissions? The thought of going to the National Archives is a bit scary... It seems like after the commissions, the governments got their skates on and turned the GBR into a park. But there's nothing really available on the GBRMPA site, or anywhere else in detail, for that matter. It just seems to be that 'There was one', and that's it. Thanks. :) - Malkinann 02:48, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, thus far, this you-beaut book by Hopley et al. about the geomorphology of the GBR doesn't mention hydrocarbons, natural gas, gas, or oil at all... "Don't mention the war", anyone? -Malkinann 22:00, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
A little birdie has whispered in my ear that chapter 2 of "AIMS - The first twenty-five years" may cover the 1960s and 1970s, Royal Commissions, and the formation of the Australian Institute of Marine Science and the GBRMPA. This same little birdie has also recommended the Bowen book, "The Great Barrier Reef : history, science, heritage". Unfortunately, I can't get a hold of them at the present, but I can but hope! -Malkinann (talk) 12:41, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reef vs reef

I agree, there is no need for the word "reef" to be capitalized unless used in the title of Great Barrier Reef G8summit 20:09, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Why are many mentions of the word "reef" capitalized? Surely this must be a mistake.--Tug201 13:39, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Automated Peer Review

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You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, Malkinann 22:40, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalists

All right now this is getting annoying! Can you guys just grow up and STOP destroying a good article on a good part of Australia. Go find something else to do, instead of vandalising wikipedia!!! Cocopopz2005 04:41, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Great Barrier Reef

I was reading the article about the Great Barrier Reef and found that someone added a swear word(f.u.)to the article. I'm just 11 years old and I would like to do my school reports without having to worry about immature people editing the content of the articles in such a way. I hope you will do something about it, Sincerely, Concered User

Replied at this user's Talk Page. - Malkinann 08:44, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree with this! I'm 12 years old and while doing a report for Great Barrier Reef, I found many words that weren't appropriate. Please stop doing this!

[edit] Gallery

I'm just putting the gallery pictures and information here for now - the clownfish and the giant clam photo can probably be used if we expand the Species section. All of these pictures are on the wikicommons anyway, so they won't evaporate if we don't use them right this minute. - Malkinann 08:44, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Clownfish on the Great Barrier Reef

Satellite image of the northernmost part of the Great Barrier Reef
Giant clam.jpg

Giant Clam on the Great Barrier Reef

[edit] Species

I thought I heard on a documentary that the GBR has the highest concentration of species per square kilometre, or the highest number of different species per square kilometre (or something) of any place in the world. If it can be verified, I think it'd go well in the introduction.

It would, but you'd think the tourist brochures would be all over a figure like that. -Malkinann 11:54, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
I think there is greater diversity in Indonesia's reefs. Sabine's Sunbird talk 06:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Split off "Environmental threats" section?

I'm proposing this split because I think the article is getting too long (37KBish) and the Environmental threats section is the longest. This would give room in the main GBR article for more stuff on the geology/geography and ecology/ecosystems/species stuff, which has a wider appeal. Thoughts? -Malkinann 11:54, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't necessarily think it is too long at this point, but it might make sense to split that section into its own article "Threats to the Great Barrier Reef". The existing text would just need to be synthesized into a few coherent paragraphs that remain in the main article. --MattWright (talk) 17:35, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
Why just 'Threats to the Great Barrier Reef'? is this this 'future proofing' that I see thrown about every so often?-Malkinann 09:16, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, Environmental threats is fine, I didn't purposefully leave off that word. --MattWright (talk) 14:54, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree that this article should be split. This would allow for further expanding of the section without worrying about changing the context of the article in general. That way anyone just wanting info on the barrier reef can find it, while people wanting to know specifics about threats to it can find that in a separate article linked to this one in a brief section. G8summit 20:12, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
I've done it, but I need help summarising what's in the main article. -Malkinann 22:04, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] NOT an organism

Here is what I have heard on the Discovery channel and seen all over the internet--The Great Barrier Reef is an organism (and the world's largest).--This is NOT CORRECT! The reef chain itself is not a organism, but a collection of rock and dead coral over millions of years. The Great Barrier Reef is rather an environment that has the biggest "population density" of life per any unit of measurement. All of the life that covers the whole reef chain is entirely separate from the reef chain itself. Another thing: the reason why I said reef chain frequently is because the Great Barrier Reef is not a single reef, but a chain of thousands of reefs situated off of Australia's coast. Therefore, two things make the "fact" that the Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest organism contrary to true fact. JustN5:12 02:31, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your enthusiasm on the Great Barrier Reef, but I feel I should remind you that Talk pages are for talking about the article itself, not the subject of the article. It's sometimes a difficult distinction to make. We don't say on the article that the GBR is a single organism. We say that sometimes it's called the world's largest organism, but we then go on to explain that really it's not the world's largest organism. We talk about the geological formation of the GBR in the Geology and geography section. If you can cite the source that the GBR has the largest population density of life, that would be very much appreciated. We have some information on the life that exists in the environment of the GBR, but not lots - this is because I'm having trouble in incorporating it. If you'd like to help with that, it would be very much appreciated. We do say in the lead that the GBR is a reef system of about 3000 separate reefs.-Malkinann 07:23, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
The GBR does not have the largest population density by far. In fact some scientists compare tropical waters to deserts as far as life. Usually life is measured in Primary_production which is the grams of carbon produced per cubic metre. Since there is no plankton in this water (billions of organisms per cubic metre of water), we can safely say the reef is far behind. I think the largest population density is actually located off South America in upwelling regions (as far as oceanic life). Erick880 (talk) 06:17, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Map request

map request —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Asphere (talk • contribs).

What kind of map are you after? Image:Map_of_Great_Barrier_Reef_Demis.png is a free-use one we could use - we can't use any maps made by the Australian Government for copyright reasons. -Malkinann 09:56, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

That map is way more informative than the image we had in lead before. Nice find. --MattWright (talk) 16:08, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

That map is good. It should have some labels and a scale though. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Asphere (talk • contribs).

[edit] No information describing the reef

The article talks a lot about the coral origins of the reef, its biological and ecologic significance, but nothing about what it is. What would I see if I came up to the Great Barrier Reef? How big are these reef islands? Is there animal or plant life on the above-ocean reef? Are there human structures on any of them? What is the range of width dimensions of the Great Barrier Reef? Is it passable by boats? There is not even a picture of the reef except from at least a few kilometers away, and it's an actual built-up island. -Rolypolyman 02:57, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I don't quite understand your questions... the article says "The Great Barrier Reef in Australia is the world's largest coral reef system, composed of roughly 3,000 individual reefs and 900 islands..." What else would be useful to know about what the GBR system is?
If you were to come to the GBR, you would see something that looked sort of like this. We decided not to use this picture as the lead picture as the map is of the whole GBR, and we liked the satellite image.
If you were to come to the GBR, you would see something that looked sort of like this. We decided not to use this picture as the lead picture as the map is of the whole GBR, and we liked the satellite image.
Coral cay island sizes vary, and their sizes aren't really something I've come across in my reading. (perhaps investigate the Category:Islands on the Great Barrier Reef, or the Australian govt's website?). There isn't really such a thing as an above-ocean reef - reefs can't grow above sea level, although I suppose at low tide they could be exposed for a short time - not long enough to have non-oceanic wildlife. Birds nest on a lot of the coral cay islands, turtles nest on some others, and I believe there is some plant life. here is some information about some wildlife in the GBR system that isn't fully in the wikipedia article. Some coral cay islands have monitoring stations or are basically left alone, and some others have been made into coastal resorts. "What is the range of width dimensions of the Great Barrier Reef?" - are you asking how wide the GBR system is? Judging by this map, (which we can't use on Wikipedia, as it's copyright to the Australian Government), I'd say it's about 300 or so kms wide at its widest point? The GBR is widely used by ships, although it is quite a dangerous route - Captain Cook famously discovered it when he ran aground on Endeavour Reef. More information about shipping in the GBR is available at Environmental_threats_to_the_Great_Barrier_Reef#Shipping. Free images that we could use of the GBR are available here, if you think there's any better feel free to swap them. If this hasn't answered your questions, I'd suggest going to the GBRMPA website to have a look around - maybe you'll find something and be able to include it in the article.  :) -Malkinann 00:21, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ecology section copyedit

This article, or a portion of it, was copyedited by the League of Copyeditors in September 2007. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
  • Copyeditor(s): Finetooth 04:39, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
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[edit] Oldest single coral on the reef

This has been commented out in the main article for some time now, I thought I'd put it here to save on space there. Any current references would be appreciated. -Malkinann (talk) 22:33, 27 November 2007 (UTC) "The oldest dated coral on the reef now is a species of Porites known as boulder coral, which is only about 1,000 years old (it grows about 1 centimetre or 3/8 inch per year)." Note--this used to be in the Reef Facts for Tour Guides reference until they updated it in 2006. It should not appear in this wiki article until it can be confirmed from a scientific publication.