FORT PIERCE — A rare deepwater coral ecosystem off the Treasure Coast is again at risk as federal fishery regulators weigh whether to reopen parts of the protected Oculina Reef to shrimp trawling.
The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council is considering amendments that could allow shrimp boats back into areas closed for decades to protect the fragile coral habitat. Scientists say the reef, discovered in 1975, is unlike any other known site.
Edie Widder, CEO of the Ocean Research & Conservation Association, said the reef’s distinctiveness was clear from the moment researchers first explored it.
“It was first discovered in 1975 diving with the Johnson Sealing Submersible, and it’s a completely unique habitat,” Widder said. “As far as we know, there aren’t any other Oculina reefs like it anywhere.”
Mark Terry, CEO of the Florida Oceanographic Society, said the reef supports branching, tree-like Oculina varicosa coral and serves as a spawning site for numerous species.
“This reef was identified as globally significant in that it supports over 2,000 different species of fish, including black sea bass, tilefish and hogfish,” Terry said. “Those are valuable fisheries that need to be sustained. But if we wipe out their habitat, then commercially they won’t be available, and that’s going to be very devastating.”
Terry said the Oculina Reef’s depth — 200 to 300 feet — sets it apart.
“It doesn’t get sunlight that penetrates to the bottom, so it exists without symbiotic algae,” he said. “This doesn’t occur in many other places in our world, and when you find reefs in this deepwater situation, you want to recognize how valuable they are.”
Rock shrimp are among the species dwelling on the reef, and their harvest method has long posed risks. Widder said trawlers historically dragged chains across the seafloor to clear paths for their nets.
“The rock shrimp fishers talked about how they did it by dragging a chain across the bottom to create what they called a goat trail,” she said.
The resulting damage, Terry said, can erase centuries of growth.
“As they would go back and visit these sites where the shrimp fishery had come in, the trawls scraped the reef right off the top,” he said. “Instead of a tall relief of corals, it was scraped down to rock and rubble. For that to recover would not only take hundreds of years, it takes a long time even to get started.”
Federal regulators closed parts of the reef in 1984 after research documented the destruction.
“They showed very clearly the damage that was being done by the trawling, and that led to that area being established as the world’s first deepwater coral marine protected area,” Widder said.
Now, those protections may shift again.
“The concern is that the Fisheries Management Council is considering amendments that would open it up to shrimp fishery again for dragging trawls too close to the bottom and over these reefs,” Terry said.
Widder said the debate is not new.
“They brought it up back in 2022 and we fought it then as well,” she said. “They just keep coming back and coming back.”
Research conducted in 2000 underscored the value of the protected areas, Widder said.
“Scientists revisited the site and found extensive destruction of coral in unprotected areas, and only in the protected areas was there still viable coral,” she said.
Widder also questioned whether reopening the fishery would bring meaningful economic benefit.
“It’s an incredibly small amount of money compared to fisheries as a whole in Florida,” she said. “In 2023, the entire rock shrimp fishery earned $1 million. In the same time period, Florida fisheries brought in $300 million.”
Terry urged residents concerned about the reef to speak up.
“Right now is the time,” he said. “People can weigh in through advocacy sites, including our website, which generates a letter to the South Atlantic Fisheries Council that says we know how valuable this reef is and we want to object.”
The council is scheduled to meet Dec. 10, when members of the public will be able to submit comments online or in writing.