AUCKLAND — Lest anyone think scientific conferences must be staid affairs, the International Coral Reefs Symposium closed with inspiration from none other than U.S. rap metal band Rage Against the Machine, known for revolutionary lyrics in the 1990s: “It has to start somewhere. It has to start sometime. What better place than here? What better time than now? All hell can’t stop us now!” Christian Voolstra, a professor at the University of Konstanz in Germany and president of the International Coral Reef Society (ICRS), which organizes the conference, choked up as he read those lyrics at the closing ceremony, as did this reporter. Reflections on how conference participants could address the many threats to coral reefs, including seas that are becoming hotter and more acidic due to climate change, had punctuated the program of more narrowly focused presentations on research and conservation practice during the conference, held July 19-24 in Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand. This 16th iteration of the conference, which takes place every four years, drew more than 2,100 participants from more than 90 countries, including coral reef scientists, conservationists, policymakers and community leaders. (Previous ICRS conferences held in locations nearer to Global North research hubs drew even more people.) Recurring themes in conference discussions included how much to focus on climate mitigation, how to characterize and communicate the current condition of coral reefs, and how to empower Indigenous communities and integrate their knowledge systems. A reef off Komodo Island in Indonesia. Image courtesy of Greg Asner/divephoto.org. Prioritizing climate?…This article was originally published on Mongabay

In the North Sea, the vast, shallow sandbank known as Dogger Bank was once among the most productive marine nurseries in Europe. The area stretches across U.K., Dutch, German and Danish waters, and is home to a vast array of marine life, including sharks, rays, dolphins, long-lived shellfish, anemones, corals, sand eels, and seabirds, prompting experts to call it the ecological heart of the North Sea. While much of Dogger Bank has been protected for its unique seabed habitat, destructive industrial activities like oil and gas extraction as well as fishing practices like bottom trawling have continued, even in the protected zones. Now, conservationists have notched a win with a recent court ruling that curtails bottom trawling in the Dutch protected section of Dogger Bank. But they say the threats continue, notably in the form of major wind farm developments rising in the U.K. protected section. A major difficulty in protecting a place as large as Dogger Bank, which spans 18,765 square kilometers (7,245 square miles), is that it’s divided into three separate marine protected areas (MPAs) managed by three different countries. The German section of Dogger Bank was the first to be protected, as a Natura 2000 site under the European Union’s Habitats Directive, in 2007. The Dutch section followed in 2009, and the U.K. section in 2012. Since then, the U.K. has left the EU and now manages its Dogger Bank Special Area of Conservation (SAC) as part of its own network of protected areas. (The Danish section…This article was originally published on Mongabay