Why I still have hope for coral reefs | Kristen Marhaver

Prevoditelj: Sanda L Recezent: Tilen Pigac - EFZG

The first time I cried underwater

Prvi puta sam plakala pod vodom

was in 2008,

2008. godine,

the island of Curaçao,

kod otoka Curaçao,

way down in the southern Caribbean.

duboko u južnim Karibima.

It's beautiful there.

Predivno je tamo.

I was studying these corals for my PhD,

Proučavala sam te koralje za svoj doktorat

and after days and days of diving on the same reef,

i nakon mnogo dana ronjenja na istom grebenu,

I had gotten to know them as individuals.

upoznala sam ih pojedinačno.

I had made friends with coral colonies --

Sprijateljila sam se s kolonijama koralja,

totally a normal thing to do.

što je sasvim normalna stvar.

Then, Hurricane Omar smashed them apart and ripped off their skin,

A onda ih je uragan Omar raskomadao i pokidao im kožu,

leaving little bits of wounded tissue that would have a hard time healing,

ostavljajući male komade oštećenog tkiva koji će teško zacijeliti

and big patches of dead skeleton that would get overgrown by algae.

te velike dijelove mrtvog kostura koji će zarasti algama.

When I saw this damage for the first time,

Kada sam prvi puta vidjela tu štetu

koja se protezala duž cijelog grebena,

stretching all the way down the reef,

spustila sam se na pijesak u svojoj opremi

I sunk onto the sand in my scuba gear

and I cried.

i zaplakala.

If a coral could die that fast,

Ako koralj može tako brzo umrijeti,

how could a reef ever survive?

kako uopće greben može preživjeti?

And why was I making it my job to try to fight for them?

I zašto sam borbu za njih preuzela na sebe?

I never heard another scientist tell that kind of story

Nikada nisam čula da je neki drugi znanstvenik ispričao sličnu priču

until last year.

sve do prošle godine.

A scientist in Guam wrote,

Znanstvenik u Guamu je napisao:

"I cried right into my mask,"

"Plakala sam ravno u masku,

seeing the damage on the reefs.

vidjevši štetu na grebenima."

Then a scientist in Australia wrote,

Zatim je znanstvenik u Australiji napisao:

"I showed my students the results of our coral surveys,

"Pokazao sam svojim studentima rezultate naših analiza koralja

and we wept."

i plakali smo."

Crying about corals is having a moment, guys.

Plakanje zbog koralja je popularno.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

And that's because reefs in the Pacific

A to je zato što grebeni u Tihom oceanu

are losing corals faster than we've ever seen before.

gube koralje brže nego što smo ikada prije vidjeli.

Because of climate change,

Zbog klimatskih promjena,

the water is so hot for so long in the summers,

mora su ljeti toliko dugo topla,

that these animals can't function normally.

da ove životinje ne mogu normalno funkcionirati.

They're spitting out the colored algae that lives in their skin,

One izbacuju šarene alge koje žive u njihovoj koži,

and the clear bleached tissue that's left usually starves to death

a bezbojno izbjeljeno tkivo koje ostane obično umre od gladi

and then rots away.

i onda istruli.

Then the skeletons are overgrown by algae.

Zatim kosturi budu obrasli algama.

This is happening over an unbelievable scale.

Ovo se dešava u nevjerojatnim razmjerima.

The Northern Great Barrier Reef lost two-thirds of its corals last year

Sjeverni dio Velikog koraljnog grebena izgubio je lani dvije trećine koralja

over a distance of hundreds of miles,

u dužini od stotine kilometara,

then bleached again this year,

onda je ponovo izbjelio ove godine

and the bleaching stretched further south.

i izbjeljivanje se proširilo dalje na jug.

Reefs in the Pacific are in a nosedive right now,

Grebeni u Tihom oceanu sada su u propadanju

i nitko ne zna koliko loše će to još biti,

and no one knows how bad it's going to get,

except ...

osim...

over in the Caribbean where I work,

u Karibima, gdje radim,

we've already been through the nosedive.

već smo prošli kroz taj proces.

Reefs there have suffered through centuries of intense human abuse.

Tamošnji grebeni stoljećima su trpjeli intenzivno ljudsko iskorištavanje.

We kind of already know how the story goes.

Mi već otprilike znamo kako to ide.

And we might be able to help predict what happens next.

I možda ćemo moći pomoći u predviđanju onoga što slijedi.

Let's consult a graph.

Pogledajmo grafikon.

Since the invention of scuba,

Otkad postoji ronilačka oprema

scientists have measured the amount of coral on the seafloor,

znanstvenici mjere količinu koralja na morskom dnu

and how it's changed through time.

i kako se ona mijenja kroz vrijeme.

And after centuries of ratcheting human pressure,

I nakon stoljeća ljudskog utjecaja,

Caribbean reefs met one of three fates.

karipske grebene je zadesila jedna od tri sudbine.

Some reefs lost their corals very quickly.

Neki grebeni su izgubili svoje koralje vrlo brzo.

Some reefs lost their corals more slowly,

Neki grebeni su izgubili svoje koralje sporije,

but kind of ended up in the same place.

ali su na kraju završili isto.

OK, so far this is not going very well.

Ok, sve ovo do sada ne zvuči baš dobro.

But some reefs in the Caribbean --

Ali neki grebeni u Karibima,

the ones best protected

oni najbolje zaštićeni

and the ones a little further from humans --

i oni malo udaljeniji od ljudi,

they managed to hold onto their corals.

uspjeli su zadržati svoje koralje.

Give us a challenge.

Dajte nam izazov.

And, we almost never saw a reef hit zero.

I skoro nikada nismo vidjeli da je greben sasvim propao.

The second time I cried underwater

Drugi put sam plakala pod vodom

was on the north shore of Curaçao, 2011.

na sjevernoj obali Curaçaoa 2011. godine.

Bio je najmirniji dan u godini,

It was the calmest day of the year,

but it's always pretty sketchy diving there.

ali tamo je uvijek prilično nezgodno roniti.

My boyfriend and I swam against the waves.

Moj dečko i ja plivali smo uz valove,

I watched my compass so we could find our way back out,

gledala sam svoj kompas kako bismo mogli naći put za natrag,

and he watched for sharks,

a on je pazio na morske pse

and after 20 minutes of swimming that felt like an hour,

i nakon 20 minuta plivanja koje su izgledale kao jedan sat,

we finally dropped down to the reef,

konačno smo se spustili do grebena,

and I was so shocked,

i bila sam toliko iznenađena

and I was so happy

i toliko sretna,

that my eyes filled with tears.

da su mi se oči ispunile suzama.

There were corals 1,000 years old lined up one after another.

Koralji stari tisuću godina nizali su se jedan za drugim.

They had survived the entire history of European colonialism in the Caribbean,

Preživjeli su čitavu povijest europske kolonizacije Kariba

and for centuries before that.

i još stoljeća prije toga.

I never knew what a coral could do when it was given a chance to thrive.

Nikada nisam znala što koralj može, ako mu se da prilika da napreduje.

The truth is that even as we lose so many corals,

Istina je da, iako gubimo toliko puno koralja,

even as we go through this massive coral die-off,

iako prolazimo kroz masovno izumiranje koralja,

some reefs will survive.

neki grebeni će preživjeti.

Some will be ragged on the edge,

Neki će biti oštećeni na rubovima,

some will be beautiful.

neki će biti predivni.

And by protecting shorelines and giving us food to eat

Štiteći obale, dajući nam hranu

and supporting tourism,

i podupirući turizam,

they will still be worth billions and billions of dollars a year.

i dalje će vrijediti milijarde dolara godišnje.

Najbolje vrijeme za zaštitu grebena bilo je prije 50 godina,

The best time to protect a reef was 50 years ago,

but the second-best time is right now.

no, drugo najbolje vrijeme je upravo sada.

Even as we go through bleaching events,

Iako prolazimo kroz slučajeve izbjeljivanja

more frequent and in more places,

sve češće i na sve više područja,

some corals will be able to recover.

neki koralji će se moći oporaviti.

We had a bleaching event in 2010 in the Caribbean

Imali smo slučaj izbjeljivanja 2010. na Karibima,

that took off big patches of skin on boulder corals like these.

koji je skinuo velike dijelove kože s kamenih koralja poput ovih.

This coral lost half of its skin.

Ovaj koralj je izgubio pola svoje kože.

But if you look at the side of this coral a few years later,

No, ako pogledate stranu ovog koralja nekoliko godina kasnije,

this coral is actually healthy again.

ovaj koralj je, u stvari, opet zdrav.

It's doing what a healthy coral does.

Čini ono što i svaki zdravi koralj,

It's making copies of its polyps,

stvara kopije svojih polipa,

it's fighting back the algae

bori se protiv algi

and it's reclaiming its territory.

i ponovo zauzima svoj teritorij.

If a few polyps survive,

Ako par polipa preživi,

a coral can regrow;

koralj može opet izrasti;

it just needs time and protection and a reasonable temperature.

samo mu je potrebno vrijeme, zaštita i umjerena temperatura.

Neki koralji mogu se obnoviti za 10 godina,

Some corals can regrow in 10 years --

drugima treba mnogo više.

others take a lot longer.

But the more stresses we take off them locally --

Što ih više stresa oslobodimo lokalno,

things like overfishing, sewage pollution, fertilizer pollution,

poput prekomjernog izlova ribe, zagađenja kanalizacijom i gnojivima,

dredging, coastal construction --

iskapanja morskog dna i gradnje duž obale,

the better they can hang on as we stabilize the climate,

toliko bolje će izdržati ako stabiliziramo klimu

and the faster they can regrow.

te će se brže obnoviti.

And as we go through the long, tough and necessary process

I dok prolazimo kroz dug, težak i neophodan proces

of stabilizing the climate of planet Earth,

stabiliziranja klime na Zemlji,

some new corals will still be born.

izrast će i neki novi koralji.

This is what I study in my research.

To proučavam u svom istraživanju.

We try to understand how corals make babies,

Pokušavamo razumjeti kako se koralji razmnožavaju

and how those babies find their way to the reef,

i kako ti potomci pronalaze put do grebena

and we invent new methods to help them survive

te stvaramo nove načine kako bi preživjeli

te rane, krhke faze života.

those early, fragile life stages.

One of my favorite coral babies of all time

Jedan od mojih omiljenih malih koralja svih vremena

showed up right after Hurricane Omar.

pojavio se odmah nakon uragana Omar.

It's the same species I was studying before the storm,

Iste je vrste kao onaj kojeg sam proučavala prije oluje,

but you almost never see babies of this species --

ali skoro nikada ne vidite potomke ove vrste,

it's really rare.

to je zaista rijetko.

This is actually an endangered species.

I radi se o ugroženoj vrsti.

In this photo, this little baby coral, this little circle of polyps,

Na ovoj fotografiji, ovaj mali koralj, ovaj mali krug polipa,

is a few years old.

star je nekoliko godina.

Like its cousins that bleach,

Kao i njegovi rođaci koji blijede,

it's fighting back the algae.

bori se protiv algi.

And like its cousins on the north shore,

Kao i njegovi rođaci na sjevernoj obali,

it's aiming to live for 1,000 years.

planira živjeti tisuću godina.

What's happening in the world and in the ocean

Ono što se događa u svijetu i u oceanu

has changed our time horizon.

promijenilo je naš vremenski horizont.

We can be incredibly pessimistic on the short term,

Kratkoročno možemo biti nevjerojatno pesimistični,

and mourn what we lost

i oplakivati što smo izgubili

and what we really took for granted.

i što smo zaista uzimali zdravo za gotovo.

But we can still be optimistic on the long term,

Ali dugoročno još uvijek možemo biti optimistični

and we can still be ambitious about what we fight for

i ambiciozni za ono za što se borimo

and what we expect from our governments,

i što očekujemo od svojih vlada,

from our planet.

od našeg planeta.

Corals have been living on planet Earth for hundreds of millions of years.

Koralji žive na planetu Zemlji stotinama milijuna godina.

They survived the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Preživjeli su izumiranje dinosaura.

They're badasses.

Oni su tek opasni.

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

An individual coral can go through tremendous trauma and fully recover

Pojedinačni koralj može proći ogromnu traumu i potpuno se oporaviti

if it's given a chance and it's given protection.

ako mu se da prilika i prikladna zaštita.

Corals have always been playing the long game,

Koralji su uvijek igrali na duge staze,

and now so are we.

a sada i mi činimo isto.

Thanks very much.

Velika vam hvala.

(Applause)

(Pljesak)