What Is Natural?: Coral Reef Crisis

by Jan Sapp

Book Overview

During the late 1960s and 1970s, massive herds of poisonous crown-of-thorns starfish suddenly began to infest coral reef communities around the world, leaving in their wake devastation comparable to a burnt-out rainforest. In What is Natural?, Jan Sapp both examines this ecological catastrophe and captures the intense debate among scientists about what caused the crisis, and how it should be handled.
The crown-of-thorns story takes readers on tropical...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195123646
• ISBN13: 9780195123647
• Release Date: January 1999
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.3" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

An excellent review of coral reef management

As a wedge in the reflection of our coral reef management policy, crown-of-thorns starfish outbreaks attracted people's attention on our deteriorating reef environments. With the concern of biodiversity conservation, Jan Sapp included and organized documents of scientific studies and political events to examine the proposed reasons of starfish plagues and its influence on global reef management. For those who are interested in coral reef biology and environmental management, this easy-read book provides good amount of reef ecology knowledge, also reveals a good case to understand how on-land decision makers determine the fate of underwater world.