Category: Blog

HOW DO CORAL MINING AND INDISCRIMINATE HARVESTING AFFECT CORAL REEFS?

• Reef destruction and sedimentation. Mining blasts and removal of the reef, destroying it and causing other indirect impacts, such as sand erosion, land retreat, and sedimentation. These can all greatly affect coastal towns, villages and the tourism industry because the coral protects coastlines and builds beaches.

• Slow recovery. The skeletal framework of reefs, which is removed through mining or removal of reef rock, is built up over hundreds to thousands of years and will take as long to grow back.

• Loss of fish habitat. Removal of coral rock ,“live rock” from reefs removes critical habitat for fish and other animals.

• Economic losses. Coral mining creates a significant long-term loss to society, including a loss in fisheries value, coastal protection, and tourism. When considering these factors, the cost of destroying or mismanaging one square kilometer (0.62 square miles) of reef results in losses between US $137,000 and US $1.2 million over a 25 year period (Richmond, 1994).

Hi Real Reef Supporters,

Here at Real Reef Mfg. we are proud to announce our new distributors Nationwide.  If you are a qualified retailer, online-etailer or professional service company and need to buy Real Reef Rock, please contact a distributor near you. Click the Distributor logo for Company info and contact details.

-Team Real Reef

Real Reef is 100% made and grown in the U.S.A. Here at Real Reef we feel it’s critical that we support and buy American made products when ever we can! It’s good for the U.S. economy, security and the American people. Innovation, farming and manufacturing should always start at home first. Real Reef is an American made product, which is sold here and exported to countries around the world. Real Reef is an example for the World, how America can be an environmental leader with innovative eco friendly products. Help conserve the Coral Reefs, while securing and creating jobs here and abroad.

It is products like Real Reef that continue to set the tone and raise the bar for a sustainable aquarium trade. It proves that aquacultured eco friendly products can be profitable and viable, even for our overseas partners. Every sold piece of wild coral rock encourages and promotes our overseas suppliers to continually damage one of the few resources they have. A habitat resource that needs to be nurtured and farmed, not strip mined, crow barred, boxed and shipped.

What example are we leading the world by? America is only interested in exploiting your resource? Ship pieces of your Island habitat and we will give you money? Let’s lead by example and send a message that farming the reefs and protecting your resource is in your best interest and the Worlds! Without healthy reefs, how will our overseas suppliers ever be able to catch next year’s crop of baby coral, fish and inverts for future aquarists? I know of no sustainable Fishery practice or conservation method that advocates the taking and removing of the very habitat that grows the very resource which brings in revenue for the country of origin. Simply….. buy responsible and support aquaculture and sustainable collected marine life here and abroad when ever possible.  The future of the Marine Aquarium hobby starts with you!

The wild Live Rock mining, harvest or collection is not a sustainable practice! Never has been and never will be, simply due to the fact that it is the very habitat that is taken and never replaced. There has never been a Fishery or Conservation program that has ever advocated the destruction and removing of habitat. The very habitat that feeds, grows and shelters the very fishery that is harvested and sold (Marine Fish, Inverts and Coral) What is the point of buying sustainable or aquacultured products, if we are placing them in or upon a reef made from destroyed coral reef habitat? This makes no sense and is not a productive practice for our hobby and industry. The idea is for native islanders to farm their coral reef resource, as they have done for thousands of years. Not to encourage them to remove and take pieces of the actual habitat that produces the very livelihood for them and future generations.

Hi Real Reefers,

Team Real Reef had a great Reefapalooza this last weekend! When premier Reef Aquarium product manufacturers, Livestock Suppliers and other in the Aquarium industry want a awesome aquarium display at their booths, they choose only the best for their Aquariums! Real Reef rock! Real Reef rock was used in over 30 Display Aquariums in over 20 different vendors booths. Simply…. a great aquarium starts with Real Reef! Below are pictures of some of the awesome exhibits aquascaped with Real Reef from Aquarium companies Worldwide. Enjoy  and see you next year at REEFAPALOOZA 2013.

-Team Real Reef Mfg.

Owner Gary Coffman of Austin Aquadome’s new Red Sea Max Reef Aquarium. From start to finish and aquascaped with Real Reef Rock ! The choice of professionals Worldwide!

Hi Everyone,

Here is Manager Robert Christensen of A World of Fish’s 135 gal. Red Sea S-series Reef display. Real Reef Dealer A World of Fish in Minneapolis Minnesota (worldoffish.com) is a full line Aquatics retailer who proudly sells the Real Reef line of Reef-Eco Friendly products. This is another example of how Real Reef Rock makes some of the most beutiful and dynamic reef displays in the Aquarium Hobby! Nice work Robert and thanks for all the support!

Sincerely, Team Real Reef