Question Anyone dive Roatan lately ? 10/26/23

[GBO80]

A friend just returned from Bonaire and said the reef was awful Said everything was brown and w no color

Was wondering if Roatan is in the same poor condition ?

 

[Doc]

I can’t offer a comparison, haven’t done both in the last X months, but due to exceptionally warm water, all sorts of ugly has beset all coral reef structures in the Greater Caribbean Basin, also worldwide.

Take in the big picture…

The seasonal rains have been limited- they cool the Ocean to a great extent. No rain, warmer water, stressed coral.

This too shall pass.

We should try to not be so short sighted. The reefs will never ever get better, man will continue to poison them. It is the undeniable path.

There was a time when Florida and Jamaica had great diving. We fixed that.

 

[laurenceh]

I'm on the island of Utila, which is just a few miles from Roatan, I expect our conditions are the same. There is plenty of bleached coral, so expect to see lots of white but the majority of the hard coral is still ok and all of the soft coral is doing well.

 

[bryankwatts]

I just came back from Roatan and yes there is a lot of bleached coral on the reef. The reef is really beautiful though. The water temp was really warm around 84-86 degrees F.

 

[Sure Squintsalot]

Shallow reefs of the west end were well past bleaching and covered with much filamentous green and red/brown algaes, as of May 2022. It looked to me like it had been this way for quite a while. Additionally it looked like even the native hard leaf algaes were stressed with some covered with filamentous tufts of cyanobacteria(?)

Reefs near Cocoview didn't seem to be fairing any beter. More here:

 

[OctopusSneakers]

A friend just returned from Bonaire and said the reef was awful Said everything was brown and w no color

Was wondering if Roatan is in the same poor condition ?

I was in Bonaire in May, and some sites were brown and dead, but others were great. In particular the lake stood out as a disappointment, but Karpata, Tolo, and Red Slave were wonderful. I know the weather has had a big impact on conditions in the last few months and can't speak to Roatan as recently, but know that Bonaire has a wide range of dive site reef status.