Human Impact
The primary human impact on deep-water corals is from deep-water trawling. Trawlers drag nets across the ocean floor, disturbing sediments, breaking and destroying deep-water corals. Another harmful method is long line fishing.
Oil and gas exploration also damage deep-water coral.
Deep-water corals grow slowly, so recovery takes much longer than in shallow waters where nutrients and food-providing zooxanthellae are far more abundant.
In a study during 2001 to 2003, a study of a reef of Lophelia pertusa in the Atlantic off Canada found that the corals were often broken in unnatural ways. And the ocean floor displayed scars and overturned boulders from trawling.
Read more about this topic: Deep-water Coral
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