Next steps for this project

So far the Global Coral Disease Database is populated almost entirely by observations taken from the scientific literature. There is an important bias inherent in this approach, principally that scientific journals do not function as a monitoring mechanism. This has two consequences.

• Firstly, that the records of coral disease in the database represent the locations at which individuals publishing work on disease are working, rather than the distribution of diseases in itself.
• Secondly, that a simple observation of coral disease would not merit publication in a scientific journal, or even perhaps in most grey literature, so that many observations may not have been placed in the public domain.

The next stage therefore is to begin incorporating unpublished field observations of coral disease in the database. These web pages and the Global Coral Disease Database will be updated on a monthly basis so that the new observations may be plotted in the mapping tool.

Why do this? If there is a link between anthropogenic influence on reefs and the incidence and distribution of coral diseases then their occurrence is unlikely to be uniformly or randomly distributed at regional scales. An understanding of possible patterns in the distribution of coral diseases would constitute a first step in examining whether any relationship exists.

If you have observations of coral disease which you would like to be included in the Global Coral Disease Database then either:

1. complete the web-based form, or
2. complete this excel spreadsheet, or
3. email, post or fax your observations to the Global Coral Disease Database at UNEP-WCMC

Note: Please provide full contact details. We cannot accept data with unknown origin.