Belize Ecology

Posted by Slickrock Adventures on October 4, 2016

The Belize Lionfish invasion actually encompasses the entire Caribbean and Atlantic marine ecosystems. This crisis has been in the news for several years now, and we write about the Belize Lionfish epidemic frequently. These invasive fish, which have no natural enemies, have disrupted coral reef ecosystems and are threatening to wipe out many indigenous species. We recently found a new article tha

Posted by Slickrock Adventures on August 16, 2016

I have posted often about hunting lionfish and the Belize lionfish invasion. Lionfish were first spotted at Glover’s Reef in the winter of 2009. We heard about them in an article online, and notified our island staff. Within days, they spotted the first lionfish; it was uncanny. Since that time, we have actively pursued them with spearguns while snorkeling to keep their numbers down as much

Posted by Slickrock Adventures on July 19, 2016

A recent New York Times article entitled Coral vs Coal details the struggle in Australia between the climate change deniers and the climate change chroniclers. And unfortunately it does appear to come down to choosing between the two. “The reef, one of the largest living things on earth, has started to fail. Whether it can recover is unclear. An organism roughly the size of Germany is bleach

Posted by Slickrock Adventures on April 20, 2016

Coral bleaching is a phenomena that results from high ocean temperatures. Coral thrives in a narrow temperature window, unable to grow if the water becomes either too hot or too cold. Sometimes a worldwide or regional weather pattern of particularly high temperatures will cause coral bleaching, where the coral dies as a result, turning white rather than it’s natural color of tan, yellow, bro

Posted by Slickrock Adventures on April 13, 2016

It is a never ending battle to regulate the local fishermen in Belize, and as the fishing stock in Belize continues to decline it has become more of an issue not only for the fishing industry but also for the tourism industry. Belize has many protected areas and Marine Reserves, but the Fisheries Department has chronic financial issues and cannot field enough rangers to effectively control over-fi

Posted by Slickrock Adventures on March 16, 2016

Every year we receive a Christmas card from Community Conservation, whose headquarters are located in Wisconsin, but they are a non-profit conservation organization with projects all over the world. In addition to helping start the Community Baboon Sanctuary of Belize, they also operate in India, Peru, Ghana, Costa Rica, El Salvador, and Madagascar, among a host of other countries. Believing that