I was nervously sucking air from my tank, 15 feet below the surface of the Caribbean Sea. Wielding pliers and zip ties, I was trying — and trying — to fasten a branch of staghorn coral to Bonaire’s newest reef, but the gentlest of currents pushed me away. My anxious breathing had me rising and falling erratically, in danger of becoming what my instructor Rob Verschoor called “a wrecking ball” that could crash into the coral.
After this dive, I would become a newly minted Reef Renewal scuba diver, trained to handle — as lightly as possible — fragments of coral grown in submarine nurseries and eventually planted on bamboo frames affixed to the ocean floor.
Here’s how you can help protect the beautiful coral reefs in Bonaire
On Bonaire, a Dutch Caribbean island east of Aruba, the nonprofit Reef Renewal Foundation Bonaire partners with 13 dive centres to certify participants in reef restoration. The organisation has planted more than 50,000 corals in 19 sites in the country since 2012 — vital work considering that, worldwide, three-quarters of reefs are threatened by forces like climate change and pollution.
Though Bonaire is an ideal place to learn about reef regeneration — the island is surrounded by a marine sanctuary — it isn’t the only destination embracing the practice. Resorts including Windjammer Landing Villa Beach Resort (doubles from USD 224/INR 18,644), in St. Lucia, and Banyan Tree Vabbinfaru (doubles from USD 570/INR 47,442), in the Maldives, invite guests who have acquired scuba certification to help with coral planting. Atlantis Paradise Island Bahamas (doubles from USD 310/INR 25,802) recently announced it would host the country’s first coral gene bank to preserve, study, and propagate species at risk of stony coral tissue loss disease.
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After spending a few days of leisurely diving on Bonaire’s reefs, which are home to eye-catching species like moray eels, I joined the two-day Reef Renewal training at the resort Buddy Dive Bonaire (doubles from USD 375/INR 31,212; reef course USD 220/INR 18,311).
Six of us began with a shallow dive at a coral nursery offshore, equipped with wire brushes to clean algae from the underwater frames to which the coral is attached. It was surprisingly meditative, what with parrotfish and queen angelfish swimming by, and soon we were attaching staghorn and elkhorn coral to the rig. On our final dive, we graduated to move large pieces from the nursery to a bamboo structure that would form the basis of a new reef.
Even through my crystal-clear mask, stringing coral underwater was like threading a needle with blurry vision. One of my patient instructors, Liza Kelly, encouraged me to keep trying, and eventually, I got the hang of it and earned my certification. I returned home with indelible memories of diving — and pride in leaving the reefs slightly better than I found them.
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(Hero and feature image credit: Tourism Corporation Bonaire)
All currency conversions were done at the time of writing
This story first appeared on travelandleisure.com
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