Barrier Reef Reserve System Belize

Barrier Reef Reserve System - Belize

Short Report

The coastal area of Belize is an excellent natural system, consisting of the largest barrier reef in the northern hemisphere, offshore atolls, hundreds of sand cays, mangrove forests, lagoons and estuaries. The seven sites illustrate the evolutionary history of reef development and are an important habitat for endangered species, such as marine turtles, dugongs, and the U.S. Navy crocodile.

Wide Report

The coastal area of Belize is an excellent natural system, consisting of the largest barrier reef in the northern hemisphere, offshore atolls, hundreds of sand cays, mangrove forests, lagoons and estuaries. The seven sites illustrate the evolutionary history of reef development and a large habitat for endangered species. The reef stretches from the border with Mexico in the north, near the Guatemalan border in the south. The Belize submarine plateau and the barrier reef, the world's second largest reef system and the largest reef complex in the Atlantic-Caribbean area. Outside the gate, there are three large atolls: Turneffe islands, Lighthouse Reef and Glover said, the Reef.

Between the mainland and the barrier reef is a comprehensive offshore lagoon that increases in the width and depth of the north to the south. In the north, an average of 2 to 3 m water depth on a flat, featureless bottom 20-25 km wide. South of Belize City, the shelf gradually deepens a channel between the mainland and the outer platform, a depth of 65 m in the Gulf of Honduras. The approximately 450 sand and mangrove cays are limited to the interior of the dam and atolls vary in size from small, ramshackle sand spits to large, permanent islands capable of sustaining human settlements.

A total of 178 terrestrial plants and 247 taxa of marine fauna is described from space. There are more than 500 species of fish, 65 scleritian corals, 45 hydroids and 350 molluscs in the area, plus a large diversity of sponges, marine worms and shellfish. The area houses a number of types of conservation, including West Indian manatee, green sea turtle loggerhead turtle, loggerhead turtle and American crocodile. The West Indian manatee population (300-700 people) is probably the largest in the world. Different bird species, of conservation concern are to be found in the cayes and atolls. Large seabird colonies and migratory waterbird species are the red feet booby (3000-4,000 individuals) on Half-Moon Caye, brown booby on Man O'War Caye and common noddy Glover said, on the reef. Other notable birds are the brown pelican and the magnificent frigate bird. The Belize barrier reef ecosystem is distinctive in the Western Hemisphere because of its size, its many types of reef and the exuberance of corals flourish in this unspoilt conditions. The are a few unusual geophysical properties, such as the nearby contiguous shelf edge barrier reef, the complex maze of patch reefs and faros in a relatively deep shelf lagoon, the unusual reef types in a small space, the presence of atolls, and the large offshore mangrove cays.

Shell centers in Maya sites along the coast and on the cayes demonstrate that the reefs were used for fishing around 2500 years ago. Between 300 V. BC and AD 900, the coastal waters probably used intensively for fishing by the Maya, and trading posts, ceremonial centers and burial grounds were established on the cayes. With the decline of the Maya civilisation, the reef resources probably largely unused for a number of centuries, although early Spanish explorers used the cayes to repair their boats and collect fresh water. At the beginning of the 17th century, however, the coastal waters of Belize had a heaven for pirates and buccaneers, largely from Great britain , which looted Spanish and British trading ships and survived the abundant marine resources available. Later, many of the pirates, as well as Puritan traders from the Mosquito Coast of Nicaragua, settled in the cayes, fishermen and plantation owners. Since then, there have been a number of waves of immigrants in the coastal area, including the Garifuna people, immigrants from Mexico, and most recently North Americans and other foreigners who were seduced by the beauty of the coral reef and its surroundings and stay on the cayes.

Source:whc/unesco