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Belize Barrier Reef
The Belize Barrier Reef is a series of coral reefs straddling the coast of Belize, roughly offshore in the north and in the south within the country limits. The Belize Barrier Reef is a long section of the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System, which is continuous from Cancún on the north-eastern tip of the Yucatán Peninsula through the Riviera Maya and down to Honduras, making it the second largest coral reef system in the world after the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. It is Belize's top tourist destination, popular for scuba diving and snorkeling and attracting almost half of its 260,000 visitors. It is also vital to the country's fishing industry.Harrabin, Roger. (2006-06-12Reef at forefront of CO2 battle BBC News. Retrieved on 2011-10-21. Charles Darwin described it as "the most remarkable reef in the West Indies" in 1842. In addition to its barrier reef, it also boasts three distinct Caribbean atolls: Turneffe Atoll, Glover's Reef and Lighthouse Reef. Lighthouse Re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Belize
Belize is a country on the north-eastern coast of Central America. It is bordered by Mexico to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and Guatemala to the west and south. It also shares a maritime boundary with Honduras to the southeast. Part of the Caribbean region, Belize is a member of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and the Commonwealth Caribbean, the historical British West Indies. The Maya civilization spread into the area of Belize between 1500 BCE and 300 CE and flourished until about 1200. European contact began in 1502–04 when Christopher Columbus sailed along the Gulf of Honduras. European exploration was begun by English settlers in 1638. Spanish Empire, Spain and Kingdom of Great Britain, Britain both laid claim to the land until Britain defeated the Spanish in the Battle of St. George's Caye (1798). It became British Honduras, a British colony in 1840, and a Crown colony in 1862. Belize achieved its independence from the United Kingdom on 21 September ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
West Indies
The West Indies is an island subregion of the Americas, surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, which comprises 13 independent island country, island countries and 19 dependent territory, dependencies in three archipelagos: the Greater Antilles, the Lesser Antilles, and the Lucayan Archipelago. The subregion includes all the islands in the Antilles, in addition to The Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands, which are in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. The term is often interchangeable with "Caribbean", although the latter may also include coastal regions of Central America, Central and South American mainland nations, including Mexico, Belize, Honduras, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, French Guiana, Guyana, and Suriname, as well as the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic island nation of Bermuda, all of which are geographically distinct from the three main island groups, but culturally related. Terminology The English term ''Indie'' is deri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Half Moon Caye
Half Moon Caye is an island and natural monument of Belize located at the southeast corner of Lighthouse Reef Atoll. This natural monument was the first nature reserve to have been established in Belize under the National Park Systems Act in 1981 and first marine protected area in Central America. This is also Belize's oldest site of wildlife protection since it was first designated as a bird sanctuary in 1924 to protect the habitat of the red-footed booby birds. World Heritage Site Half Moon Caye Natural Monument is part of the Belize Barrier Reef Reserve System World Heritage Site which was established on December 4, 1996, by the United Nations World Heritage Committee after they formally adopted seven marine protected areas along the Belize Barrier Reef and its adjacent atolls under UNESCO at their meeting in Mérida, Mexico. Significant features * The littoral forest, composed primarily of the orange-flowered siricote tree, provides an endangered and fragile habitat tha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Water Caye Marine Reserve
South Water Caye Marine Reserve is the largest marine reserve in the Stann Creek district of Belize. It was established in 1996 and covers of mangrove and coastal ecosystems. It includes the crown reserve of Man-O-War Caye, a nesting site for the brown booby and magnificent frigatebird. In 2017, ''National Geographic'' named Pelican Beach on South Water Caye one of the 21 best beaches in the world. Important Bird Area A 1.2m ha site off the coast of Belize, comprising the nation’s offshore and barrier islands, has been designated an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International because it supports significant populations of several resident, passage or breeding bird species, including white-crowned pigeons, red-footed boobies, roseate terns, Yucatan vireos, black catbirds, and golden-winged and cerulean warblers. The IBA encompasses the South Water Caye, Gladden Spit and Silk Cayes, Sapodilla Cayes and Glover's Reef marine reserves, Half Moon Caye Half Moon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caye
A cay ( ), also spelled caye or key, is a small, low-elevation, sandy island on the surface of a coral reef. Cays occur in tropical environments throughout the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian oceans, including in the Caribbean and on the Great Barrier Reef and Belize Barrier Reef. Etymology The Taíno word for "island", , became in Spanish and "cay" in English (spelled "key" in American English). Formation and composition A cay forms when ocean currents transport loose sediment across the surface of a reef to where the current slows or converges with another current, releasing its sediment load. Gradually, layers of deposited sediment build up on the reef surface – a '' depositional node''. Such nodes occur in windward or leeward areas of reefs, where flat surfaces sometimes rise around an emergent outcrop of old reef or beach rock. The island resulting from sediment accumulation is made up almost entirely of the skeletal remains of plants and animals – ''biogenic s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marine Reserve
A marine reserve is a type of marine protected area (MPA). An MPA is a section of the ocean where a government has placed limits on human activity. A marine reserve is a marine protected area in which removing or destroying natural or cultural resources is prohibited, marine reserves may also be "no-take MPAs,” which strictly forbid all extractive activities, such as fishing and kelp harvesting. As of 2007 less than 1% of the world's oceans had been set aside in marine reserves. Benefits include increases in the diversity, density, biomass, body size and reproductive potential of fishery and other species within their boundaries. As of 2010, scientists had studied more than 150 marine reserves in at least 61 countries and monitored biological changes inside the reserves. The number of species in each study ranged from 1 to 250 and the reserves ranged in size from 0.006 to 800 square kilometers (0.002 to 310 square miles). In 2014, the World Parks Association adopted a target ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Invertebrate
Invertebrates are animals that neither develop nor retain a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''spine'' or ''backbone''), which evolved from the notochord. It is a paraphyletic grouping including all animals excluding the chordata, chordate subphylum Vertebrata, i.e. vertebrates. Well-known Phylum, phyla of invertebrates include arthropods, molluscs, annelids, echinoderms, flatworms, cnidarians, and sponges. The majority of animal species are invertebrates; one estimate puts the figure at 97%. Many invertebrate taxon, taxa have a greater number and diversity of species than the entire subphylum of Vertebrata. Invertebrates vary widely in size, from 10 Micrometre, μm (0.0004 in) myxozoans to the 9–10 m (30–33 ft) colossal squid. Some so-called invertebrates, such as the Tunicata and Cephalochordata, are actually sister chordate subphyla to Vertebrata, being more closely related to vertebrates than to other invertebrates. This makes the "invertebrates" para ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alcyonacea
Alcyonacea is the old scientific order name for the informal group known as "soft corals". It is now an unaccepted name for class Octocorallia. It became deprecated . The following text should be considered a historical, outdated way of treating the taxonomy of Anthozoa and Octocorallia. Some, or many parts of it, are no longer valid. Any remaining information found to be still valid, should be carefully merged into Octocorallia. Alcyonacea are an order of sessile colonial cnidarians that are found throughout the oceans of the world, especially in the deep sea, polar waters, tropics and subtropics. Whilst not in a strict taxonomic sense, Alcyonacea are commonly known as soft corals. The term "soft coral" generally applies to organisms in the two orders Pennatulacea and Alcyonacea with their polyps embedded within a fleshy mass of coenenchymal tissue. Consequently, the term "gorgonian coral" is commonly handed to multiple species in the order Alcyonacea that produce a min ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Belize City
Belize City is the largest city in Belize. It was once the capital city, capital of the former British Honduras. According to the 2022 census, Belize City has a population of 63,999 people. It is at the mouth of the Haulover Creek, which is a distributary of the Belize River. The Belize River empties into the Caribbean Sea from Belize City on the Philip Goldson Highway on the coast of the Caribbean Sea, Caribbean. The city is the country's principal port and its financial and industrial hub. Cruise ships drop anchor outside the port and are tendered by local citizens. The city was almost entirely destroyed in October 1961 when Hurricane Hattie swept ashore. It was the capital of British Honduras (as Belize was then named) until the government was moved to the new capital of Belmopan in 1970. History Belize City English settlement of Belize, was founded as "Belize Town" in 1638 by Baymen, English lumber harvesters. It had been a small Maya peoples, Maya settlement called ''Ho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacques Cousteau
Jacques-Yves Cousteau, (, also , ; 11 June 191025 June 1997) was a French naval officer, oceanographer, filmmaker and author. He co-invented the first successful open-circuit self-contained underwater breathing apparatus (SCUBA), called the Aqua-Lung, which assisted him in producing some of the first underwater documentaries. Cousteau wrote many books describing his undersea explorations. In his first book, '' The Silent World: A Story of Undersea Discovery and Adventure'', Cousteau surmised the existence of the echolocation abilities of porpoises. The book was adapted into an underwater documentary called '' The Silent World''. Co-directed by Cousteau and Louis Malle, it was one of the first films to use underwater cinematography to document the ocean depths in color. The film won the 1956 at the Cannes Film Festival and remained the only documentary to do so until 2004 (when '' Fahrenheit 9/11'' received the award). It was also awarded the Academy Award for Best Do ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Blue Hole
The Great Blue Hole is a large Blue hole, marine sinkhole off the coast of Belize. It lies near the center of Lighthouse Reef, a small atoll from the mainland and Belize City. The hole is circular in shape, across and deep. It has a surface area of . It was formed during several phases of the Quaternary glaciation when sea levels were much Last glacial period, lower. Analysis of stalactites found in the Great Blue Hole shows that formation took place 153,000, 66,000, 60,000, and 15,000 years ago. As the ocean began to rise again, the cave was flooded. The Great Blue Hole is a part of the larger Belize Barrier Reef, Belize Barrier Reef Reserve System, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Exploration The site was made famous by Jacques Cousteau, who declared it one of the top five scuba diving sites in the world. In 1971 he brought his ship, the ''RV Calypso, Calypso'', to the hole to chart its depths. Investigations by this expedition confirmed the hole's origin as typical karst lim ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lighthouse Reef
Lighthouse Reef is an atoll in the Caribbean Sea, the easternmost part of the Belize Barrier Reef and one of its three atolls, the other two being Turneffe Atoll and Glover's Reef. Lighthouse Reef is located about southeast of Belize City. The atoll is of oblong shape, approximately long from north to south, and about wide. It forms a shallow sandy lagoon with an area of and a depth between deep. The reef is one of the best developed and healthiest reefs in the Caribbean, "with an emergent fringing reef, a sloping fore reef with a coral rimmed shelf edge, vertical coral walls, and numerous patch reefs in the shallow central lagoon." There are several islands, listed here from north to south: * Sandbore Caye * Northern Caye * Half Moon Caye * Saddle Caye * Long Caye * Hat Caye Lighthouse Reef is known as a snorkelling and diving destination, considered one of the best dive sites in Belize and the whole Caribbean. Notable diving locations are Half Moon Caye Wall, Long C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
