Reef Ball Foundation Digital Assets

The 8th CARAH (An International Artificial Reef Scientific Conference) was on March 6, 2005 in Biloxi, MS and was attended by Todd Barber and Tom Maher of Reef Ball Foundation. Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Artificial Reefs and Artificial Habitats (CARAH), edited by Thomas Maher, is now available The 8th CARAH provided the scientific community an opprotunity to present, demonstrate, and otherwise display the current state of understanding and knowledge of artificial reefs and artificial habitats. The presentation platforms offered by the CARAHs and other regional gatherings, as well as the publication of their proceedings, have laid a firm foundation for the continuing development of this relatively new sub-discipline of the aquatic sciences. The Bulletin of Marine Science has been an integral part of this process, and has been the venue for publication for the 3rd (held in Newport Beach, California, 1983), 4th (held in Miami, Florida, 1987), 5th (held in Long Beach, California, 1991), and now the 8th (held in Biloxi, Mississippi, 2005) CARAH. The present volume offers a comprehensive inspection of ongoing research. In his perspective of artificial reef investigations Stephen Bortone writes that the titles in this volume and in the abstracts posted for the 8th CARAH indicate “some improving trends in artificial reef research”. He acknowledges that “much of the current research is now hypothesis-based, where experimental designs are deployed to test hypotheses and create ecological models.” Thus, “current reasearch on artificial reefs has benefited by limiting the questions asked, increasing the power of the observations, and focusing on more goal-oriented, species-specific questions.” Copies of the conference proceedings (Bulletin of Marine Science, Volume 78, no 1) can be purchased on CD-Rom (PDF) or hardcopy, or are available on BMS online through IngentaConnect. The price of the volume is $45 plus shipping ($5 in the US, $8 for other countries).