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A green turtle glides over a wasteland of dead coral near Kanton island in the central Pacific. Before water temperatures spiked here in 2002-03, this reef was brimming with life.
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A halfspotted hawkfish (Paracirrhites hemistictus) rests near a reef at Nikumaroro island damaged by ocean warming in the central Pacific. The pink coralline algae is an early sign of recovery: The algae form a substrate on which new coral can attach itself and grow.
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A shy and elusive fish, a Napoleon wrasse at Orona island is a good omen for the marine reserve. The abundance of this species, often fished out early when reefs are targeted, means that the reef system here is still relatively intact. “The Phoenix Islands are what the oceans were like a thousand years ago,” scientist Stone says, “and what they can be like a thousand years from now.”
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A school of Pacific steephead parrotfish graze on dead coral at Kanton island. “You can hear them going crunch, crunch, crunch,” says Greg Stone, a diver and marine scientist. By grazing on algae, these and other herbivores keep reefs free of seaweed, enabling pink coralline algae to take hold and form a substrate for new coral.
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A four-saddle grouper in the Kanton island lagoon passes over the candy-pink coralline algae on which new coral will grow.
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Healthy new plate coral in the lagoon on Kanton island is a sign of hope. Since the waters here were hit by a severe bleaching episode, the coral has grown to a diameter of more than four feet.
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A bluefin trevally (Caranx melampygus) shadows a longface emperor (Lethrinus Olivaceus) off Nikumaroro, one of eight small islands in the chain known as the Phoenix Islands, which is part of the nation of Kiribati.
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On a mission to feed, yellowfin surgeonfish crowd the water at Nikumaroro. Although the atoll lost many corals, it kept an abundance of grazing fish that help reefs recover by keeping them clean.
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Frigatebird chicks await circling adults on Rawaki, one of 33 islands in the sprawling nation of Kiribati.
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A green turtle (Chelonia mydas) swims through a school of striped surgeonfish (Acanthurus lineatus) near Orona island in the Phoenix Islands Protected Area (PIPA), which was named a World Heritage site last year. About the same size as California, PIPA is one of the world's largest marine protected areas.
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David Obura, a marine scientist with CORDIO, an Indian Ocean conservation organization, measures new growth on table coral (Acropora hyacinthus) in the lagoon on Kanton island, where reefs were devastated by a rare episode of extreme ocean warming.
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Even without counting the vast open ocean and largely unexplored deep-sea regions in the reserve, the Phoenix Island Protected Area shelters more than 800 fish, bird, and coral species, including 120 species of hard corals, such as this leafy formation at Enderbury Island.
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A pair of emperor angelfish (Pomacanthus imperator) shimmers in the waters off Kanton island. With more than 500 fish species, reefs in this undisturbed island chain have recovered more quickly from coral bleaching than reefs in places such as the Caribbean, which also face pollution and fishing.
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Hovering briefly over the photographer, feet tucked up beneath its belly, a frigatebird comes in for a landing on Rawaki. Hundreds of thousands of birds lay their eggs on the island.
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