GREAT BARRIER REEF

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18906, 5 July 1923, Page 7

GREAT BARRIER REEF

PROBLEM OF CORAL FORMATION. VALUABLE DATA SECURED. Pres* Association—By Telegraph—Copyrig it BRISBANE, July 4. The scientific expedition which has returned ' from examining the Great Barrier Reef between Cairns and Thursday Island secured valuable data as the result of a month’s work. The members claim to have made discoveries which will have an important bearing on the solution of the major problems of, the Barrier Reef. They point to the fact that probably during long geological ages Queensland lost territory through the sea invading the coast for many miles. The former coast line is now composed of rows of islands and peaks of submerged mountains. During all this time , the Barrier also had been sinking, but the coral had grown as fast as the foundation had sunk, so that the gain equalised the loss.

The coral' formations of the Great Barrier Beef have formed the subject of much scientific investigation, and various theories have been put forward as to' their origin. C. Darwin, one of the early investigators, advanced the subsidence theory, but in later years many instances of recently upraised coral formations have been described by Sir J. Murray and others, and a mass of evidence has been adduced which has shaken this theory to its foundations. Some of these later researches have shown that many of the peculiar coral formations of the Great Barrier cannot be explained on the theory of subsidence, but aro rather attributable to the natural growth of corals on banks formed by prevailing currents, or on extensive shore platforms or submarine flats formed by the erosion of pre-existing land surfaces. The message printed above indicates that important new light lias been thrown on the problem.