[greenbean36191]

I'm not really sure what you men by cyanide, and especially dynamite, destroying the reefs? I'm not saying that you're wrong but it's the first that I've heard of this.

Cyanide is squirted into the reef to stun reef fish and make them easy to capture in some parts of the world. It use to be much more widespread, but a lot of pressure has been put on the collectors to stop because the fish have poor survival and the cyanide kills the reefs. It's still a major problem though.

Blast fishing is also a common way to catch fish on the reef in many parts of the world. Dynamite or home-made bombs are thrown on the reef and the fishermen collect the maimed and dying fish. Obviously it destroys the reef. It's illegal pretty much world-wide, but as with most measures meant to protect the reefs, it's nearly impossible to enforce in the areas where it's historically been a problem.

I'm not sure where you get your information about florida's reefs, but I was under the impression that all the work being done to sink or build "artifitial reefs" has done wonders for the health, numbers, and spread of floridas's reefs, maybe your numbers don't include these as they arent deemed to be truly "wild" reefs?

Florida's reefs are in absolutely terrible shape. The three main reef building corals have been functionally extinct on most reefs there for the past 20 years and don't show much sign of recovery. A lot of Florida's reefs were on the edge before human impacts though. The really troubling thing is that the same story of the loss of the primary reef builders is true in most of the Caribbean where reef development has been historically good.

There isn't a whole lot of data about what good artificial reefs do. It's unlikely that they have any significant impact on coral populations, and they may not even have much impact on fish.

I do know that everthing short of armed guards has been done to save the wild reefs across the world recently, as in no more shiping channels to be dug, large filter screens to catch larger polution like plastic bags and things built into streams and rivers, and dramatic changes in the types of field fertilization used (ie: the work being done to curb the invation of the crown of thorns starfish on the great barrier reef, they are doing more damage to the great barrier than anything else hasin the last 50 years)

Very little has been done to protect reefs around the world. Coastal runoff and pollution is still increasing, fishing pressure is still increasing, mangrove destruction is still increasing, wildlife protection laws are still unenforceable, very little has been done to curb CO2 emissions, etc. Essentially nothing has been done to curb the biggest manmade threats to the reefs.

Also, FWIW there is no demonstrated link between pollution and crown of thorns outbreaks. We also don't know that they're a new phenomenon since we have only really been documenting them since about the 1970s. We don't even know if they are even a real threat to the reefs. Most of the reefs that are wiped out are back to pre-outbreak coral densities within a few years.

there should always be reefs "should" you guys have seen how fast these guys can grow, they'll just creep to colder and colder water as it becomes inhabitable

I agree that there may always be reefs, but I don't expect them to be recognizable to us. The idea that corals will just creep further north is unlikely. Calcium availability is a big problem. Once you go past northern FL, you don't have enough calcium for fast reef-building. The water isn't saturated with aragonite like it is in the tropics and the sand switches from calcium to silica, so even if the pH continues to drop there still isn't a new source of calcium. Also, as pH continues to drop the area with enough dissolved aragonite to support fast growth will shrink towards the tropics.

So there are several factors that would prevent reefs from moving north, particularly in the Atlantic. The main reef builders are already gone, so the reefs are growing slower than in the past, those corals recruit poorly, so their recovery and spread is slow, and calcium availability won't allow for faster growth if they do start moving. To compound all of those problems the expected sea level increase will drown a lot of reefs since it's expected to be very fast in geologic terms.

To answer the original question, I don't think reefs will go extinct any time soon but I do think it's likely that they'll become unrecognizable to us as we think of reefs today. I also think in the near future wild collected livestock will be a thing of the past, at least in the US. That will probably be due to legislation rather than a push by hobbyists. Depending on how soon that happens either we will end up with good availability of cultured corals and fish and the hobby will continue or we'll have roughly the same, limited selection we have now and the hobby will essentially die off as people get bored or species go extinct within the hobby.