Experts have warned that the richly diverse coral reefs of the Coral Triangle around southeast Asia will disappear by the end of the century if action is not taken against climate change.

As well as the loss of one of the world’s most diverse underwater ecosystems, the knock on effect would be the collapse of coastal economies that supports around 100 million people, according to the WWF- commissioned study outlined at the World Ocean Conference this week.

The Coral Triangle includes 30 percent of the world’s reefs, 76 percent of global reef building coral species and more than 35 percent of coral reef fish.

However the authors of the study believe that effective global action on climate change and regional attention to problems of over-fishing and pollution would prevent catastrophe.

The report presents two different possible futures for the world’s richest marine environment — the coasts, reefs and seas of the six countries of Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Timor Leste… Full Story on CNN.com

MADISON COUNTY, Virginia (CNN) — Amidst the tranquility of a fishing trip at the Rose River Farm in Madison County, a wounded warrior says he almost feels “semi-normal again.”

Retired Navy Capt. Ed Nicholson’s Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing helps rehabilitate wounded servicemembers.

Retired Navy Capt. Ed Nicholson’s Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing helps rehabilitate wounded servicemembers.

The amputee is one of about 1,000 servicemen and veterans who have reaped the benefits of the therapeutic art of fly-fishing, with the help of retired Navy Capt. Ed Nicholson.

“The demons of war, you just don’t set them aside,” says Nicholson, 67. “But once you get out on the river, the serenity is incredibly healing.”

While recovering from cancer surgery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in 2004, Nicholson witnessed wounded and disabled men and women — many of them amputees — struggling with their injuries.

“Other than being in Vietnam and seeing people in the process of getting hurt, I never really had a full appreciation for the recovery part and what happened after they came home. My recovery was nothing compared to what they were facing. It planted the seed that maybe there’s something I could do,” Nicholson says.

The solution was obvious to Nicholson, who says being an outdoorsman is in his blood: Get them out of the hospital and into nature.

Through free classes and outings, Nicholson’s organization, Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing, helps rehabilitate injured and disabled servicemembers and veterans.

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