Australian scientist find household vinegar can prevent collapse of Great Barrier Reef by killing starfish

The Crown of Thorns Starfish, or CoTS, has caused alarm over breeding at epidemic levels and eating a majority of the live corals on the Great Barrier Reef. However, scientists have discovered that the coral-eating pest can easily be killed by the simple household vinegar as effective as the current, expensive ox-bile drug being used.

Prior to the discovery, the use of vinegar on experiments has failed, and the researchers at the James Cook University in Australia tried to refine the process that resulted in a 100 percent kill rate. The current drug being used to kill the coral-eating starfish is more expensive and require permits and longer processes compared to vinegar that is available at any local supermarket, the researchers say.

The lead author of the study, Lisa Bostrom-Einarsson, said that the team used 20ml of vinegar for laboratory tests, which is only half of the price of current drug. The researchers injected the vinegar on the CoTS, which killed the marine animals within 48 hours.

CoTS are described as one of the biggest threats that caused the decline of corals on the Great Barrier Reef over the past 30 years. One of the factors that scientists consider by developing treatments to kill the CoTS is its effect to other marine species living on the reef. However, the team said that the fish that fed on the dead CoTS didn’t developed any illness or visible side effects.

But large-scale field trials should also be done to support the findings and to ensure the safety of the process for other marine life, Bostrom-Einarsson said. "There's no reason to think it won't work or it'll be dangerous, but we have to be sure," she stated.

Bostrom-Einarsson added that the findings may help developing countries to stop using the current drug to eliminate the starfish. However, with the success of the vinegar experiment, scientists still say that preventing the CoTS outbreak will not help to save coral reefs alone.

According to recent estimate, between 4 and 12 million starfish are dwelling on the Great Barrier Reef alone, while a single female CoTS can produce about 65 million eggs in a single breeding season. Conservation teams have killed around 350,000 starfish in 2014, and Bostrom-Einarsson said that as insane efforts are needed to eliminate all the CoTS, sustained efforts can still “save individual reefs."

The reef report card, released by the government in the past week, shows that the Great Barrier Reef is still in bad shape, and that the goals to reduce chemical runoff from agriculture are not being met and is worsening the situation. To date, to kill the animals one by one is the only method available, and the research team from JCU plans to conduct sea trials of the vinegar method by the end of 2015.

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