1. The Great Barrier Reef is the largest coral reef in the world. He begins from the East coast of Queensland (about 2600 km. long and its area is about 344,400 square km.) and its made of 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands. 2. It has 400 species of coral(there are hard and soft corals), 1500 species of fish (like butterflyfish), 215 species of birds (like black-naped tern) , 500 species of seaweed and 16 kinds of sea snakes (like olive sea snakes). 3. Were losing it! The Great Barrier Reef has lost half of its coral in the last 27 years! The causes are: Pollution of oil spills, fertilizers, and pesticides; another cause is people (taking the corals like souvenirs, walking on them) : the fishes that eat the coral are damaging, etc. Shen Neng!