Coral reef to form fringing reefs, and can eventually grow become a barrier reef. Where the bottom is rising, fringing reefs can grow around the coast, but coral raised above sea level dies. If the land subsides slowly, the fringing reefs keep pace by growing upwards on a base of older, dead coral, forming a barrier reef enclosing a lagoon between the reef and the land. A barrier reef can encircle an island, and once the island sinks below sea level a roughly circular atoll of growing coral continues to keep up with the sea level, forming a central lagoon. Barrier reefs
Coral Sea Reserves Ramsar Site Geographic Society of Queensland which visited the Herald Cays and their surrounding reef in 1997. The site was designated as a wetland of international importance under the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. It was listed on 21 October 2002 as Ramsar Site 1222. The site is centred on the Coral Sea Plateau, about 440 km east of Cairns, Queensland, and east of the Great Barrier Reef, from which it is separated by an area of deep water known as the Queensland Trough. Lihou Reef NNR lies to the south-east of the Coringa-Herald NNR and is separated from it by about 100