Another BT'r -- the one with the pink fins -- has found this Bonaire-based story on NPR and I am re-posting it here.

Damselfish kill a section of the coral, and then wait for algae to grow in the dead spot. On this coral, only a few live sections remain.

Interesting, Leo.

Reading carefully, it says that man is doing it again, here topping off the predator chain, unbalancing the ecology. Makes sense.

Fishing again.

How do the local fishermen get into this process?
It is obvious (to me) that it is, long term, in their best interest that the reefs thrive.
If fish for dinner tonight is the only easy option to feed your family you will kill the fish.
I would, and you would too, in that situation.
No easy solutions, but I would like to hear from others, especially those living on island.

As in the other recent thread here about local fishermen fishing in the no-fishing zones.

If the only easy option is to kill the fish today and you do it, then you eat now and starve later. Europe fished out the North Sea before WWI and WWII. All of us are over fishing the world's oceans today. As the Fram man says, we pay now or later.

A large part of the problem seems to be too many mouths to feed, and limited resources with which to do so.
But that is another, and much larger, can of worms.