Acropora Spawn

2011-06-23T16:54:00.000-04:00

The mission of the Teen Research Underwater Explorers, or T.R.U.E. Dive Team, is to use marine science and SCUBA diving as tools to mentor young adults (ages 10-18). The hands-on experiences are designed to promote science, active stewardship and conservation of our oceans and coasts, while also building citizenship and leadership capabilities for future generations.

August 30th, 2010

2010-08-30T11:34:00.002-04:00

Unfortunately, the Acropora didn't spawn again last night, but that's okay becuase i saw my favorite fish on the day dive yesterday, and we got to dive aquarius. Plus, i got a really good picutre of a moray eel and a great barracuda. :) Even if the Acropora didn't spawn, I'm really excited to see whether or not the Montastrea will spawn. Those are my favorite type of coral, so it would be pretty cool to see them spawn. Today, we're going to Mr. Nedimyer's lab which should also be really cool because so far we've only been to the coral nursery so it will be a good chance to see what happens beyond the nursery.

Monday August 30, 2010

2010-08-30T11:12:00.003-04:00

The Smithsonian crew has been monitoring acroporids in Carrie Bow, Belize for the past 4 nights (Aug. 26 - Aug. 29). We did not observe any spawning this month. However, last month a mass acroporid spawn was observed here in Carrie Bow.

Here are Raphael Ritson-Williams' observations from last month:

Full moon night of July 25th

July 26th-No monitoring

July 27th-No spawning observed. Monitored small patch reef, too rough for CBC reef.

July 28th-No spawning observed-monitored CBC reef from 7:45-9:30pm.

July 29th-Observed Acropora palmata spawning. Only a few colonies and one or two branches within those colonies. Monitored CBC reef from 7:45-9:45pm.

July 30th- Observed Acropora palmata and A. cervicornis spawning. This was a large spawn of A. palmata (set approx. 8:10 pm and release 8:45 pm). Many colonies released gametes and typically it was the entire colony. We also observed a few A. cervicornis release gametes shortly (approx 20 min.) after the A. palmata. Monitored CBC reef from 7:45-10pm.

July 31st- Observed Acropora palmata and A. cervicornis spawning. This was a large spawn of A. cervicornis. Many colonies released gametes (set approx. 8:15 and release 9:10 pm) and typically it was the entire colony. We also observed some of the same A. palmata colonies release gametes as on the previous two nights. Monitored CBC reef from 7:45-10pm.

August 1st-Observed one A. palmata colony release gamete bundles. Also observed 5-6 Siderastrea siderea males releasing sperm (10:05-10:20pm). Monitored CBC reef from 9:15-10:30pm.

August 2nd-No spawning observed. Monitored CBC reef from 9:40-10:20.

2010-08-29T11:18:00.002-04:00

Saturday, 3:00 p.m. - On this lovely afternoon the TRUE dive team was blessed with the oppurtunity to visit the Neidemeyer's coral nursery, where they have been collecting and asexually creating more and more A.Cevircornes over the past few years. The dive group consisted of the Neidemeyer family, the TRUE dive, and a few members of the coral restoration foundation. We went on 2 seperate dives while we were at the farm, and split up all the work in between the different groups. The different jobs were as follows; cleaning the algae off bases of the corals, hanging the corals on line similar to a "hydroponic farm", epoxying the baby corals to bases, and moving rubble without fins.

Saturday Night, 9:00 p.m. - While the world is getting ready for bed, the TRUE dive team is getting ready to go on another coral spawning adventure. The dive group was essentially the same as the afternoon dives were, except an added cameraman. Once we got to the reef, half of the divers went in at around 9:45 and stayed down for 45 minutes, while the second half went down at around 10:15. It was quite an exciting dive, but I find all the night dives to be exciting. But, as with the other dives, it was another unsuccessful dive trip without a spawn. And we are all hoping that today will be "the day."

sporal conning

2010-08-28T12:04:00.002-04:00

As much as I hate to restate things, here's the saga so far:

Thursday, 7:00 AM- we leave from north st. petersburg on our sojourn to key largo. this takes just under 6 hours.

Thursday, 12:15 PM-we arrive. The dive shop and drydock are just as we left it all those months ago, not a thing has changed. The captain is still the serious but friendly man I met 2 years ago. The deckhands are new, but I like them, too.

Thursday, 3:00 PM-we're on the water. yo ho ho and a bottle of compressed air, and all that. we're acclimating ourselves to the restoration site, and the current isn't helping. it's to be expected, of course, but still, Odin could stand to lend a hand.

Thursday, around 5:00 PM-we feast. chinese food (in hindsight, not the best thing to eat before a night dive while working with delicate coral) is our muse. pretty straightforward.

after that, we go back out to watch the A. Cervicornis. nothing happens, as the tablets predicted.

Friday, Noon- we're on our way back to the drydock. same plan tonight, but during the day we're just diving on a couple reefs (the Benwood and French Reef) for gits & shiggles (and fish counts). nothing to report.

Friday, around 5:00- we get back for dinner, only to meet three new arrivals; Zach, Chrales and Jeff. I hadn't seen Charles in months, so that was cool. Jeff Dunbar and I hadn't hung out since the DC trip, so this was a glorious reunion, to be sussinct.

we proceed to follow the same plan as yesterday, except this time, we're met by the entire Nedimyer armada (and friends), and dive the Acropora site again. Jeff and I are dive buddies, and we try our hardest to will the corals to spawn.

Saturday, 12:20 PM (now)-turns out Dr. P is down with some sort of sickness, and the weather seems to be taking a turn for the worse. clearly Odin is testing me for weakness, and I will not disappoint him. today we sail for the nedimyer nursery.

Until my next contact,
Matthew "Frenchman" Mostrom

8/26/10... DAY ONE!

2010-08-27T12:52:00.003-04:00

Hey everybody! Andrea here writing from Key Largo, woohoo!!!
Quite excited to be here :)
So T.R.U.E caravaned down here from St.Pete at seven in the morning and we literally drove straight to the dive shop (a rather uneventful 5.5 hours), and stayed there till 12:30 a.m. We have Dr.P back from his hiatus with the oil spill ('cuz if you haven't heard, he's kind of a big deal... and I mean kind of as really).
We met Andy and Katie from the Coral Restoration Foundation (CRF), who are pretty cool :)
They showed us how to set up spawning nets and collection containers ect. (more on that in a bit) on our way out to the dive site, Molasses Reef, to do recon dives in order to orient ourselves for our night dives.
There are four teams, blue, pink, yellow and green each assigned to certain corals. All teams are responsible for A. cervicornis, except pink, who's on the palmata. We rove around monitering our respective corals for signs of setting (when the gamete bundles are in the polyps' mouth, this indicates it's aboout to spawn) in which case we put the net over it. The nets are cones of mesh with a small screw top container affixed to the top with a peice of foam (so it stays upright) and a lead line on the bottom so the net won't float away. When the corals spawn they release thier gamete bundles, which are bouyant and thus float into the container (there's a hole in the lid attached to the net). Once this is full you take a lid without holes from your big mesh bag'o'tricks (that's what it feels like at least, with all the collection containers and extra nets and floaties... but I digress) and position it right next to your full container. Then you adroitly unscrew the full container, taking care to keep it flat so no spawn escapes and screw it into the lid. Matt and I can do this quite well but our practice was during the day and without spawn, although I'm confident we'll excell at this when it's the real deal, which almost happened!
On our night dive blue and green teams went in twenty minutes after pink and yellow and we roved around from blue coral to blue coral (they're not really blue but have a marker consiting of a blue sponge tied to a bolt right next to them) until Libby noticed one of them with its lower branches setting! The tenacles on the polyp were out more, looking almost turgid (this was around 10:35p.m.) She called Andy over to reconfirm since he was near by and Matt and I placed the net over it. Unfortunately our dive was over mere minutes later and we exited the water leaving the net behind. Katie picked it up for us since it wasn't actually set, the bundles were getting ready, pushing the envelope, reelin' to go.
Besides the excitment of the spawning event I'm ecstaic to be in such alovely place as Key Largo. Every time we come here I'm blown away by how amazingly blue and clear the water is. And then on night dives, once you're off shore the stars are fantastic! One can even see the Milky Way! Alright, NOW I'm rambling..... Hopin' for spawn tomorrow.
:)
Andrea

P.s. Hi Coral! You're dad's sitting behind me and mentioned you might read this. So, HI!!!

TRUE Acropora Spawning Trip 2010

2010-08-27T12:33:00.003-04:00

The Teen Research Underwater Explorers have arrived in Key Largo for our 2nd annual Acropora Spawning Research Trip!!! During the days, we will do some of our favorite dives in the upper keys, conducting fish surveys for REEF and Bleachwatch for Mote Marine Lab. While other folks are tucking themselves into a nice warm bed at night, we will be heading out to do multiple night dives under the moonlight on the Florida Keys Reef Tract.

This year, we are pleased to be working with Katie and Andy of the Coral Restoration Foundation. We are collecting spawn from Acropora cervicornis, staghorn corals, at the Wellwood Restoration site on Molasses Reef. These corals were transplanted by the Coral Restoration Foundation in 2007, 2008, and 2009. The goal is to collect gametes from different known genotypes of corals, cross-fertilize the samples, and create "test tube corals", hopefully developing a strain of Acropora cervicornis that preserves the best characteristics from each genotype. Sorry for all the scientific mumbo jumbo. I am sure you will be more interested to hear our story told from the mouths of our Teen Explorers. So, here is the "rest of the story...."

Libby Carnahan
TRUE Education Officer

Night 6... Shockingly Spawntastic!

2009-08-14T18:24:00.000-04:00

This update is somewhat delayed because we have been very busy raising lots of larvae!

We went out on again on night 6 (after the full moon) to Elbow Reef and Sand Island (with help from Evan D'allesandro of Univ Miami) and got a spawn from nearly every clone within our monitoring plots at Elbow and a few outside the plots. In all 7 to 8 different genets released anywhere from a small dribble to massive amounts of gametes.

The Sand Island group reported a vigorous spawn, much more than we have seen in the past. They were able to collect from 3 different colonies that were likely different genets (though we are not sure). Night 6 after the full moon is typically the first night that we begin to look for Montastraea faveolata spawn so after collecting bundles we hung around to have a look at Montastraea and the Elbow group did not see any bundles but the Sand Island team did.

SCUBAnauts - 8/10/09

2009-08-14T11:00:00.003-04:00

Hi it's Marcos again. Today we quickly ate breakfast with the hopes of getting out early to dive The Eagle. Unfortunately when we got there the dive was called because the current was way to strong. Instead we headed over to Crocker Reef, where we did an amazing 70 foot dive. Many of us got to see a sea turtle swim by. After that we decided to go to Davis' Ledge to snorkel. At night we decided that we should monitor the coral one last time, but this time, we headed over to a different location called Sand Island. At night the Acropora palmata spawned for us a third night in a row, and we were there to collect the gametes. We were speechless at the fact that we had seen the coral spawn even once, but three times was unbelievable. There was only Acropora palmata at this site, and it spawned at about 10:40 PM.

Night 5 Better!

2009-08-10T23:35:00.002-04:00

We were watching palmata at Elbow and Sand Island (with help from the SCUBAnauts!) tonight and got some dribbles from Sand Island once again but did a bit better at Elbow Reef. The same clone that has spawned the past few nights spawned big tonight! 3 different genets on the other spur spawned tonight but in lesser amounts. One large colony gave us a decent volume and we got a bit from the other 2 (forgive the vague measurements!). Given that this spur has lagged a bit and seems to be just getting started we are hoping to try to go out again tomorrow night. Traditionally we only watch them from nights 2-5 after the August full moon but can't help but wonder what will happen on night 6 this year!

SCUBAnauts - 8/9/09

2009-08-10T09:51:00.002-04:00

Hey it's Marcos once again from the SCUBAnauts. Today we did two morning dives at Aquarius, a one-of-a-kind underwater marine lab. Our first dive we hit around 60 feet, and our second dive we stayed at about 50 feet. There were some of the biggest fish in all of the Keys swimming around and underneath Aquarius, including two huge Tarpon, and three large Goliath Groupers. We received a call from NOAA earlier in the day saying that the coral might spawn again tonight, so we gathered a group of 11 kids to do more night dives. The current at our site was less then the nights before, and the visibility was pretty good, so the dives were very enjoyable. The coral ended up spawning again at around 10:30. We collected the gametes, and had them transfered to a neaby NOAA boat.

SCUBAnauts - 8/8/09

2009-08-10T09:42:00.002-04:00

Hey it's Marcos again from the SCUBAnauts. Today we got up around 10:00 AM a little tired but pumped from last nights dives. We did two recreational dives in the morning, the first at The Benwood, and the second at Snapper's Ledge. The Benwood was an amazing dive, with great visibility, and amazing wildlife. Snapper's Ledge was great too, but the current was killer. At night each group did two dives again in rotation, and the coral started spawning during my second dive. The two species we were monitoring, Acropora palmata, and Acropora cervicornis, both spawned at approximately the same time (~10:40), releasing their gametes into collection nets we had placed above the coral to collect them. The dive left us amazed and wanting for more.

SCUBAnauts - 8/7/09

2009-08-10T09:33:00.002-04:00

Hey, my name is Marcos, I'm 18 years old, I just graduated from high school, and on my way to Notre Dame. Thanks to NOAA and FWC, the SCUBAnauts are monitoring the coral spawning in the Keys. We arrived today in Key Largo, a little tired but ready to do science. We first did a checkout dive at Molasses Reef (mooring ball 11), the site that we are supposed to be monitoring, and although the dive was only 15 minutes, it gave us a chance to get a good feel for the reef. At night we split into two groups, each group going down for 30 minutes at a time in rotation. There was no spawning that night, but it was a good practice run.

Night 4 So so spawn

2009-08-09T23:55:00.000-04:00

We were watching 3 sites again last (Sunday) night and as you can see from the SCUBAnauts post, there was some spawning at Molasses Reef again. Although it was a good volume, it was unfortunately all one clone. Sand Island only saw a few bundles. One clone (same one as Saturday night) spawned even more than last night at Elbow Reef but all the other clones kinda sat around twiddling their tentacles. Oddly enough the same tiny patch of tissue in the picture from last night's post had a few (but even fewer) bundles but that was it from the others. So for any hope of fertilization we had to high tail it home to meet up witht he gametes collected from Mollases. Talk about artificial insemination! Since Puerto Rico saw very little last night too, we are hoping that tonight will be 'the night' but we are getting tired of saying that!

No spawn at our Rincon PR last night but trying again tonight

2009-08-09T12:48:00.003-04:00

Last year we got a massive spawn in Rincon three nights after the full moon of (Aug 19 to be exact) which we had not realy expected but luckily were ready for it. This was later in the calendar year than this year. Minor spawning observations have been reported this year by others in Curacao and Florida Keys (except for massive at Horseshoe Reef in Key Largo which does not surprise me because it always seemed to go off earlier than other reefs). Spawning in A palmata has been observed as late as 7 to 8 days after the full moon in previous years and as early as 2 days after the full moon (e.g. July 31 in 1996). Thus the later we get after the full moon the higher the probability there will be spawning, up to a point. A good number of years we have failed to observe spawning in A palmata in spite of our best efforts to be out there (e.g. 1994, 2000 and others). This may have been because beginning day 5 or 6 we used to switch our attention to Montastraea spawn which is more predicatbel, and the A palmata likely spawned later in the cycle those years, or maybe not at all. While some populations (like Horseshoe seem to be like Old Faithful, others seem flakey and maybe do not spawn every year. This is something that bears morfe attention.

Night 3 dribbles

2009-08-08T23:51:00.000-04:00

We were only occupied 3 of our sites (Elbow, Molasses and Sand Island) last night and saw some activity at all 3. At Elbow, several ramets from one clone had small areas that produced bundles and one colony of a different clone had a very small patch of bundles.
Sand Island reported about the same. At Molasses, one palmata clone spawned farirly well and some cervicornis also spawned. They cervicornis colonies were outplanted by Ken Kedimyer so it is pretty exciting that they are out in the wild doing their thing!
We have had some uncooperative weather so far and the bundles that are released are getting washed out of the collectors so we end up with only a small portion of what is there. Hopefully the spawn will be so big tonight that we will get enough even with the surgey conditions we are expecting!

2009-08-08T11:36:00.002-04:00

The Florida Aquarium and University of Florida team were out at Western Sambo Reef (south of Key West) last night (Aug. 7) and were watching colonies of both palmata and cervicornis. No activity.

Night 2 Going back in...

2009-08-07T23:15:00.004-04:00

Empty handed! Night 2 after the full moon and no signs of any Acropora spawning at two of the four sites we were watching tonight. Horseshoe Reef had some spawn and Molasses had one Palmata and one Cervicornis go but that is it for tonight. Seas are supposed to be even rougher tomorrow night so we were really hoping to get what we needed tonight!
We often see some small dribbles on the first night before most of the activity so hopefully tomorrow will be the big night!!

BEAR Spawning and Sky watch 2009!

2009-08-07T08:57:00.010-04:00

For those of you who do not know, our Miami research group is officially called the BEAR unit (Benthic Ecosystem Assessment and Research) and thanks to Abel Valdivia, we now have a logo!

We have 'finalized' our field plans and after many changes we have settled (no pun intended) on monitoring the following locations (click to bigify the map):

Elbow Reef where we have observed and collected for the past 4(?) years and have detailed information on each colony's history and genotype.
Sand Island where we have observed and collected for many many years. It has some colonies with known genotypes.
We are also working with the SCUBAnauts who will be assisting us by monitoring both staghorn and elkhorn out at Molasses Reef. We have genotype identifications for most and the diversity is less but should the palmata spawn we hope to cross the gametes with those collected from sand Island. The staghorn that is there are restored colonies outplanted by Ken Nedimyer and we have no idea whether they are large enough or inclined to spawn but the SCUBAnauts (accompanied by our own Ben Mason) will be reporting back on any sightings.
The Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary office will be sending a contingent out to try to collect some spawn from Horseshoe Reef that we are hoping to cross with our Elbow Collections if needed.

In sum we will have information on four sites that we will report here starting tonight!

Also, while sitting around on the boat I will be looking upward as it is that time of year for the Perseid Meteor Showers which can be quite a spectacular show! It will peak on August 12th but I hope to see some tonight too! FOr more info on them go here:

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/31jul_perseids2009.htm

Welcome to Spawn 2009

2009-08-06T08:14:00.002-04:00

As I was leaving my house this morning at 5:30, the full moon lit up the sky and I said a little prayer...Although I will not be witnessing this year's spawn in person, I am very hopeful that we will have a very successful event! I look forward to reading about all of your observations...

August 2008, Vega Baja, Puerto Rico

2008-10-20T13:58:00.011-04:00

Hello dear coral lovers and
other curious,

This is a late post but late
is better than never. This August 2008 at Vega Baja, Puerto Rico, we
have been able to observe spawning of Acropora palmata.

It is worthy to note that although
we were on site 5 nights (from the 19^th to the 23^rd),
we were able to observe the coral spawning only when visiting the same
coral thicket, which occurred in 3 of the 5 nights, but was rewarded
each time with bundle release! The two other (unsuccessful) nights,
we visited very shallow thickets and isolated colonies.

I have not been able to take
any good picture, so I will only post the least uninteresting ones!

Here is a more detailed report
of the events:

Tuesday 19^th.
No spawning was seen, neither were any bundles spotted in the water
column. This was a night where only isolated colonies in shallow water
(0.75 to 1.75 m) were observed.

Wednesday 20^th.
Although we arrived too late to observe gamete release on the reef (around
9:30 pm), we observed abundant coral spawn in the water column around
the colonies. This reef is a shallow reef (1.5 to 2.25 m) with dense
thickets.

Egg bundles can be spotted on the coral. Particles in the water are egg bundles and, well, particules.

Thursday 21^st.
A different part of the reef was observed this night. Since it a bit
distant from the thicket where gametes were observed the night before,
we can only guess what happened on this day other there… For the sake
of Science, we will not!

Sadly, this was not a very good choice, since no spawning or bundles
were observed around the small thickets of large colonies in extremely
shallow water (0.5 to 1.25 m) that we decided to visit. It is worth
noting that once we got out of the water, a local snorkeler mentioned
the presence of egg bundles around close-by colonies.

Friday 22^nd.
At the same shallow reef with dense thickets (1.5 to 2.25 m) observed
on Wednesday 20^th, mass spawning occurred again! While the
spawning on the 20^th was significant, spawning this night
of the 22^nd (night after the full moon) was really impressive
and the reward of almost literally bathing in coral bundles was exhilarating!
Spawning activity was concentrated between 21:15 and 21:45 with a peak
around 21:25-21:30.

Saturday 23^rd.
Again, coral spawned at the same reef, same hours and peak activities.
Releases were still very abundant but somehow fewer and slighter than
the previous night though it really seemed more than on the 20^th.

This was a rather off-track
activity for us, since most lab members do not specialize in coral science
and no special project was ongoing. Curiosity was rewarded (by luck?)
and we hope to come back next year for more monitoring, it is a very
well conserved piece of reef, recently rediscovered, and in surprising
good health. Let’s hope it will stay so, there are some worrying construction
activities on the shore that seem to be taken care of by the local administration
but they will certainly need help.

Good luck to all and take care,

Pascal Mege, PhD student, University of Puerto Rico (Rio Piedras)

I would like to thank and remember Sergio who had to go on another
voyage in another life in the following days.

No Palmata Spawn Observed in STT and STJ

2008-08-26T17:27:00.004-04:00

Hello All,

I hoped to observe A. palmata spawn on St. Thomas and St. John, USVI, this year. I'm sorry to report that I observed no spawn at Flat Cay, St. Thomas, on tuesday, August 19, 2008 (between 8 and 10pm). I also observed no spawn at Hawksnest Bay, St. John, on both Wednesday, August 20th, and thursday, August 21st (between the times of 8:30 and 10pm). During the past several years, Dr. Caroline Rogers and others have observed the elkhorn colonies at Hawksnest Bay and have observed little spawn. I'm glad to see that others are seeing the spawn!

Allan Bright

Ap Spawn at Elbow

2008-08-23T11:17:00.002-04:00

Last night (Friday Aug. 22) was the first night we were able to go out to look for spawn due to the lingering effects of Tropical Storm Fay which brought rough seas and very limiting visibility. We were stationed at Elbow Reef and had previously identified the 7 unique genets with ramets large enough to potentially spawn. We got in the water at 9:30 and immediately saw a few bundles set on one of the genets and approximately 15min later a few set bundles were observed on 2 other genets. A fourth genet on the next spur however had large numbers of set bundles. Collectors were placed over the set bundles and bundles released around 10:30 to 10:45. The numbers of bundles released from different genets did not allow multiple crosses but at least one cross/batch yielded excellent fertilization. More details to follow! (P.S. Special thanks to National Undersea Research Center for the XL boat and Captain Tim for taking us out!)

Waiting for spawn

2008-08-22T20:06:00.000-04:00

Lovely scenery while we are waiting (and hoping) for spawn. Seas are
calmer than we thought but visibility is still pretty low.

Fay put the Kibosh on spawning (so far)

2008-08-21T16:10:00.004-04:00

Tropical storm Fay passed over the Florida Keys the night before the first night planned for spawn collecting and the rough seas and high winds have not dissipated so we have missed all three nights that were most likely for spawning. We are hoping to go out on Friday Aug 22nd (night 6 after the full moon) which would normally be considered too late but we are hoping that the corals have been delayed too 8-(. Abel and I did some snorkel reconnaissance on Wednesday to see if it might be workable and he shot the video below. We were happy to find the Acropora in pretty good shape but as you can see the conditions are not exactly workable!

Spawning 2008

2008-08-07T13:57:00.002-04:00

Hey fellow acropora-ites... just thought I would post a reminder that this blog is still 'up' and waiting for posts on any acropora spawning observations from this upcoming season!
Our BEAR (Benthic Ecosystem Assessment and Research) team will be monitoring 2 sites for Acropora palmata spawning in the upper florida keys on the nights of August 19, 20 and 21st. We will try to post promptly and hope to hear from others as this helps us know what to expect the next night. Happy spawning!

Acropora spawning in Rincon, Puerto Rico

2007-09-11T14:26:00.000-04:00

On August 31st, 2007, Dr. Nick Schizas Invertebrate Class laboratory went to the Marine Reserve Tres Palmas in Rincon, Puerto Rico to hopefully witness the Acropora palmata mass spawning event. We entered the water around 7:30 and started seeing bundles on some colonies around 8:30 to 9pm. The spawning event started roughly around 9:30pm. I honestly do not remember how long the event lasted because I was too focused on acquiring samples. I have posted some pictures of colonies partially full of bundles as well as videos of the colonies releasing bundles and bundles at the surface. The videos are me snorkelling while holding my camera on one hand and the flashlight on the other so it's kinda shaky. But it was very exciting to see the spawning again this year at Tres Palmas Marine Reserve!! Hope you enjoy the pictures and videos!

SOL

2007-09-03T09:51:00.000-04:00

Same EXACT Obs as last night... At Elbow the same colony spit out a decent number of bundles and another colony had a tiny patch of tissue that released bundles but that is it. We got every bundle we could get by putting 2 collectors (pic) on one colony (that is desperate!). Sand Island still saw NOTHING! Not what we expected and very disappointing! On to Montastraea and Diploria now 8-(

Something! 9-1-2007

2007-09-02T10:56:00.000-04:00

Last night we were at Elbow Reef and Sand Island (see Aug post below). One colony spawned about 50% (sometimes that is all we see from a colony) and another colony released a few bundles (we caught 5 bundles from that colony but I did not see it so there may have been a few more that did not make it into the net). Hopefully this means tonight is the night! More random pics can be seen in our Spawning 2007 Album)

Nada Encore

2007-09-01T15:05:00.001-04:00

Same time same place same sights as last month's post... NOTHING at either place 8-( Fun w/ Squid though!

A. palmata spawn, Rincon & Bajo Gallardo, Puerto Rico, Aug 2-7, 2007

2007-08-12T02:38:00.000-04:00

A team of researchers and professional aquarists from the USA and Europe went to Rincon to collect gametes of Acropora palmata for aquaculture and conservation research as part of the 3rd SECORE workshop (see workshop blog at http://www.secore.org/).

About 20 divers in groups of 2-3 persons observed the Tres Palmas reserve during the period of Aug 2-7. We additionally went to Bajo Gallardo on Aug 5-6. We observed the following:

- Thurs. Aug 2nd, 8.45 - 11.00 p.m. - No spawning observed

- Friday August 3rd, spawning observed in 3 medium to large colonies and gametes collected between 9.05 p.m. - 9.55 p.m.

- Saturday August 4th - slightly more spawning: 6 colonies spawned, gametes collected from 9.15 - 9.52 p.m

- Sunday August 5th - 4 colonies observed spawning 9.20 - 10.00 p.m.

- Monday August 6th - 3 colonies spawned between 9.27 - 9.51 p.m.

- Tuesday August 7th - no spawning observed

We additionally went by boat to Bajo Gallardo offshore the West coast of Puerto Rico on 2 days:

- Sunday August 5th - between 30-50% of the observed colonies (observed area about 50x50m) spawned massively between 9.20 - 9.45 p.m.

- Monday August 6th - no spawning observed in same area

The low spawning percentage in the observed period can probably explained by a split spawn. In comparison, the 2006 spawning was much greater with about >90% colonies spawning at Tres Palmas and slightly less spawning at Bajo Gallardo.

Aug 1-3, 2007 Elbow Reef

2007-08-08T13:14:00.000-04:00

In short: nothing!
All 3 nights we arrived on site at Elbow Reef and set up @7:30pm then got back in the water @ 9:30pm and waited until10:30 or 10:45. We were watching colonies on 3 separate spurs (2 patches are our monitoring sites with >6 different genets that had ramets large enough to spawn. A total of 5 divers (experienced in palmata spawn obs) watching ~30 colonies did not find even a small patch of polyps with bundles and did not observe bundles in the water column. Depth of colonies 20ft or less. Colonies on two of the spurs were observed to spawn in 2005 and 2006.
A second team was observing colonies at Sand Island following the same routine and also saw nothing!