Conservation of Florida’s Coral Reefs
through Controlled Propagation – Year 2
“Protect Our Reef” Grant -Interim Report
(April 1 – September 30, 2007)
Principal Investigators
Kevan Main
Kim Ritchie
Submitted to
Dena Smith
Mote Marine Laboratory
October 19, 2007
Mote Technical Report # 1215
PROJECT GOALS
The goals of this project are to develop optimal culture techniques to produce four selected
scleractinian corals for reef restoration research, to evaluate the health of natural and cultured
stocks, and to disseminate project results to the user groups in the Florida Keys and the scientific
research community. The cultured coral fragments produced in this project will be used to
scientifically evaluate coral re-establishment to increase success rates of restoration efforts.
PROJECT ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Objective 1: Develop and refine culture methods to produce four scleractinian coral species
impacted by boat groundings and other catastrophic events for restocking research in the
Florida Keys.
The Coral Aquaculture Laboratory at TRL has colonies from 19 species of scleractinian corals in
the aquaculture tank systems in our environmentally controlled laboratory, which are being
monitored for growth and survival. The focus of this project is to develop the culture technology
for the four coral species shown in figures 1-4.
Figure 1. Acropora cervicornis
Figure 3. Montastrea annularis
Figure 2. Acropora palmata
Figure 4. Montastrea cavernosa
During this reporting period, we continued to culture these species and monitor the
environmental parameters and feeding rates in the culture systems. New colonies were not
collected during this reporting period; however, colonies of some species were fragmented to
increase the number of corals in the culture systems.
Objective 2: Culture, fragment and document growth rates of four coral species in land-based
fully recirculating, environmentally friendly aquaculture systems.
Growth measurement data was collected in May and September 2007 for
all coral colonies in the indoor culture systems. Coral colonies were
photographed from two views (top view to determine laminar growth;
side view to determine growth in height).
In May, we initiated a growth study with M. annularis at six different
light levels in all indoor tanks. A total of 36 (approximately 1 inch) coral
colonies were fragmented, mounted and placed on the coral culture bars
in 3 100-gallon and 3 200-gallon tanks (see Figure 5). All colonies were
photographed in May to obtain initial growth measurements and again in
September to measure growth. The data from those photographs has not
yet been analyzed.
In October, this growth study will be expanded to include A. cervicornis
and M. cavernosa.
Figure 5. Partial view of Tank 100A
with M. annularis on culture bars.
Objective 3: Establish captive broodstock colonies for the four selected coral species to ensure
availability for restocking and research.
Broodstock colonies for all four selected coral species are being maintained in the broodstock
reserve facility at Mote’s Tropical Research Laboratory at Summerland Key.
Objective 4: Monitor coral health at the time of collection for cultivation and during fragment
cultivation.
This objective is linked to field collections of new coral colonies. Since no new colonies were
collected in the field, no progress was made on this objective during this reporting period.
Objective 5: Disseminate project results through public meetings, presentations and outreach
to stakeholders, researchers and the general public.
No progress has been made on this objective during this reporting period.
PROJECT STATUS
A change in project staffing occurred in July and our biologist, David Lackland, is no longer
working on this project. We have not identified an individual to replace Mr. Lackland; therefore,
in the interim, Drs. Kevan Main and David Vaughan have been managing the project activities
and the experimental studies. Other staff at Mote’s Tropical Research Lab (Erich Bartels, Cory
Walters and Steve Davis) are also assisting in maintaining the corals during this interim period.