[CDHC] clonal coral line update

[Cindy Hunter]

Aloha Eric,

Just to allay any concerns about the potential for spreading pathogens 
between oceans, are your Caribbean and Pacific coral cultures kept in 
separate (isolated) systems? And do you have a policy/philosophy about 
shipping Caribbean species to researchers in the Pacific and vice versa.

Thanks for your thoughts here-
Cindy Hunter
Interim Director
Waikiki Aquarium

At 02:02 PM 2/21/2004, Eric Borneman wrote:
>Hi list:
>
>This a brief note to inform the list of progress on the establishment of 
>coral clonal lines through culture efforts. As some of you may know, I 
>have been working intensively with Reef Savers, a large coral propagation 
>facility here in Houston.
>
>The main purpose of this note is to acquire any feedback from interested 
>parties as to species, sizes, and numbers of corals that might be required 
>for your research so that we can tailor the propagation efforts to meet 
>this initial demand.
>
>Pacific species are easily available for us, and we are concentrating on a 
>few species with a large literature base.  If anyone has particular 
>requests or needs, please send me an email and we would be happy to try 
>and get them into culture.
>
>Furthermore, this is a general request to the list to consider shipping 
>any live specimens used in your research to us after the course of your 
>investigation, provided, of course, that the corals have not been 
>subjected to any agents that may compromise the health of existing stock. 
>This would be a good way to increase the diversity at the facility, 
>prevent wastage of corals already collected, and would make the same 
>genotype line available to the party for later work if any aspect of the 
>research needed to be repeated or expanded.
>
>Caribbean genera and species currently present:
>
>I have acquired broodstock from the Flower Gardens, Belize, and the Keys. 
>The most extensive collections are from the Truman Annex site at Key West, 
>where, in November, we brought back 165 pounds of coral. This week, we 
>will be driving a truck back to the site to bring back a great deal more.
>
>Mycetophyllia sp.
>Scolymia sp.
>Porites porites
>Porites divaricata
>Porites astreoides
>Montastraea franksi
>Montastraea faveolata
>Montastraea annularis
>Montastraea cavernosa
>Stephanocoenia michelinii
>Siderastrea radians
>Siderastrea siderea
>Manacina areolata
>Madracis decactis
>Diploria strigosa
>Diploria labyrinthiformis
>Oculina diffusa
>Favia fragum
>Agaricia agaracites
>Agaricia tenuifolia
>Isophyllia sinuosa
>
>Muriceopsis flavida
>Plexaura sp.
>
>At the end of next week, I will be able to include at least:
>
>Acropora cervicornis
>Colpophyllia natans
>Meandrina meandrites
>
>Pacific species:
>
>Acropora millepora
>Pocillopora damicornis
>Stylophora pistillata
>Acropora nana
>Acropora formosa
>
>We have many other species of Pacific corals that can become CDHC culture 
>material if the need or request arises.
>
>We have just finished a first round of fragmentation of several of the 
>Caribbean species.
>
>Corals are separated by location, species, and genotype.
>
>We expect to be able to offer some of these corals to the research 
>community within a year in limited amounts, but full availability of these 
>species must wait until production is ramped up. For some, broodstock 
>levels are currently too low to support large scale propagation, and this 
>is especially true of large fleshy species (e.g Scolymia, Mycetophyllia) 
>or massive slow growing species (although our growth rates thus far have 
>been very high and the growth of M cavernosa and Diploria has surprised us).
>
>Thus far, mortality of collected specimens is less than 0.05%, having lost 
>only a single colony of Favia fragum to bleaching without recovery upon 
>introduction to strong metal halide lamps.
>
>I look forward to hearing feedback and comments
>
>Best,
>
>Eric Borneman
>
>Department of Biology
>University of Houston
>Science and Research Bldg II
>4800 Calhoun
>Houston TX, 77204
>
>ph 713-743-2667
>eborneman at uh.edu
><br>
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