[Coral-List] corals growing on red mangrove prop roots

[Aisling Brady]

Hi Caroline,

I did my MSc on a few coral communities growing in mangrove channels  
and along causeways in a mangrove-dominated habitat in north central  
Cuba (Ciego d'Avila, Cayo Coco and Cayo Guillermo) - the mangrove  
channels were fast moving water channels in the middle of dense  
Rizophora mangle forests. We saw an abundance of Porites asteroides,  
Porites porites, Manicina areolata, some Favia fragum, Siderastrea  
radians, Millepora alcicornis, Diploria clivosa and some Eusamilia  
fastigiata. We never saw any colonies growing directly on the prop  
roots, but there were many less than 0.5 m away. We had a few colonies  
of Scolymia and Mycetophyllia on the coral reefs in open water, but  
never any in the mangrove-dominated habitats.

**************
PhD Graduate Student
University of Calgary
Department of Biological Sciences
lab: (403) 210 5484
akbrady at ucalgary.ca

Message: 2
Date: Mon, 3 Aug 2009 09:03:54 -0400
From: Caroline S Rogers <caroline_rogers at usgs.gov>
Subject: [Coral-List] corals growing on red mangrove prop roots--St.
	John,	USVI
To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Message-ID:
	<OF6D8C7F73.797B8649-ON04257607.0046F7E7-04257607.0047C4EC at usgs.gov>
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Over the last several months I have seen over 30 scleractinian coral
species growing directly on or near the prop roots of red mangrove trees
lining the shorelines of three bays in Virgin Islands Coral Reef  
National
Monument, St. John, US Virgin Islands. There are a few individuals of
genera that are quite rare on the coral reefs around the island, for
example Scolymia and Mycetophyllia.  Photos are available in the Reef  
Site
that I just published on line in Coral Reefs.  I see little mention of
corals growing on prop roots in the published scientific literature, and
some major review papers do not mention this at all.  Several coral  
species
have been reported for the Pelican Cays off Belize but it does not  
appear
that the number of species is as high as seen in St. John.
I would be very interested to know if other people have seen such a high
diversity of corals in  mangrove habitats anywhere else in the  
Caribbean or
know of any papers on this.

Thanks--

Caroline