[Coral-List] 82 Corals Status Review under the US Endangered Species Act

Tue Jun 26 13:03:16 EDT 2012

Saludos Billy, nice to hear from you. Hope you are doing fine. 

If I remember correctly, Millepora was common in BNP when we did our reef
characterizations after hurricane Andrew back in 1994-95.  From what I have
observed during the last 10 years, it seems populations in the southern
Caribbean seem  to be less susceptible to the bleaching stressful
conditions. In Curacao,  some pops. of M. complanata that dominate many
shallow, front reef areas in the western coast,  bleached during the 2010
intensive bleaching event but, no significant mortalities were observed
during or after the event, at least in the three reefs I have been surveying
for several years.  As Alina mentioned, they are doing well. Most mortality
is due to disease and competition.

Best!

EW 

From: Billy Causey [mailto:billy.causey at noaa.gov] 
Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2012 12:41 PM
To: Ernesto Weil
Cc: Szmant, Alina; Douglas Fenner; Eugene Shinn;
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Subject: Re: [Coral-List] 82 Corals Status Review under the US Endangered
Species Act

Greetings Ernesto,

Thank you for your descriptive narrative on the loss of Millepora during
significant bleaching events.  In the Florida Keys, at Looe Key Reef, during
the massive coral bleaching event of 1990, we lost 65% of the Millepora
complanata along the spur and grooves of the Fore Reef alone.  Since it
followed the 1987, Florida Keys and Caribbean mass bleaching event, we were
prepared to monitor the impact in July-October 1990, using the chain
transect technique that Judy Lang suggested at the 1988 Coral Bleaching
Workshop, hosted by John Ogden in St Croix, VI.

Anecdotally, it seems the Millepora is just beginning to recover slightly in
the Florida Keys, with the reefs in the Upper Keys recovering better than
those in the Lower Keys.  Other species were severely impacted 1990 and we
lost significant amounts of all species at Looe Key Reef, including Acropora
species.  It was a devastating event.

Just for interest, Alina Szmant had been out to the reef with me in mid-July
and the Palythoa was already showing signs of stress to the elevated
sea-surface temperatures.  Two week later the reef both offshore and inshore
turned white!!

Just a little history.  Billy

On Tue, Jun 26, 2012 at 12:02 PM, Ernesto Weil <eweil at caribe.net> wrote:

Here in Puerto Rico, Millepora populations went down significantly after two
significant bleaching events, the 2005
being the most detrimental, which also affected populations in Grenada,
Cayman, V. Islands, and many other north and eastern Caribbean localities.
Both M. alcicornis and M. complanata suffered high mortality in moost reefs
of La Parguera, mostly in their preferred shallow habitats. One particular
species, M. squarrosa, the box fire coral, completely disappeared from
several fringing reefs. M. alcicornis and M. complanata, and the crustose
ecomorph that overgrows and kills octocorals (whatever that is) are slowly
coming back. However, after 6 years of surveys, I have only seen one tiny
colony of M. squarrosa recently.

EW

-----Original Message-----
From: coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
[mailto:coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov] On Behalf Of Szmant, Alina
Sent: Monday, June 25, 2012 5:59 PM
To: Douglas Fenner; Eugene Shinn; coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Subject: Re: [Coral-List] 82 Corals Status Review under the US Endangered
Species Act

Millepora complanata and M. alcicornis are doing exceeding well down here in
Curacao...healthy, nice color and everywhere.  Maybe just get permission to
reintroduce it to rest of Caribbean from propagules.  But first you need to
fix whatever problem led to their demise in the first place.  If it's global
warming, fat chance!

*************************************************************************
Dr. Alina M. Szmant
Professor of Marine Biology
Center for Marine Science and Dept of Biology and Marine Biology University
of North Carolina Wilmington
5600 Marvin Moss Ln
Wilmington NC 28409 USA
tel:  910-962-2362  fax: 910-962-2410  cell: 910-200-3913
http://people.uncw.edu/szmanta
*******************************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
[mailto:coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov] On Behalf Of Douglas Fenner
Sent: Monday, June 25, 2012 5:11 PM
To: Eugene Shinn; coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Subject: Re: [Coral-List] 82 Corals Status Review under the US Endangered
Species Act

Gene,
    I've been told that Millepora grows like a weed in aquaria, and that if
people had realized the problem, they could have been grown in aquaria and
the species saved.  Zoos do that sort of thing for vertebrates all the
time.  I remember reading the story of the Phoenix, Arizona, zoo, which
gathered the last half dozen or so Arabian Oryx left in the entire world,
and started a captive breeding program.  They brought them back from the
brink of extinction by producing many calves.  Likewise, Whooping Cranes
have also been brought back from the brink of extinction by captive breeding
programs.  Wikipedia has these two stories. There are lots more success
stories.   I've read that no species that has been declared under the US
Endangered Species Act has gone extinct, but one of the papers I had in my
references in my earlier message documented that hundreds have gone extinct
while waiting for government to make a decision on whether to list  them. 
The Endangered Species Act makes a difference.  It certainly isn't perfect. 
Name anything that is.  The alternative is grim, as extinction is forever.  
   Cheers,  Doug

________________________________
 From: Eugene Shinn <eshinn at marine.usf.edu>
To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Sent: Monday, June 25, 2012 2:55 AM
Subject: [Coral-List] 82 Corals Status Review under the US Endangered
Species Act

Thanks Doug, I wonder if those Millipora species had been listed back in the
1980s would they be living today? Gene
--

No Rocks, No Water, No Ecosystem (EAS)
------------------------------------ -----------------------------------
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University of South Florida
College of Marine Science Room 221A
140 Seventh Avenue South
St. Petersburg, FL 33701
<eshinn at marine.usf.edu>
Tel 727 553-1158 <tel:727%20553-1158> ----------------------------------
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-- 
Billy D. Causey, Ph.D. 

Regional Director

Southeast Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Region

NOAA's Office of National Marine Sanctuaries

33 East Quay Road

Key West, Florida 33040

Office:  305 809 4670 (ex 234)

Mobile: 305 395 0150

Fax:     305 293 5011

Email:  Billy.Causey at noaa.gov

Will Our Grandchildren Remember Us For What We Conserved and Protected or
For What We Let Slip Away?