[Coral-List] FW: Evidence for Porites surviving rising ocean temperatures?

Richard Dunne RichardPDunne at aol.com
Mon Oct 8 03:10:44 EDT 2012


Jessica and Listers

You should see the Special Issue of the Phuket Marine Biological Center 
(PMBC) Bulletin No 71. Free to all at this link - 
http://www.pmbc.go.th/webpmbc/ResearchBulletin/re/71.php

There was extensive warm water (mainly) induced bleaching in 2010 which 
was the culprit. Certainly Porites lutea on the intertidal reef flats 
and shallow subtidal reefs is known to be particularly hardy.

There is a lot known about Phuket and the Andaman Sea coast of Thailand. 
Barbara Brown and Niphon Phongsuan have worked there since 1979 and 
published extensively. Also there is a very active scientific program at 
PMBC.

Richard P Dunne
Barnard Castle, Co Durham, DL12 9UP. UK

On 07/10/2012 14:39, Jessica Ward wrote:
> Hello Listers.
>
> I just wanted to flag something of interest I noted recently while diving off Phuket.    My husband and I did a series of dives in the area over two days, visiting a site known as 'Shark Point' twice.  Though the local dive masters claimed this was the best site in the area,  we noted that the reef was not in great shape .  In fact, much of the scleractinian coral was dead, with exception of Porites colonies (I think P. lobata).  This interested me  after seeing posts on the List predicting that Porites may survive climate change  and rising ocean temperatures better than other genera of scleractinian corals. When we inquired as to what may have happened to kill off the coral, we were told a bleaching event occurred a couple years back.  If this is true, the fact that only Porites (mostly) survived may be evidence of the current theory.  I was curious to know if anyone had any  pre-bleaching information on this or other sites in the area and could compare pre-bleaching verus
>   post-bleaching coral cover and species survived?  Would  make for an interesting study .
>
> Cheers.
>
> Jessica C Ward
>
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