[Coral-List] In memoriam: Remembering pillar coral

[Pawlik, Joseph]

Dear colleagues,

Watching the demise of Caribbean reef corals has been tragic and terrible, but profoundly heartbreaking was the recent loss of the most charismatic of corals, Dendrogyra cylindrus.
Even if this species is rescued in captivity and engineered to survive future seas, nobody for a century or more will be able to swim in a circle around the once amazing columns, often more than 5 m high, rising like narrow towers from shallow gorgonian fields, furry tentacles moving like a field of wheat blown by the wind.
This morning, I posted a video with segments showing living colonies of pillar coral from various places in the Caribbean from 2015 to 2020, dying colonies in 2020 and 2021, and dead pillars in 2023. The dead pillars are rapidly degrading and will soon fall. Here is the link:

https://youtu.be/GOqNiMN5A6Q

Gone but not forgotten.



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Joseph R. Pawlik

Frank Hawkins Kenan Distinguished Professor of Marine Biology

Dept. of Biology and Marine Biology

UNCW Center for Marine Science

5600 Marvin K Moss Lane

Wilmington, NC  28409

Office:(910)962-2377; Cell:(910)232-3579

Website: http://people.uncw.edu/pawlikj/index.html

PDFs: http://people.uncw.edu/pawlikj/pubs2.html

Video Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/skndiver011

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