[Coral-List] Fotos of juvenile corals

[andrew baird]

Greetings corallist

Just a quick update for all those interested in the identification of
scleractinian coral recruits. Unfortunately, this will not help those after
descriptions that will help to identify juvenile scleractian corals in the
natural enviroment, like Monica, as the method relies on bleaching the
recruits to reveal the skeleton. To the best of my knowledge their are only
4 or so works that deal specifically with this issue. 

The first is (Babcock 1992) which contains a comprehensive set of photos of
coral recruits, however, no interpretation of the specimens is included.
For example, while Babcock (1992) implies that certain families are
distinguishable, the features which define them are not outlined. Russ's
set of photos were reproduced in (English et al. 1994), however, while this
work is more accessible, once again there is no interpretation of the
specimens.  Babcock (1992) contains an extensive discussion on the use of
settlement panels to measure coral recruitment and some original data that
has not been produced elsewhere. It is worth a getting hold of and is it a
great shame it is no longer in print and very few copies were produced.  

However, if coral recruit identification is your thing these works have now
been superseded by Baird and Babcock (2000; Babcock et al. (2003).  Baird
and Babcock 2000 presents a relatively simple means to distinguishing among
the three common genera of pocilloporids (on the GBR at least) and Babcock
et al 2003 outlines further significant advances in taxonomic resolution
including

1.	distinguishing among the three common genera of acroporids
2.	distinguish brooded from spawned poritid recruits 
1.	identifying Galaxea and Tubastrea recruits

In addition, we present a hypothesis on how to distinguish between brooded
and spawned recruits in taxa with mixed modes of reproduction e.g.
Pocillopora. Furthermore, this manuscript contains new material (i.e. not
in Babcock 1992) from 12 species from 7 additional genera and one
additional family.  Other significant and novel features of the current
manuscript, include

·	providing a sound rational for length of soak by establishing that the
maximum taxonomic resolution occurs between 4 to 8 weeks after settlement
·	the description of recent advances in the culture of coral larvae.

Babcock et al 2003 is available from the Zoological Studies web site.  The
editors of Zoological Studies provide free online access to the journal to
all University Libraries worldwide a policy which should be applauded.
Reprints of Baird & Babcock 2000 are available from me on request.

Babcock RC (1992) Workshop on coral and fish recruitment. Boliano Marine
Laboratory, Marine Science Institute, University of the Philippines, 7,
Manilla
Babcock RC, Baird AH, Piromvaragorn S, Thomson DP, Willis BL (2003)
Identification of scleractinian coral recruits from Indo- Pacific reefs.
Zoological Studies 42: 211-226
Baird AH, Babcock RC (2000) Morphological differences among three species
of newly settled pocilloporid coral recruits. Coral Reefs 19: 179-183
English S, Wilkinson C, Baker V (1994) Survey manual for tropical marine
resources. Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville, pp 368


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>I´m looking for some photografs or descriptions that can help me identify
in natural enviroment juvenile scleractin corals.
>I know that Dr Russ Babcock, has a more extensive collection of Russ'sSEM
(from English et al) are presented in Babcock (1992). This work includes 
>photos of representative juveniles, raised from known parents, of 11 of
the 15 Families of scleractinian corals.
>I don´t know if this document has photografs of juvenile corals or coral
recruit. 
>Some one knows how I can do the identification of species in juvenile
corals of the Caribbean.
>I would be very grateful if some one help me with this information. 
>
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Dr Andrew H. Baird, Centre for Coral Reef Biodiversity, School of Marine
Biology and Aquaculture, James Cook University, Townsville, Qld,  4811,
Australia. Tel + 617 47814857, Fax:  + 617 47251570, email:
andrew.baird at jcu.edu.au