[Coral-List] White spined Diadema

[tdwyatt at aol.com]

Stuart and Gruppe:

Just a longitudinal observation of three inividual specimens?from the aquarium hobby:? the white spines appear as the specimens get older (and as they get large).? I have had three that at sometime during their?second to third year of age?start to develope the white spines, all starting out as totally black specimens.? Could this not be just a normal consequence of aging or some sign of maturity?

Hope this helps,

Tom
tdwyatt at aol.com





> Genetics and disease resistance seems likely to me, although neither of
> these areas are my speciality so please don't quote me on that......




-----Original Message-----
From: Barbara Whitman <terramar at caribcable.com>
To: Stuart P. Wynne <Stuart.Wynne at gov.ai>; coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Sent: Tue, 27 May 2008 11:01 am
Subject: Re: [Coral-List] White spined Diadema



Since this discussion I have been paying more attention to  Diadema.  The 
other day I snorkeled along the coast and saw white and black spined and 
black spined Diadema of various sizes in the same locations - depth, 
habitat, water clarity were all the same. The white spined ones were out in 
the sunlight as much as the black spined ones and vice versa.  I couldn't 
find any correlation between habitat and/or urchin size and spine color.  I 
also saw a couple with white, light purple-black and black spines.  The 
lighter spines just looked as if the black pigmentation was more dilute on 
those spines.

Barb Whitman
Nevis

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Stuart P. Wynne" <Stuart.Wynne at gov.ai>
To: <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>
Sent: Monday, May 26, 2008 5:01 PM
Subject: [Coral-List] White spined Diadema


> Hi,
>
> I just wanted to say thanks to all those who replied to my question
> about white spined Diadema. It has been interesting to read your
> ideas/observations and also read the articles that some of you have sent
> me.
>
> For the record, I see the white adults everywhere, and it doesn't seem
> at all correlated to depth/light. Areas here that seem to be recovering
> somewhat from the famous mortality event seem to have more black
> individuals present, and areas that for whatever reason haven't yet
> recovered seem to be made up mostly of white individuals - many in less
> that a meter of bright sunlit water. I liked the idea that was mentioned
> about during the mortality event cave protection may have mitigated
> damage/predation to the white individuals that preferred to live in them
> - although we have few such caves here so that doesn't hold for us.
>
> Genetics and disease resistance seems likely to me, although neither of
> these areas are my speciality so please don't quote me on that......
>
> Stuart Wynne
> Marine Biologist
> Department of Fisheries and Marine Resources
> Anguilla
>
>
>
>
> Government of Anguilla
> _______________________________________________
> Coral-List mailing list
> Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> http://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list 

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