[Coral-List] SCTLD on Bonaire

[Melbourne Briscoe]

I did see a diseased pillar At Andrea 2 today......some of the pillars had
the retracted polyps, but one was clearly diseased with the pure white
portion.. I can't post the photo here, but would be happy to send it
directly to you folks.
- Mel

On Thu, Sep 7, 2023 at 8:39 AM STINAPA Monitoring <monitoring at stinapa.org>
wrote:

> Hey Judy and Mel,
>
>
>
> I can’t see the picture but I know the behaviour well. We’ve also seen it
> on a few DCYL that ended up contracting SCTLD. There’s one at the dive site
> forest I could share if it’s of interest.
>
> We saw it on some of the pillars at Bachelor’s beach as well. Curiously
> didn’t see it on all the pillars that we’ve seen with SCTLD, but if it
> something worth looking into we could also ask our divers to keep an eye
> out for this.
>
>
>
> Saludos,
>
>
>
> Rox
>
>
>
> *From:* Judith Lang <jlang at riposi.net>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, September 6, 2023 5:09 PM
> *To:* Melbourne Briscoe <mel at briscoe.com>
> *Cc:* Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>; STINAPA Monitoring <
> monitoring at stinapa.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [Coral-List] SCTLD on Bonaire
>
>
>
>
>
> Hi Mel,
>
>
>
> Most of those pillars in this photo are alive but the polyps are very
> contracted except at their tips. Strangely, that behaviour was being
> noticed in Curacao last month in an area and the dive operators were
> concerned it meant they are now getting SCTLD.  I’d like to share this with
> coral histologist coral disease specialist Esther Peters, and ask her if
> that’s what she saw last month and was talking with the local divers. On
> the whole, coral diseases are getting more and more confusing to understand!
>
>
>
> Judy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On 6 Sep 2023, at 16:58, Melbourne Briscoe <mel at briscoe.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> Thank you Judith and Roxanne. I apologize for being so casual about
> what the color codes mean, but when the various colored sit4s look so
> similar, the details of the colofs seem less important.
>
> Today I visited Rappel; it was almost pristine, *except for the pillars*!
> They appeared to be almost dead except for the tips. Is this
> characteristic of SCTLD or something else.
>
> <image.png>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Sep 6, 2023 at 11:17 AM STINAPA Monitoring <monitoring at stinapa.org>
> wrote:
>
> Hi Mel,
>
>
>
>    1. Judy is correct, green is disease free, 2 is disease is present,
>    and 3 is disease is affecting multiple species and we are already seeing
>    mortality. Now there can be quite a bit of overlap between sites as 1) we
>    have over a 100 divesites on Bonaire so monitoring all of them all the time
>    is not feasible and 2) we update the map once every other week.
>    2. Maze and boulder brains are being hit the hardest so far here on
>    Bonaire. But unfortunately it seems the rest of the brain corals are not
>    far behind.
>    3. We have also seen pillars affected by SCTLD but it seems they take
>    a bit longer to start showing symptoms. At the first outbreak sites the
>    pillars didn’t get hit until 4-5 months into the outbreak. We are also
>    hopeful that some of the pillars will be spared and are keeping an extra
>    close eye on those as well.
>
>
>
> Saludos,
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* Judith Lang <jlang at riposi.net>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, September 6, 2023 8:16 AM
> *To:* Melbourne Briscoe <mel at briscoe.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [Coral-List] SCTLD on Bonaire
>
>
>
> Hi Mel,
>
> 1. The difference between STINAPA’s 1, 2, 3 may relate more to how long
> the site has shown signs of infection.
>
> 2. Yes
>
> 3. Yes, at least so far,  and this is a big difference between the
> behaviour of the disease in Florida and when it originally invaded the
> Caribbean. Don’t know what that means, but now that SCTLD's also in
> Curacao, we can hope its huge stand of pillar corals will be spared.
>
>
>
> All best,
>
> Judy
>
>
>
> *Judith C Lang*
>
> *www.agrra.org <http://www.agrra.org/>*
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On 5 Sep 2023, at 17:51, Melbourne Briscoe via Coral-List <
> coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:
>
>
>
> I've been here 9 days so far and have three observations about SCTLD on
> Bonaire:
> (1) Sites are categorized by the local marine park authority (STINAPA) as
> Green, Orange, or Red, meaning clean, caution, and infected. I have dived
> numerous sites so far of all three colors, some 2 or 3 times.There is very
> little visible difference between the sites....they all look alike in so
> far as SCTLD-like issues.
> (2) Maze seems he hardest hit.
> (3) I have seen perhaps 10 small stands of pillar...and *none *show any
> signs of disease of any kind.
>
> - Mel
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