11th ICRS Abstract book - Nova Southeastern University

18.674
Monitoring Of Coral Recovery After 97-98 Mass Bleaching Event At,
Naneng SETIASIH* 1
1 Reef Check Foundation Indonesia, Denpasar, Indonesia
The aim of the monitoring was to understand the ecological response of the 4 reef
systems to the mass bleaching event in relation to different reef habitat and protection
level.
LIT up to taxa level 5 (Oliver et all, 2002) was conducted in all parks as the baseline
methodology.
Monitoring stations at BBNP and BNP had a diversity of protection level and natural
resilience. As the consequences, the result showed a wide range of % hard coral
(%HC). On the other hand, stations the other parks were located in a limited human
presure areas in the open sea, resulted in almost similar %HC.
All locations showed a good condition of reef. Stations at KSMP and KJMP had a higher
%HC, probably indicated that they were not affected by bleaching at 1997-1998, or
showed a good recovery. This was confirmed by the relatively large coral colony found
and high coverage of Acropora which is highly susceptible to bleaching (Baird and
Marshall, 2002).
Despite being badly hit by bleaching and repeated Acanthaster outbreak, an increase from
7% HC (1998) to 25%HC (2006) was noted at BBNP. There were also segments with
large coral colonies (>1m) at the park.
Moreover, BBNP and KJMP indicated a higher percentage of high reistant taxa. This is
consistent with the development of reef system after a mass bleaching event (Coles and
Brown, 2003, Hoeg-Guldberg, 1999, Hughes and Connell, 1999), suggested a community
structure’s shifting.
BNP located in a naturally higher resilience areas to the other parks. The condition plus
the well manage park probably has led the area to be less affected by bleaching.
18.675
Distribution And Abundance Of Sponges Of Minicoy Island, Lakshadweep, India
Anita G. MARY* 1 , Robert SLUKA 2 , S. LAZARUS 1
1 Institute for Environmental Research and Social Education, Nagercoil, India,
2 Millennium Relief & Development Services, Bellaire, TX
We conducted a survey of the distribution and abundance of sponges of Minicoy Island
which lead to the discovery of thirteen species representing eleven genera from nine
families. They are Axinella donnani, A. manus, Dragmacidon agariciformis, Auletta
aurnatiaca, Pseudoceratina purpurea, Hyrtios reticulates, H. erectus, Spongia (Spongia)
ceylonensis, Terpios cruciatus, Haliclona (Gellius) aff. Cymacformis, Dysidea granulosa,
Leucetta chagosensis and Callyspongia (Euplacella) mannarensis. The distribution of
sponges were assessed by using line-intercept transect technique. This was a pioneer
study for this area with the discovery of five species entirely new to India and eight
species new to the Lakshadweep islands. Images of each species are included to facilitate
field identification.
Poster Mini-Symposium 18: Reef Status and Trends
18.676
Variability in Growth Form Of Gulf Of Kachchh Corals, India.
Prasanna YENNAWAR* 1
1 Zoological Survey of India, Marine Aquarium and Research Centre, Digha, India
The coral reefs in the Gulf of Kachchh are one of major reefs in the Indian sub-continent, which
is under much threat due extreme environmental conditions. The biophysical monitoring study
of the coral reefs in the area shows that the corals in this region are mainly massive & submassive
corals like Porites, Favia, Favites & Montipora spp.). Many coral species are now
exterminated like branching corals. The huge reef flats are dominated by one or two species at
an instance and are exposed to uniform climatic changes with variable substrates reflected
zonation in growth forms. Various topographic zones were compared with dominant species
and it is observed that ubiquitous species adopted different forms in different zones of the same
reef area. This is because of drastic environmental conditions like high sedimentation rate,
extreme temperature conditions, periodical exposure, etc. The area is also highly industrialized
with many refineries, submerged oil & gas pipelines, ports, cement, salt, power, ship-wrecking,
etc. industries. The paper describes the variability in the growth forms with reference to variable
climatic impact.
18.677
Seasonal Bleaching Did Not Impede Coral Growth in Todos Os Santos Bay, Eastern
Brazil
Eduardo CHAVES 1 , Pedro MEIRELLES 1 , Ruy KIKUCHI 1 , Zelinda LEAO* 1
1 Federal University of Bahia - Brazil, Salvador, Brazil
The linear growth rate of the corals Siderastrea spp and Montastraea cavernosa, from Todos os
Santos Bay, was evaluated in order to verify if there was a relationship between the observed
coral growth with variations in the conditions of sea water parameters (temperature, salinity and
nutrients), as well as with the occurrence of coral bleaching events. Seventeen colonies of the
coral Siderastrea spp and nineteen colonies of the specie Montastraea cavernosa were marked
and observed from December 2005 to April 2007. Coral growth was measured every 15 days
using fixed nails on the top of the coral colonies. This technique shows more efficiency in
measuring the growth rate of the coral Siderastrea spp, once the specie Montastraea cavernosa
shows resistance to the presence of the nails on the first months of the experiment. Among the
measured sea water parameters, only sea water temperature shows relationship with the growth
rate of the measured corals. The analyzed coral species grew more during summer time when
temperature of sea water reached values up to 29°C. The growth rate of Siderastrea spp varied
from 0.39±0.51 mm/month during summer (in the southern hemisphere from October to March)
to 0.24±0.45 mm/month in winter (from April to September) and of Montastraea cavernosa
from 0.21±0.41 mm/month during summer to 0.13±0.29 mm/month in winter. Observed
bleaching was mild, during summer time, and all affected colonies recovered. During the period
of investigation, sea surface temperature anomalies that could have been the major cause of the
occurrence of a bleaching event of major scale was not registered in the studied region.
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