With Reef Futures 2018 coming up in just a few weeks, intern Kristin Anderson is hard at work preparing a poster to present at the conference! Throughout the fall, Kristin's intern project has been to measure and document the growth rates of our two boulder coral species in Tavernier Nursery, Orbicella faveolata and Orbicella annularis.
She has been doing this by taking pictures of the corals in the nursery and then using image analysis software to take precise measurements of the corals, documenting the rate at which they are growing. Since Coral Restoration Foundation™ is extremely focused on genetic diversity, we keep 51 different genotypes of these species represented in the nursery. Of the 51 genotypes, 26 belong to O. faveolata, 25 belong to O. annularis, and there are six fragments of each genotype located in the genetic bank of the nursery.
Using information like growth rate, CRF will have baseline data of nursery coral performance that will eventually be used to enhance our boulder coral outplanting and monitoring methods. As she continues to gather data, Kristin is creating graphs and tables of her results for a scientific poster, which she will present at Reef Futures 2018. We're all really excited to see her data and how it can be used to benefit and streamline our practices!
About the Author:
Erin Bowman