Mountainous Star Coral (O

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Mountainous Star Coral (Orbicella faveolata) Mountainous star coral (also known as reef building coral) is native to the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. They are most abundant on the ont reef slopes beteen the depths of 33 to 66 feet. Its color is usually pale brown but may be deep brown with fluorescent geen highlights. Mountainous star coral gows in heads or sheets, the surface of which may be smooth or have keels or bumps. The skeleton is much less dense than in the other to star coral species. Colony diameters can exceed up to 30 feet with heights of 13 to 16 feet. Mountainous star coral is a slow-gowing species and the rate at which new colonies are fored is less than the rate at which matre colonies die. It takes them 3-8 years to matre, compared to the average lifetime of coral of 10 years. Colonies can gow ver large and live for centries. Mountainous star coral are both male and female that release eggs and sper into the water column once a year. They usually sele on the underside of surfaces, they prefer to sele on organisms found on the reef surfaces. In laborator exeriments most larae found seled at least half an inch away om the red algae. Several species of zooxanthellae are associated with the coral, depending on the degee of light intensit reaching the par of the surface where they reside. The surface of the coral can be considered a small ecological communit of many tiny organisms. The large stctres produced by this species are of high ecological imporance as they enhance the stctral diversit, as well as integit of reef systems and provide habitat for other species. Once a highly abundant species, mountainous star coral has declined rapidly in the last few decades and is now absent in many of the shallow reef habitats it once dominated. Decreased temperatre can also stess mountainous star coral as the sybiotic algae associated with them are not ver cold water tolerant. Unlike staghor corals, the mountainous star corals collected through 1996 showed no evidence of change in calcification rates; however, ocean acidification has been documented to reduce their reproductive success. Lear more about these and other coral species in the Gulf of Mexico on our coral web poral at hs://poral.glfcouncil.org
Rough Cactus Coral (Mycetophyllia ferox) Rough Cacts Coral occurs in the wester Atlantic Ocean and throughout the wider Caribbean Sea, but it has not been repored in the Flower Garden Banks (Gulf of Mexico) or in Beruda. They are tically shades of gey or brown, but may also be reddish or geen. Rough cacts coral gows in water 15 to 270 feet deep, including shallow and mesophotic habitats that are geater than 300 feet. It fors a thin, encrsting plate and has valleys and walls of contasting colors. Rough cacts coral has both male and female reproductive organs but they do not release eggs into the water column; rather, they hold onto the ferilized embros until those larae are ready to sele onto something. Ferilized embros are stored in the interal body cavit and spawned through the mouth. The embros develop into a planktonic larae and slowly stared gowing tentacles, plates and mouth pars before it seles in a substatm. Reproduction usually occurs once a year, beteen December and Januar. Rough cacts coral is one of the least common coral species obsered in monitoring stdies, which makes it difficult to discer population tends. In Florida, this species has exerienced sigificant population declines. Repored losses of rough cacts coral om monitoring stations in the Florida Keys and Dr Torgas indicate a 63-80% population decline in these locations. As a result, it is presumed that genetic diversit for the species is low. Rough cacts coral has declined due to disease in at least a porion of its range and has low recritent, which limits its capacit for recover om moralit events and increases vulnerabilit. Low recritent makes it hard for this species to recover om moralit events. Following a mass bleaching event in Florida in 2005, no bleached rough cacts coral colonies obsered; only dead colonies were obsered several days aſter the event. Ocean acidification is predicted to accelerate most in deeper and cooler waters than those in which the species occurs. Its habitat includes shallow and mesophotic reefs which has moderate vulnerabilit to exinction over the foreseeable ftre because of the species occurs in numerous tes of reef environments that are predicted, on local and regional scales, to exerience highly variable theral regimes and ocean chemist at any given point in time. Lear more about these and other coral species in the Gulf of Mexico on our coral web poral at hs://poral.glfcouncil.org
Page 1 and 2: Elkhorn Coral (Acropora Palmata) El
Page 3 and 4: Pillar Coral (Dendrogyra cylindrus)
Page 5: Lobed Star Coral (Orbicella annular

ESA Corals From the Gulf of Mexico

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ESA Corals From the Gulf of Mexico

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