Strange Coral Spawning Improving Great Barrier Reef's Resilience
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
A phenomenon that makes coral spawn more than once a year is improving the resilience of the Great Barrier Reef.
The discovery was made by University of Queensland and CSIRO researchers investigating whether corals that split their spawning over multiple months are more successful at spreading their offspring across different reefs.
Dr. Karlo Hock, from UQ's School of Biological Sciences, said coral mass spawning events are one of the most spectacular events in the oceans.
"They're incredibly beautiful," Dr. Hock said.
"On Australia's Great Barrier Reef, all coral colonies typically spawn only once per year, over several nights after the full moon, as the water warms up in late spring."
Study co-author Dr. Christopher Doropoulos from the CSIRO Oceans & Atmosphere said sometimes however, coral split their spawning over two successive months.
"This helps them synchronise their reproduction to the best environmental conditions and moon phases," he said.
"While reproductive success during split spawning may be lower than usual because it can lead to reduced fertilisation, we found that the release of eggs in two separate smaller events gives the corals a second and improved chance of finding a new home reef."
Split spawning increases robustness of coral larval supply and inter-reef connectivity, Nature (DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-11367-7)
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