Be sure to read our monthly updates from Marine Savers – direct from our resident teams at
the Marine Discovery Centres at Landaa & Kuda Huraa – our long-term partnership with Four Seasons Resorts Maldives.
Landaa Giraavaru
To monitor for signs of coral spawning, we schedule night-snorkels around the full moon period
At Landaa this month, we transplanted 20 new coral frames, kindly sponsored by guests (8), the Resort (12), and online (0), adding ~900 new coral fragments to the reef. We monitored (cleaned, repaired, photographed) a total of 388 established coral frames at various sites around Landaa and Voavah. We actively remove any corallivorous species encountered during our maintenance work, which this month included 245 Drupella snails, 5 Monodonta snails, and 6 cushion stars.
Seabar Frames: we relocated 35 medium-sized frames from the Seabar/ Elephant site that had suffered 100% mortality following this year’s coral bleaching event. This month, we completed our recycling work here, before the sponsors’ return to the Resort next month.
To see the progress of your own frame, please visit our dedicated Four Seasons monitoring page where we upload new photos every 6 months or so.
Coral Settlement
🗓️ November 2023: coral gametes were collected and successfully settled ex situ. Following a year of growth, 10 recruits were fitted into concrete moulds.
🗓️ October 2024: 5 coral recruits were out-planted onto the reef, one under a steel “cage” (recruits outside the cage were soon predated).
🗓️ This month: the remaining 5 recruits were out-planted under a steel “cage” for protection, and they are growing well so far.
Coral Spawning around the Full Moon
Around the full moon period (15 December) we surveyed for signs of coral spawning in massive and encrusting genera. We successfully recorded spawning in colonies of Montipora peltiformis, Galaxea fascicularis, and Astreopora species.
Kuda Huraa
At Kuda Huraa this month, our coral experts transplanted 10 new coral frames. During monitoring, we actively seek and remove known corallivores that eat the living corals (this month: 6 crown-of-thorns starfish, 2 cushion starfish, 347 corallivorous snails). This month, we also conducted 20 hours of underwater monitoring over 5 days, looking for signs of coral spawning.
To see the progress of your frame, please visit our dedicated Four Seasons monitoring page where we upload new photos every 6 months or so.
Coral Propagation Training Programme
This month, we hosted Sharnietha (Marine Biologist at Club Med Kani) for a 5-day training session. Our coral propagation training programme was hands-on and very comprehensive, covering topics such as: fragmentation techniques, frame building, how to take good monitoring pictures, genotype tracking, data collection & entry, QGIS overview, in-water maintenance, diagnosing & troubleshooting past problems.
Coral Maintenance
The Channel – With the reopening of the Channel site to guests during the festive season, this month we focused our efforts into repopulating frames in this area. The conditions at this site are not conducive to the survival of Acropora species, therefore we transplanted Porites cylindrica and Pocillopora meandrina fragments as they grow well here (despite the low flow of water, and increased sand movement). We have been monitoring how these fragments adjust to their new environment throughout the month, and so far they have been responding well. We will continue to monitor their progress into the new year.
Water Villas – We are pleased to report that the Montipora foliosa fragments from last month appear to be adapting well to their new environment! Due to this success, we have continued repopulating frames at this site with Montipora foliosa and also Pocillopora verrucosa. We have noticed the emergence of a few juvenile Acropora colonies, and some transplanted fragments of Acropora muricata are slowly regaining their symbionts. This suggests that conditions at this site might be improving, and therefore we will continue monitoring fragment survival in the coming months.
Coral Spawning
Mid-month, we conducted gamete checks on species which have previously spawned in the Maldives during December. Several colonies of Acropora tenuis were found with highly pigmented eggs, suggesting that these colonies might spawn during the December full moon. We conducted spawning checks around this period, but no spawning was observed (or inferred by missing eggs). These colonies remain gravid, so it’s possible they may spawn in the coming weeks.
Resilient Corals: Genotype Experiment
🗓️ During November, we transplanted coral fragments from resilient natural colonies of Acropora vermiculata onto our frames at various sites.
🗓️ This month, we identified wild colonies of Pocillopora verrucosa and Pocillopora eydouxi on the reef flat behind the Blue Hole which had survived the bleaching event. As these wild colonies are found relatively far apart, we can assume these corals are of different genotypes from one another. We labeled the colonies and collected fragments to transplant onto frames (at the same sites), so we can monitor their progress in challenging conditions.
In addition to challenging these resilient corals, we want to ensure that we protect them too. To do this, we are following the same method as described, but outplanting frames at sites with conditions ideal for coral growth. This will hopefully ensure that we preserve these genotypes during more severe bleaching events that are almost certain to occur in the future. This work to both challenge and protect resilient corals will continue into the new year.
