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
At Landaa this month, we transplanted 10 new coral frames, kindly sponsored by guests (3), the Resort (7), and online (0), adding ~450 new coral fragments to the reef. Frames were planted at “Plankton”, a site located near Charlie’s Head, where they will be frequently seen by divers. We also monitored (cleaned, repaired, photographed) ~282 sponsored frames, mainly at our Coral Trail, Voavah, and Dive sites. A new project was also launched to place Four Seasons frames around the water villas, where they can be viewed directly from the villas.
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.
Voavah Reef
All coral frames at Voavah were monitored this month in anticipation of guest arrivals and the return of sponsors. Not only are the coral frames thriving, but the surrounding house reef at Voavah is also very healthy. Following the 2024 mass bleaching event, such healthy gardens of Acropora are a very promising sign, as these corals may repopulate local reefs that are more degraded. A bay on the southern side of the island where 10 frames have been planted is particularly healthy and serves as a prime location for snorkelling/diving.
Recycling & Retransplanting
Maintenance efforts focused on removing coral frames that meet the criteria of >80% dead coral cover or are largely bare and/or degraded. Removing degraded frames improves the appearance of restoration sites and enables existing materials to be repurposed and recycled. Healthy colonies on severely degraded frames are removed and re-transplanted. Dead coral is hammered off, taking care not to expose the underlying metal rebar, which compromises the frame’s integrity. Preserving the coating makes the refurbishment process more efficient and helps extend the lifespan of the frames. Once cleaned and touched up, these repurposed frames can be deployed as new frames, a sustainable approach that reduces waste.
Focal sites for frame removal include the Water Villas, which endured ∼85% mortality during the 2024 bleaching event, and the House Reef. Following significant maintenance efforts, this month we collected 81 stacked coral frames in total from three key locations around Landaa Giraavaru:
– 22 frames from Al Barakat, 33 from the House Reef Dive Jetty, and 44 from the Water Villas area.
An additional 22 frames at the Water Villas site are still awaiting collection. We hope to continue this project for the following months, increasing stacking efforts and aiming for 200–300 frames in the next few months.
Additional focus has been on re-fragmenting viable frames with resilient shallow-water species. Acropora aspera and Porites cylindrica have been collected and brought to the villas for transplantation. Fragments from these species attached six weeks ago are already showing promising signs of calcification (growing over the cable tie and encrusting on the frame).
Most common species rescued from sand and older frames to maximise the use of local coral: Pocillopora damicornis, P. meandrina, P. verrucosa.
Predator management was also carried out, with over 100 Drupella snails (corallivores) removed from colonies around the villas.
Water Villas – Recycling Project
Our Reefscapers-JCU intern, Libbie, has continued to lead the Water Villas recycling and re-fragmentation project. Between Villas 301–309, a total of 42 degraded frames have been removed and transported to the Staff Jetty for collection and recycling, with a further 30 frames in this area scheduled to be recycled. New sponsored frames have been planted in this cleared area.
Work has now begun around Villas 401–409, where approximately 70 frames will be prepared for collection and recycling once this section of the Water Villas is complete.
Research Publication
This month, Reefscapers’ research paper on coral spawning was published in Frontiers of Marine Science: “Multi-specific coral spawning and monsoonal transitions: assemblage-level observations from Baa Atoll, Maldives” — Errington, Moody & Le Berre, 2025. The findings serve as a key baseline for reef managers, researchers, and restoration practitioners utilising sexual reproduction for large-scale reef restoration.
Our study documents the exact spawning times of 375 colonies of 28 species between February 2024 and April 2025. It revealed two peak annual spawning seasons: in March/April and from October to December, coinciding with transitions in the monsoon season. Larger spawning events in a given month were significantly correlated with lower wind speeds, higher sea surface temperatures, and increased solar insolation, highlighting the influence of environmental conditions.
Kuda Huraa
At Kuda Huraa this month, our coral experts transplanted 4 new frames, kindly sponsored by guests (3), the Resort (1), and online (0). In addition, we monitored and repopulated 55 growing coral frames.
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.
Reef Maintenance
This month, we maintained the coral frames at all four restoration sites around Kuda Huraa: the Blue Hole, the Water Villas, the Channel, and the House Reef. Improved weather conditions and greater whaler access allowed us to visit the House Reef more frequently than last month. During these visits, we monitored guest frames and checked coral colonies for mature gametes, in preparation for the upcoming coral spawning season in early October. At this site, we observed pale eggs in several Acropora colonies.
A total of two frames were recycled during Junior Marine Savers activities. To celebrate PADI-Aware week, we built a small coral frame with members of staff from multiple departments. We delivered a short fifteen-minute presentation on coral reefs and our restoration and rehabilitation work before heading to ‘secret beach’ to build the frame. It was great to talk to fellow members of the Four Seasons family about our role around the island and answer their questions!
Coral Predators – This month, we observed a rise in corallivorous starfish but a decline in corallivorous gastropods. A total of 7 Corallivorous Starfish and 72 Drupella snails were removed from our sites.
Frame Remapping & Repopulation
The 8 pre-existing flat coral frames in the Blue Hole that had died during the bleaching event last year were repopulated this month, using fragments of Pocillopora that have been thriving at this site. We also relocated the flat frames away from the centre of the Blue Hole, where sediment tends to settle. We outplanted five new frames (two guest and three recycled) to the Blue Hole to enhance the already thriving ecosystem. We have already seen encouraging megafauna activity at this site throughout the month, including a juvenile nurse shark, a hawksbill sea turtle, eagle rays, and many blacktip reef sharks.
Frame Relocation & Coral Maintenance
After the successful relocation of most Water Villa frames to a deeper area with less wild Montipora digitata, we moved most of the remaining at-risk frames to the same deeper area. All Water Villa frames have now been monitored, and the site is performing well. We will continue to closely monitor the Montipora digitata overgrowth and to outplant fragments of M. foliosa.
