With so much beauty under the waves around Tioman Island we thought we would talk a little about one of the things that makes our little island so very special, it’s coral Reefs!
Surrounded by Captivating Coral
We are surrounded by fringing coral reefs that can be found at many locations around the coastal waters of Tioman. Here in Juara we are lucky to have shallow coastal coral reefs, sloping coral gardens, secrete coral spots, Drop offs, bouldering coral outcrops and deeper water pinnacle reefs. Each collection of coral houses specific species that have adapted to live in each unique ecosystem.
The many different hard coral species create the structures, the building blocks, of these underwater cities exploding with life.
Our NGO Reef Tribes has set up a coral resilience and education project, taking corals of opportunity, broken fragments of coral, from the reef and attaching them to our underwater structures that stimulate growth. We clean, measure and monitor these pieces before replanting them back onto the reef system. In the afternoons I will pop down to our coral nursery to check on our coral ‘babies’ often taking interested divers with me on this shore dive.
We love our nursery as it has turned into a thriving ecosystem within itself. There is so much macro there we can often get distracted by beautiful nudibranch, exciting little shrimps and coral crabs as well as larger species such as cowtail rays, Trevally, puffer fish and groupers that now call this new site their home. We often get visits from large schools of squid and had a nesting pair of cuttlefish choose this site for their eggs last season, soooo fascinating to watch the whole process!
Conservation is one of the core pillars of our business and so we focus heavily on coral resilience, reef monitoring, workshops, and education courses to highlight the importance and fragility of these complex ecosystems so crucial to ocean health.
Through Reef Tribes, our reef resilience NGO, we work with the local community and our wider ‘family’ spreading information about these ocean ‘life-spots’ and the ways in which we can help their survival long into the future.
Complex Colonisation of Coral
But today we wanted to start at the beginning and talk a little about what a Coral Reef actually is!
Coral has two ways in which it reproduces, sexually through Coral Spawning events and asexually through individual polyp cloning. This interesting secondary reproduction method makes this animal quite unique.
Upon settlement of a coral polyp a magical process starts. The coral polyp starts to sequencer Calcium Carbonate from the water column and begins to form an exoskeleton, this hard outer layer is crucial to the survival of the coral, its colony, and acts as the base of the WHOLE coral reef.
Coral has two ways in which it reproduces, sexually through Coral Spawning events and asexually through individual polyp cloning. This interesting secondary reproduction method makes this animal quite unique.
Upon settlement of a coral polyp a magical process starts. The coral polyp starts to sequencer Calcium Carbonate from the water column and begins to form an exoskeleton, this hard outer layer is crucial to the survival of the coral, its colony, and acts as the base of the WHOLE coral reef.
The single coral polyp builds its exoskeleton for several reasons:
- It adds strength to the corals connection to the rocky substrate in which it has chosen to grow
- It provides protection to the polyp animal from grazing fish crustations or other invertebrates that may enjoy this tasty snack
- It provide a new substrate for its ‘best friend’ the symbiotic algae zooxanthellae that lives in companionship with its coral
- It also builds its complex structure to expand its colony, through asexual reproduction
This means that each coral polyp we see is genetically identical to the others within its individual colony and that, as a community, it can replace damaged or dead polyps as needed; meaning that technically a coral colony could live forever.
We discuss more about the ecology of coral, the animal, in our blog entry titled: The Coolness of Coral and if you would like to learn more about individual coral species you could always join us for our ‘CORAL IDENTIFICATION’ speciality taught by our dedicated coral obsessed instructors it is open to divers and non-divers and can be studied as a standalone online course or combine with an underwater experience, through diving or snorkelling, where you can get some hands on IDing experience.
Underwater Cityscapes
So as we mentioned Reefs are defined as being an Outcrop of rock, in the sea, formed by the growth and deposit of stony coral skeletons (known as hard corals) but they are so very much more than this.
Coral Reefs are often referred to as underwater cities and we believe this ennealogy is quite perfect.
Corals act as the buildings and business or the city, varying in size, shape and colour they provide structure to the reef.
The perfect home for fish, invertabrates and crustations alike. They provide restaurants for Nudibranchs, parrot fish, starfish and sea snails. ‘Spar’ facilities for visiting pelagic species and ‘local residents’ alike. Business for many species that provide services for others such as cleaner wrasse and banded shrimp.
City Similarities
But there is much more going on in the complex Reef systems than meets the eyes, Sea cucumbers trail the sands as mobile garbage units cleaning the sands, Damsel fish farm and manage their own ‘algae patch’ making sure that it is strongly defended by any possible intrusion (no matter the size). ‘Rush hour’ happens, every day, as residents and visitors commute to their daily activities. You can hear neighbours chatter in pops and clicks, impromptu underwater orchestra recitals, and of course each morning starts with the early riser’s rendition of their own dawn chorus. Night times discos, created by phosphorescent algae, rain down around the reef illuminating evening activities, sleepless nights, and midnight snacks.
Seasonal tourist come in from the open ocean for spawning events, date nights, family gatherings and for a bit of R&R (Rest and Recovery) in the form of their cleaning stations or by directly using the anaesthetic qualities of the coral itself,
And of course the Coral reef are world renound for their Birth and Nursery facilities that many would travel across the world to use.
With up to a 25% of marine species directly relying on Coral Reefs for their survival and half of the ocean creatures using Coral Reefs in some way during their lives, these underwater cities really are the backbone to ocean health and species diversity. We are lucky to have a reef just like this right in front of our dive centre aptly named ‘The Aquarium’ this beautiful fringing reef can be entered directly from the beach, you can read all about this busy reef right here.
