Mfav spawn II pictures!

mexico spawning 2009 ii

BIG BIG BIG Montastraea faveolata spawn

On Sep 10, the 6th night after the full moon, Montastraea faveolata spawning occurred in ~80% of the colonies at La Bocana Reef, Puerto Morelos, Mexico. It was a big, massive, huge spawning. It started at about 22:30h, and was still going on at 23.15h.

please find pictures in the following post. It was AMAZING!

pictures

mexico spawning 2009

we got Montastraea faveolata spawn!

what a memorable date … yesterday 09.09.09 we got Montastraea faveolata spawn from 4 out of 10 colonies. Spawning started around 10.30 pm.

We were afraid in the beginning as most of the colonies are more or less bleached, but we decided to go for the ones that look ok. No shallow colonies spawned (1-3m).

we didn t get too much but it looks pretty ok. tonight, we hope to get the big spawn. stay tuned.

find pictures in the next post!

back for coral spawning 2009

we re back in Mexico, Puerto Morelos at UNAM for coral spawning! Today is the 3rd night that we re going out for Acropora spawn. Everything is super organized and nice. Thank you UNAM

pictures !

before takeoff

pizza time

pizza service boat to boat

M. faveolata spawn

M. faveolata spawn

A. palmata spawn

A. palmata spawn

spawn water surface

wet lab

August 22nd: BIG SPAWN both species :)

internet was gone for 2 days … sorry for the delay !

in terms of our spawning operation: we split up the team to take control of what everybody feared to come: both species spawning at the same day ! so we went out with two boats, split the dive teams AND … got spawn from both species !

A. palmata started spawning around 10pm, M. faveolata a little later around 10.30pm.

we have an estimated 3,000,000 M. faveolata larvae and around 50,000 A. palamata larvae. BOO-YAA ! the larvae are doing great ! this year we changed to an air conditioned wet lab and filtered and UV-treated water and it works wonders

pictures will be posted soon …

August 21st: SPAWNING … not the big one, but both species :)

we got spawn from A. palmata and M. faveolata. In essence, one colony from both species went off and we collected spawn. Not much for now, but we re prepared and a nice sign of more to come! we ll be there!

A. palmata spawn

taking care of spawn

spawning Mum Monica

August 20th, second day/night out for Acropora spawn

we were still unlucky concerning spawning but our team skills improved by 200% … all operations took about half the time, so now we re really ready for spawning, and hopefully the corals are in the mood …

August 19th, first day/night out for Acropora spawn

yesterday was our first night out for A. palmata spawning, but nothing happened … i think everybody was kind of happy for that wet dry-run. apart from that the colonies look nice, the nets are huge, the wet lab is running, so we re pretty much ready to go … maybe it s happening this night … sex is in the air !?

Acropora fields forever

big net