Submitted by: Jay Harvey, Aquarist II, Aquarium of the Pacific
Edited by: Sean B. Eckley, Dive Safety Officer – Field Operations, Aquarium of the Pacific
This past summer the Aquarium of the Pacific was fortunate to be able to send two staff divers, Jay Harvey and Nate Jaros, to represent the Aquarium on a project on the island of Saipan in support of the coral reef restoration work done by SECORE International, one of our institutional partners. SECORE, short for SExual COral REproduction, focuses on developing new and innovative techniques for coral spawning and out-planting, and helps to implement those techniques on at-risk reefs around the world. This year we helped with a spawning event on Saipan, but in years past the Aquarium has sent staff members to help with SECORE projects in Guam, Palau, and multiple sites around the Caribbean.
Saipan is a small island in the Western Pacific about 130 miles north of Guam. While most Americans have never even heard of the island, it is technically U.S. soil because it is part of the Northern Marianas Islands, a commonwealth of the United States. The coral reefs that surround the island have been in a steady decline following multiple bleaching events in the 2010’s. SECORE has partnered with Johnston Applied Marine Sciences, who are based on Saipan, to help repopulate and restore the local coral reefs around the island. Due to the decreasing density of the corals living on the reef, it is becoming harder for free-floating coral gametes to fertilize naturally in the ocean. SECORE has helped try to mitigate this by collecting gametes from spawning corals on the reef and relocating them into a lab space where they can combine in a much more concentrated space, greatly increasing the fertilization and development rate.
As aquarists and divers from the Aquarium of the Pacific, our role was to provide physical and diving support wherever necessary. This mainly consisted of helping collect gametes from wild coral colonies during nightly spawning dives, as well as helping to maintain and clean underwater coral nurseries used to grow small coral juveniles before they are out-planted onto the reef.
As someone who spends most of their time at work diving small, enclosed reef exhibits, I was thrilled to be able to utilize my dive skills and training on a dynamic coral reef. During the project, divers dove five nights in a row, heading out just after sunset to look for spawning coral colonies in the hopes of being able to collect coral gametes for fertilization. In addition to spotting corals, it was fun for us to be able to watch some of the more elusive residents of the reef like lionfish, octopus, and some interesting invertebrates come out at night to hunt . After collecting gametes from the reef, we then mixed them together on land and brought them back to the lab where the coral larvae can begin to develop and grow. SECORE uses special ceramic tiles as a substrate for the larvae to settle on and attach to. These tiles can then be easily out-planted back onto the reef once the juvenile coral colonies have grown big enough.
Since corals take a very long time to grow, we weren’t able to see the development of the corals we helped create in the short time that the Aquarium of the Pacific divers were there. But I hope to return to the island again this summer to see the effects of all the hard work that has gone into restoring these delicate reefs. It has also been very rewarding to be able to incorporate messaging about coral reef restoration techniques into my exhibits back at AOP. Highlighting ways that organizations like SECORE are actively supporting at-risk coral reefs has helped our visitors to connect with and care about these fascinating ecosystems.
Jay Harvey is an Aquarist II at the Aquarium of the Pacific and an active AAUS scientific diver for the institution’s staff dive program.
