This summer I have two interns (Bri & Dom) from the Biology department of a local University (Utica University) working with me on an ambitious project to classify all of the coral growing in our collection at the Bull Reef Aquaculture facility. The goal is to get everything classified down to Genus, Species, and Common/Trade name. This project provides an excellent learning opportunity, and relevant field experience to help kick off their careers in the Biological Sciences post graduation.
This is a LARGE undertaking as we have hundreds of different coral growing in our aquaculture facility. Some have already been fully classified (Genus/Species/Common), but most still need species level identification and common/trade names. This thread is a way for us to crowdsource the project, and help these students accurately identify each specimen while getting verification from the community. By working on this project they are doing a service to the entire reefing community. They will be cross referencing images they take of specimens in our facility with online sources such as:
World Register of Marine Speices (WORMS): https://www.marinespecies.org/
Corals of the World: https://www.coralsoftheworld.org/page/home/
as well as print sources such as:
Indo-Pacific Corals (Rowlett)
Corals of Australia and the Indo-Pacific (Veron)
Corals a Quick Reference Guide (Sprung)
Book of Coral Propagation (Calfo)
among many others in their attempts at accurate species level identification. We also have access to the University labs, and have the ability to inspect specimen skeletons under high power microscopes if needed to get proper ID. If you have suggestions of other online sources that may be useful please feel free to provide them in this thread.
Which brings me to the second part of this project... the community contest! We are hoping that when the students get stumped on identifying a specimen at any level (Genus, Species, Common/Trade) that members of the community may be able to jump in and help. This project will end around September once the students are concluded with their internship. The community members that provide input will be entered into a drawing that will be done at Fragsgiving 2025 in November. We will pull two names from the drawing, and those two winners will each get a $75.00 credit to use at our table during the show.
The Rules:
1. Be nice, the students are doing us all a service, and are gaining practical experience in scientific classification of species. They are learning as they go and will make mistakes as we have all done trying to identify the things we stuff in our glass boxes. Be helpful and courteous. Neither of them have reef tanks, or have been involved in the reefing hobby. They are general biology students being thrown into our world.. so make them feel welcome, and help them become experts!
2. The goal is to identify each specimen at GENUS, SPECIES, and COMMON name along with native geographic region of the specimen. GENUS and SPECIES are most important as we all know the common names get ridiculous, hold no scientific value, and there could be multiple for a single specimen.
3. The students will post a picture and provide all of the info they currently have gathered along with any reference materials. For example:
Genus: Acropora
Species: ?
Common: ?
Geographic Region: Indonesia
In this case they would be asking for community input on the Species and Common name of the specimen. You may respond with an answer to both or just one. Either counts if it is correct. Each correct answer gets an entry into the raffle. So the more you help the students identify over the course of the project the more times your name will be tossed into the hat. Let's make this even sweeter. Each entry has to have validation! So the first person that calls it and the first person to verify it is correct both get entries! References must be provided to substantiate your claim.
4. At the end of the internship we will go through the thread and tally up all of the valid community member entries to the contest. You (or a representative) must be present at Fragsgiving 2025 during the time of drawing to win. We will leave it up to the Fragsgiving coordinators to decide when the drawing will be held during the event. This will be separate from our standard raffle donation.
5. If you like what you see in any of the pictures the students are posting, and you would like to order a cutting/frag send me a DM and we can talk about the size you are looking for, pricing, and logistics of getting it out to you!
This is a LARGE undertaking as we have hundreds of different coral growing in our aquaculture facility. Some have already been fully classified (Genus/Species/Common), but most still need species level identification and common/trade names. This thread is a way for us to crowdsource the project, and help these students accurately identify each specimen while getting verification from the community. By working on this project they are doing a service to the entire reefing community. They will be cross referencing images they take of specimens in our facility with online sources such as:
World Register of Marine Speices (WORMS): https://www.marinespecies.org/
Corals of the World: https://www.coralsoftheworld.org/page/home/
as well as print sources such as:
Indo-Pacific Corals (Rowlett)
Corals of Australia and the Indo-Pacific (Veron)
Corals a Quick Reference Guide (Sprung)
Book of Coral Propagation (Calfo)
among many others in their attempts at accurate species level identification. We also have access to the University labs, and have the ability to inspect specimen skeletons under high power microscopes if needed to get proper ID. If you have suggestions of other online sources that may be useful please feel free to provide them in this thread.
Which brings me to the second part of this project... the community contest! We are hoping that when the students get stumped on identifying a specimen at any level (Genus, Species, Common/Trade) that members of the community may be able to jump in and help. This project will end around September once the students are concluded with their internship. The community members that provide input will be entered into a drawing that will be done at Fragsgiving 2025 in November. We will pull two names from the drawing, and those two winners will each get a $75.00 credit to use at our table during the show.
The Rules:
1. Be nice, the students are doing us all a service, and are gaining practical experience in scientific classification of species. They are learning as they go and will make mistakes as we have all done trying to identify the things we stuff in our glass boxes. Be helpful and courteous. Neither of them have reef tanks, or have been involved in the reefing hobby. They are general biology students being thrown into our world.. so make them feel welcome, and help them become experts!
2. The goal is to identify each specimen at GENUS, SPECIES, and COMMON name along with native geographic region of the specimen. GENUS and SPECIES are most important as we all know the common names get ridiculous, hold no scientific value, and there could be multiple for a single specimen.
3. The students will post a picture and provide all of the info they currently have gathered along with any reference materials. For example:
Genus: Acropora
Species: ?
Common: ?
Geographic Region: Indonesia
In this case they would be asking for community input on the Species and Common name of the specimen. You may respond with an answer to both or just one. Either counts if it is correct. Each correct answer gets an entry into the raffle. So the more you help the students identify over the course of the project the more times your name will be tossed into the hat. Let's make this even sweeter. Each entry has to have validation! So the first person that calls it and the first person to verify it is correct both get entries! References must be provided to substantiate your claim.
4. At the end of the internship we will go through the thread and tally up all of the valid community member entries to the contest. You (or a representative) must be present at Fragsgiving 2025 during the time of drawing to win. We will leave it up to the Fragsgiving coordinators to decide when the drawing will be held during the event. This will be separate from our standard raffle donation.
5. If you like what you see in any of the pictures the students are posting, and you would like to order a cutting/frag send me a DM and we can talk about the size you are looking for, pricing, and logistics of getting it out to you!
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