Abstract Summary
The Florida Aquarium has consistently increased success in larval propagation in several species of Western Atlantic stony corals with approximately 50% survival after one year in the most recent years. Culture conditions were optimized through construction of aquarium systems specifically for this purpose at the Center for Conservation, the use of herbivores, regulating light exposure, and routine feeding of recruits. Ongoing projects include rearing of additional species, construction of aquaria to induce spawning in the laboratory, and rearing of recruits produced via cryofertilization and assisted gene flow. Despite the increased cost of larval rearing ex-situ, the ability to maximize survival and early growth may outweigh these costs in some cases. The addition of land-based spawning will allow genetic crosses to be conducted that would not be possible in the wild in areas where populations are greatly reduced.
