SMSG Blog

The brooding reef coral Favia gravida (Verrill 1868) is found on the mid-Atlantic volcanic islands of Ascension and St. Helena, about 1,300 km apart.

First recorded in 1881 in small tidal rock pools, Professor Wirtz revisited the original site at Shelly Beach, Ascension Island, during the recent SMSG expedition.

[caption id="attachment_742" align="aligncenter" width="584"] Peter Wirtz collecting samples from the Shelly Beach rock pools.

Although a large number of dead corals were found in the pools, the small population has somehow persisted to the present day. In a new publication, authors Bert Hoeksema and Peter Wirtz suggest that the remarkable survival of Ascension’s small population for at least 130 years has been made possible through inbreeding and fragmentation, suiting it for life on the bottom of these unique shallow rock pools. The full article can be found and downloaded here.

[caption id="attachment_741" align="aligncenter" width="584"] Live corals photographed in situ

The team returns to Shelly Beach

We mentioned in one of our early posts that two of our team members had been fortunate enough to be shown a very special site here on Ascension, the small rock pools at Shelly Beach where two very rare and vulnerable species of shrimp are found.

Yesterday a large number of the team enjoyed a return visit to the pools, escorted by Stedson Stroud and Jolene Sim of Ascension Conservation. This time we were loaded with all the equipment we would need for a survey of the site, including underwater cameras, devices to measure salinity and temperature, GPS units to map the site and, most excitingly, special permission by the Ascension Island Government to collect a small number of samples for further study.

Enjoy this short gallery of images taken at this exceptional location.

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