Coral Primary
Polyp Settlement on Crustose Coralline Algae from India
Kashyap Kumar, Venu Sasidharan, Kalita Samrat, Kripa S. and Lakshmanan Sreelakshmi
Disaster Advances; Vol. 17(4); 48-52;
doi: https://doi.org/10.25303/174da048052; (2024)
Abstract
Crustose coralline algae (CCA) are calcareous red algae belonging to the diverse
group Rhodophyta. They are known to play numerous important ecological roles in
the coral reef ecosystems such as various invertebrate larval settlement, cementing
the reef together, participating effectively in primary productivity. One of the
most important ecological roles these algae play, are the settlement and metamorphosis
of coral larvae.
Though lots of observations have been made on a juvenile coral being settled on
CCA, there has not been any study on the initial settlement of coral larvae on CCA.
The present study was carried out in the intertidal regions of South Andaman district.
During intertidal survey, a single thin layered CCA was observed to house four different
coral recruits which had settled and metamorphosed to form a single polyp coral.
