Fire Coral Villages

From a Public Facebook Album
Photos Posted Feb & Mar, 2020.

Album Description:

I cite 3 species, however based on more detailed observations in 2024 I think that most of the “M.sqaurrosa” were or could have been  M. companata specimens. See Obs I/Taxonomix Issues/Fire Corals (Millepora spp)

“I don’t think fire corals were nearly so abundant on Barbados fringing reefs 50 years ago, certainly I remember them as mostly an irritant and not much else. But today, they are prominent features where the reefs are doing well or half well, especially on the Reef Crest (where the waves break) and on the advancing Spurs towards and at the seaward edge at 2-5 m or so depth. They form some beautiful aggregations that could elicit a description as “villages of gold”, and those villages are home to a host of fauna and flora, some not found elsewhere in the reef. In the old days when everything was abundant, we probably would have taken a hammer and broken them apart to find outs what’s in them, today I use a camera. So this album will record some of my visual impressions and shots of some of the inhabitants. ’Will begin with a few landscape shots.”