Some good news: Millepora alcicornis on Vauxhall Reef was largely unaffected by the extreme warming events in the fall of 2023
Tom Goreau cited the Acropora and Millepora species as tho reef-building species most affected by extreme warming in the fall of 2023.
Both the “true” coral A prolifera and the coral-like hydrozoan M. complanata occur, with the colonial zoanthid Palythoa caribeana, in the “A. prolifera Mother Colony Complex” at Vauxhall.
Both A prolifera and M. complanata were uniformly drab and covered with epiphytic growth when I viewed the colony on Jan 12, 2023, in sharp contrast to the vibrant colours of a year earlier (Palythoa caribeana was ‘normal’ in both years) READ MORE