Coral nursery and planting

Sorry about the delay between posts.  We had a free day with no scheduled activities except evening lecture presentations.  This was followed by two days of reef rehabilitation during which I was out of commission with unwanted viral and bacterial inhabitants.  I'm feeling better now.  Most of us have taken our turn with some sort of illness.  The two days of reef rehabilitation work provided the students with great hands-on experience.   Coral fragments were harvested from donor colonies by the marine biologists because that part of the project has to be done very carefully, meanwhile our students conducted the Reef Watch protocol for evaluating reef health, for which they prepared two days earlier.  After the coral fragments were on the boat, the students prepared them by inserting them into tubes and putting the tubes into plastic mesh racks, then diving the racks down to the nursery.  After that activity, the students planted fragments that had been in the nursery for one year (placed there by last year's students) into a dead reef.

Coral fragments were placed into tubs around which the students worked to insert them into tubes.  This is Gai Tong's group.

David's group minus some, plus Nalanee the marine biologist from the Phuket Marine Biological Center.

Maggie putting the tubes into a rack.

Jay's group.

Carlie is showing off her work.

Jake.  Love the shorts...

Carley and Kyler.

After a rack is complete, it's important to get it back into the sea ASAP so the coral polyps don't dry, so we hang them from the side of the boat.  Every year, the students are more efficient than previous years.  This year we set a record 2,160 coral fragments placed into the nursery.

The students swam the racks down to the nursery platform.

The racks were placed on two platforms, each of which holds 14 racks.  Additional racks were placed on the new artificial reef blocks.

The racks were cable tied to the platform.

In the dead reef, the students cable tied last year's coral nursery fragments to dead, stable coral.

This looks like Sara.  The current was quite strong on this day, so this was not an easy task.

Kyler.  Note his and the other students excellent buoyancy skills, holding their bodies above the coral.  They could not have done this on the first few days of the program, so the early acclimation dives were important.

Kyler acknowledging that he's doing careful work.

This might be Gabi, but I'm not sure

I'm guessing Gabi and Kelly.