World’s largest coral transplantation in Okinawa
March 9, 2016 Ryukyu Shimpo
“Coral reef week” was from February 27 to March 13. Healthy coral reefs are in danger of being bleached by high water temperatures and red soil run-off. In order to protect biodiversity, tourism and fishing resources, the Okinawa Prefectural Government entrusted Onna Village Fisheries Cooperative and other organizations to transplant coral. The coral transplantation area will be more than three hectares, a world first on this scale, this November. The involved organizations plan to use a method of sexual reproduction to plant about 20,000 corals, which will be the world’s largest for such a project.
The transplantation started as part of a project to protect and restore coral reefs that began in the fiscal year of 2010. Congeners of staghorn coral are being planted. The coral transplantation area is currently about 2.5 hectares. Methods of sexual reproduction and asexual reproduction are used to plant corals. With the method of asexual reproduction, the involved organizations will plant about 100,000 corals.
(English translation by T&CT)
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