USGS Monitors Coral Growth Rates

A parrotfish swims past a calcification monitoring station, here shown with the Lesser Starlet Coral, Siderastrea siderea, at Molasses Reef Sanctuary Preservation Area in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. In 2009, a network of such stations was set up at five outer-bank reef sites from Miami to the Dry Tortugas to quantify calcification rates by corals and other calcifiers, and to determine the factors that control carbonate production.