Coral rescued from Ahukini

Live coral anchored atop “degrading man-made structures” prompted a collaborative ocean rescue recently in the waters of Ahukini State Park.

“This is a rescue of coral from the submerging man-made structure,” said Tim Leichliter, the president of Hoomalu Ke Kai. “The rescued ‘corals of opportunity’ will have an opportunity to stabilize and grown out at the nursery before being restored to degraded reef sites around the island.”

Leichliter said the collective effort started long before the coral rescue mission on Nov. 17, and involved the Hoomalu Ke Kai, the state’s Department of Land and Natural Resources, Division of Aquatic Resources, Kauai Ocean Awareness, the Kauai Sea Farm, the University of Hawaii Coral Resilience Lab, and others.

“This week’s work represents Kauai’s first-ever coral rescue collection for the new Kauai Coral Restoration Nursery under Special Activity Permit #2026-11 from the DLNR-DAR,” Leichliter said. “Our team identified and collected ‘corals of opportunity’ — colonies naturally growing on deteriorating man-made structures at Ahukini Landing. These are fragments that would eventually break off or die as the structures decay. By rescuing them, we are able to stabilize, quarantine, microfragment, and grow them out at the nursery before restoring them to reef sites around the island that have been degraded over time.”

The DLNR, in a press release, said the corals of opportunity, or loose corals that have been dislodged from their parent reefs or damaged from storms, boat groundings or anchors, were collected by Hoomalu Ke Kai in collaboration with Kauai Ocean Awareness, Kauai Sea Farm, the DLNR-DAR, and the UH Coral Resilience Lab.

The DLNR said the first coral specimens are being cared for at the new Kauai Coral Restoration Nursery at Nomilo Fishpond utilizing rapid-growth methodology developed at the DAR Hawaii Coral Restoration Nursery on Oahu.

“This pilot collection is deliberately small and methodical — the first step in a multi-year journey to build coral restoration capacity for our island,” Leichliter said. “It has taken nearly seven years of collaboration between practitioners, agencies, nonprofits, researchers and cultural leaders to reach this point, so it is a deeply meaningful moment for everyone involved.”

The DLNR said the work being done is especially vital in the wake of recent severe bleaching events, and increasing environmental stressors affecting coral reefs across the islands.
Source: The Garden Island