Coral Crossbreeding -- Keri O' Neil FL Aquarium

The Florida Aquarium and the University of Miami are joining forces in an effort to help coral in the Florida Keys survive rising water temperatures. It involves crossbreeding Florida coral with coral from a warm bay in Honduras. We speak with Keri O' Neil, who's leading the project for the Florida Aquarium. 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Gordenbird here with Beyond the News.Florida's signature coral reefs are in danger,
and much of that danger is dueto coral bleaching and a big factor in
that is rising water temperatures off theFlorida Keys. The Florida Aquarium, based
in Tampa, is joining forces withthe University of Miami to bring in coral
from Honduras as a way to promoteresiliency. We're going to get the details

(00:20):
about that now. We're speaking withCarry O'Neil, the director and senior scientists
at the Aquarium. She is alsodirector of the Coral Conservation Program. Carry
O'Neil, welcome, thank you forhaving me. Great to talk to you
today. So what is the planhere? Are you hoping to create a
more heat tolerant coral and what's specialabout the coral that you're looking at from

(00:41):
Honduras? Sure, so, ultimatelythat is the big long term plan is
to try to create a more resilientline of elkhorn coral that could be outplanted
or returned to the reef in Florida. And we actually already did acquire these
elkorn coral fragments from Honduras. Sothey're already at the University of Miami and

(01:04):
here in Apollo Beach at our conservationcampus. And these corals came from a
place called tell A Bay in Hondurasthat is naturally very warm every summer and
is quite turbid, is located closeto shore. So we do believe that

(01:26):
these corals may be pretty well suitedand adapted to these warm water temperatures and
nearshore environments, so hopefully they holdsome sort of genetic key to survival in
those kind of conditions. The aimis to spawn them or breed them with
Florida corals, So we're not goingto be taking pieces of these corals and

(01:49):
sticking them directly on the reef.We're hoping to cross breed them with corals
that are from Florida waters. Now, this sounds like I'll be coral are
protected. It sounds like it's avery involved process. What are the hoops
that you have to jump through tomake this plan a reality? Yeah,
so many hopes. So there's theElcorn. Coral is actually listed under the

(02:14):
Endangered Species Act as threatened, sothis is a listed species. It's not
yet bumped up to endangered, butit's listed as threatened, so that carries
its own level of permitting. Sowe work very closely with the Noah Office
of Protected Resources and they're communicating withthem all the time about, you know,

(02:35):
what we're doing with the breeding ofthe elkhorn coral, and they support
our work, you know, tothe ends of the earth. They really
really support this breeding program for thisspecies. And then in terms of shipping
coral internationally, stony corals in generalare protected by SIGHTS, which is the

(02:58):
Center for International Trade an endangered species, So you have to get site's permits
from the country of origin to exportthese corals, and then you have to
have a US Fish and Wildlife youknow, import certificate. So there's a
lot of hoops and both governments haveto be on board with this transfer.

(03:19):
And that was the University of Miamiand doctor Andrew Baker that did has been
doing legwork on this for literally years, and to try to find a country
that was willing to do this anda local government that was willing to do
this in local researchers and finally makingit happen is a huge, huge feat.

(03:44):
So again, what's going to begoing on here is you're not going
to be bringing the Honduran coral tothe keys. You're going to be bringing
them to the aquarium, and atsome point I presume you're going to be
meeting them with Florida coral that youalso have at the aquarium's facilities. Correct,
So both the University of Miami andthe Florida Aquarium have what we call

(04:06):
land based coral nurseries. So they'rebasically aquarium systems on land that are kept
in a biosecure way so that thosecorals are not exposed to like invasive species
or anything like that. And that'swhere these fragments will continue to live indefinitely.
This is their new home. Andthe pieces that were collected are large

(04:31):
enough to be reproductively active, Sothey're old enough, mature enough, large
enough that they should be able tospawn every year on the coral's normal annual
spawning cycle, which is after thefull moon of July and or August.

(04:51):
So the plan is to hear atthe Coral Conservation and Research Center at the
Florida Aquarium. We already spawn elkcorn coral and we already hold about thirty
five different genetic individuals from Florida thatspawn here at our center. So we

(05:11):
already have a pretty successful elkcren coralbreeding program here, which is one of
the reasons that University of Miami waskind of like here, you know,
you guys should take half of theseand we'll take half, and then we'll
work together and we'll just do everythingwe can to make this happen. So
we're hoping that these corals that camein are already what we call gravid or

(05:33):
carrying eggs, and when the fullmoon comes a few days after the full
moon, you know, we'll makesure they're getting all the right light cues
to make them release those eggs andsperm into the water, and then we
can cross the eggs and sperm fromthe Hunduran corals with the Florida corals.

(05:55):
Now, are there are there analogieshere? Have has something like this been
obviously the corals unique, But havethere been cross breeding programs like this done
with other species that have resulted inthe preservation of the species from an external
threat. Sure. So this technique, so to say, is called genetic

(06:16):
rescue, meaning our population has kindof gotten so small that it has a
very limited genetic diversity in the FloridaElkorn coral population, and in order for
a coral to adapt, you potentiallyneed to have new genes brought into that
population. So by bringing these Honduruscorals and crossing them, were kind of

(06:43):
trying to boost the Florida population withsome new genetic input of hopefully heat tolerant
genes. So this is similar towhat was actually done with the Florida panther.
The Florida panther had gotten to suchlow population levels that there is a
very high level of inbreeding. Nowthat's a little bit different with corals because

(07:04):
our corals aren't inbread they're just notbreeding at all. So our corals are
so far apart that mom never evenfinds dad and we don't actually get new
juveniles in Florida at all. Sonot having them breeding at all is really
not good, especially for adaptation tonew environmental conditions. So that's why we

(07:27):
breed them in the lab in thefirst place. And what they did with
the Florida panther was, you know, they were so inbred that by bringing
in a closely related animal from Texasand adding those to the stock, it
helped eliminate that genetic pressure on thatpopulation. So this has been done,
I believe also for the Florida scrubjay, but don't quote me on that.

(07:53):
So it's rare, it doesn't happenoften, but it is a technique
that scientists use when a pipe,a population of a species becomes so isolated
and so potentially inbred that it isdetrimental to that population. What's what's the
timeline as far as getting coral producedfrom this and that we'll be able to

(08:16):
hopefully withstand the rising temperatures in thewaters around the keys. Well, if
everything goes perfectly, then these coralswill spawn as soon as a couple of
weeks from now, you know,the end of July, and then we
would you know, make those crossedlarvae. They will settle and that coral

(08:41):
could be big enough to start fragmentingin about a year's time. Now,
we would want to do a lotof genetic testing and sort of research on
that. We still need to getall of the permits to actually release these
in Florida, So that is nota given this point, and we are

(09:01):
in conversations, you know, withthe state authorities that oversee that as well
as the federal authorities that oversee that. You know, the Florida Keys National
Marine Sanctuary in Florida Fish and WildlifeConservation Commission. You know, everybody has
to be involved in those conversations,but the Honduras corals are at least kind
of the correct genetic stock to bedoing this with, so we are hopeful

(09:26):
that we will get those permissions,so it could be as early as maybe
two or three years that we couldbe putting small pieces of these corals back
onto the reef and actually seeing howwell they do. That would be great
and something that obviously a lot ofpeople are following, and a lot of
people who have enjoyed the privilege ofdiving and seeing the coral are We really

(09:52):
look forward to that and are hopefulabout that. Well, thank you very
much for this update on your work, and we certainly wish you all success
us with that and getting through allthe legal hoops and getting it done.
Kerry O'Neill, director and senior Scientistsat the Florida Aquarium and director of their
Choral Conservation program, thank you forjoining us on Beyond the News