The University of Puerto Rico research cruise, April 25-May 10, sponsored by the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science, used high-resolution bathymetric mapping to further detail the distribution of MCEs within the U.S. Caribbean, which will aid in quantifying, understanding and eventually predicting their occurrence. Because MCEs serve as essential habitat and refugia for threatened [...]
NCCOS and OCRM’s Coral Reef Conservation Program successfully concluded a series of unique community outreach activities in Puerto Rico called “Reef Smart”—A Coral Reef Ecosystem Education Initiative. The 2012 Nancy Foster Mapping Mission to map Puerto Rico’s coral reef ecosystems and fish habitats served as a platform for hosting a series of unique events designed to engage students, [...]
A 12-foot hammerhead shark, an undersea canyon that suddenly plunges 900 feet and an enormous orange-and-brown barrel sponge are only a few things in an unexplored Puerto Rican reef that U.S. scientists are using sonar and submersibles to explore. “You could actually live in that thing it was so big,” said Tim Battista, the expedition’s [...]
During the week of February 27, National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) researchers met with U.S. Coral Reef Task Force stakeholders to provide the status of NCCOS’ collaborative research efforts in the Caribbean. NCCOS scientists provided attendees a status of ongoing coral research projects in the Caribbean with special attention to the status of [...]
Collaborating with local partners, scientists from the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science recently completed annual research missions in St. John, USVI, and the La Parguera/Guanica region of southwest Puerto Rico, where they continue to evaluate the health of marine resources, including reef fish, corals and invertebrates. In both locations, dive teams surveyed habitats to [...]
This baseline assessment of Jobos Bay and surrounding marine ecosystems consists of a two part series. The first report (Zitello et al., 2008) described the characteristics of the Bay and its watershed, including modeling work related to nutrients and sediment fluxes, based on existing data. The second portion of this assessment, presented in this document, [...]
In order to assess whether U.S. Department of Agriculture best management practices in Puerto Rico benefit water quality around coral reefs, NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Science has completed the second of two reports that establish the conditions of the water, plants, and animals in Jobos Bay. This snapshot of the bay can be used [...]
Scientists from NOAA’s National Center for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) have developed a cost-effective modeling technique for mapping the most important coral reefs for keystone fish species in the U.S. Caribbean. The techniques used only two types of existing data: (1) a detailed map of the seafloor bathymetry collected from airborne laser altimetry, also known [...]