Observations of spawning in laboratory aquaria for species and morphs of the Acropora humilis species group recorded during three spawning seasons (1999–2000, 2000–2001 and 2001–2002)

Brief description

Data in this file documents the timing of various aspects of coral spawning for the five species of the Acropora humilis species group which occur in the Lizard Island group. All species in this group are hermaphroditic, with each coral polyp in a colony releasing bundles a mixture of eggs and sperm. Data was collected for two purposes. One purpose was to document the potential for species/morphs to interbreed based on the timing of spawning and time taken for egg sperm bundle to separate. The second purpose was to conduct hybridization experiments in which the collected sperm and eggs from two different species/morphs were combined. The egg-sperm bundles of coral spawn were collected from colonies maintained in laboratory aquaria. All colonies were collected in the week prior to the spawning event and placed in the aerated aquaria with an open flow-through system. Colonies of A. samoensis, A. humilis, A. gemmifera, A. monticulosa and the six morphs were all collected from around the Lizard, Palfrey or South Island. The colonies of A. digitifera were collected from North Direction Island. Data was collected over three spawning seasons. In the first season, data was collected in November, 1999 and January 2000. In the second season, data was collected in November 2000, December 2000, January 2001 and February 2001. In the third season, data was collected in December 2001. Each row of the spreadsheet corresponds with a spawning observation for a single colony. Date indicates the night that the spawning observations were recorded. Month indicates the number of months after the main spawning event, with 0 being the month of the main spawning event within that season. Nights after the full moon indicate the night that the colony was observed spawning in relation to the full moon (night 0). Time of Setting indicates the time when egg-sperm bundles were seen in the openings of the corallites. Time of Spawning is the time at which the egg-sperm bundles started to be released from the polyps. Separation of Bundles is the time taken for the egg-sperm bundles took to separate following collection. Bundles were separated by gently shaking the collected spawn, filtering sperm through plankton mesh.