Galaxea, Journal of Coral Reef Studies 16: 11-12（2014） Photogallery Daytime spawning of Pocillopora species in Kaneohe Bay, Hawai‘i Sebastian SCHMIDT-ROACH1, 2, *, Erika JOHNSTON3, Silvia FONTANA4, Christopher P. JURY3, and Zac FORSMAN3 1 Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, Hobart, Australia 2 Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville, Australia 3 Hawai‘i Institute of Marine Biology, Kāneʻohe, Hawai‘i 4 Biodiversity Research Center, Academia Sinica, Nankang Taipei, Taiwan * Corresponding author: S. Schmidt-Roach E-mail: [email protected] Communicated by Masayuki Hatta (Biology Editor) Keywords Pocillopora acuta, P. damicornis, reproduc tion, sperm release Here we report simultaneous sperm release of Pocillopora mean­ drina Dana, 1846 and Pocillopora acuta Lamarck, 1816 (for merly synonymized under P. dami cornis (Linneaus, 1758), see Schmidt- Roach et al. 2014) at Kāne‘ohe Bay, O‘ahu. Daytime spawning is characteristic for the hermaphroditic coral genus Pocillopora (Kinzie III 1993; Fiene-Severns 1998; Hirose et al. 2000; Riddle 2008; Riddle and Peck 2009; Bouwmeester et al. 2011; Schmidt- Roach et al. 2012; Suzuki 2012). While most Pocillopora species seem to produce larvae solely by broadcast spawning, P. damicornis in Australia was observed to reproduce by sexual spawning and Fig. 1 Ex­situ sperm release of a. Pocillopora asexual brooding (Schmidt-Roach et al. 2012), con firming previous meandrina and b. Pocillopora acuta colonies. suggestions inferred from histological studies (Ward 1992; Muir 1984). Schmidt-Roach et al. (2012) concluded that asexual brooding seems to be apomorphic to a single monophyletic clade within Pocillopora, consisting of P. damicornis, P. acuta and the recently described species P. aliciae (Schmidt-Roach et al. 2013). However, although brooding was observed for these three species, spawning observations were limited to P. damicornis. In June 2013 two days before full moon, five colonies ofP. acuta were collected from shallow reef flats at Moku o Lo‘e (Coconut Island; 21°26′1″N 157°47′11″W) and five of P. meandrina at more exposed habitats in Kāne‘ohe Bay (21°29′34″N 157°49′42″W). Colonies were maintained in a seawater flow-though system at the Hawai‘i Institute of Marine Biology. For a period of eight days (starting the day before full moon) the flow through was stopped each morning shortly before sunrise for five hours to allow gamete release to be observed. Sperm release for P. acuta occurred simultaneously to sperm release in P. meandrina. P. meandrina released sperm over four days (25th-28th June), with the earliest sperm release being observed at approximately two hours after sunrise 12 Schmidt-Roach et al.: Daytime spawning of Pocillopora species in Kāneʻohe Bay, Hawai‘i (Fig. 1a). In contrast, P. acuta was observed to release sperm only on a single day, four days after the full moon, starting approximately four hours after sunrise (Fig. 1b). Further, sperm release for P. acuta was limited to three colonies, while all sampled specimens released brooded larvae during the observation period. Only sperm release was observed for both species, although regular checks for eggs were performed. How ever, colonies may have been sampled too late in the season, as P. meandrina in Hawai‘i is known to peak in reproductive activity in April and May (Fiene-Severns 1998) and this reproductive timing may be similar for P. acuta. Nevertheless, our observations match previous reports in Hawai‘i regarding the time and lunar day of gamete release (Fiene-Severns 1998; Riddle 2008). This is the first observation of sperm release in P. acuta. It provides fundamental data that can be used to further investigate the roles of sexual and asexual progeny in these complex life histories. Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank EF Cox, PL Jokiel, I Knapp and RJ Toonen for their help and advice during sampling and experiments. Further, we would like to thank the Pauley Foundation for support during the 2013 summer program. References Bouwmeester J, Berumen ML, Baird AH (2011) Daytime broadcast spawning of Pocillopora verrucosa on coral reefs of the central Red Sea. Galaxea 13: 23-24 Fiene-Severns P (1998) A note on synchronous spawning in the reef coral Pocillopora meandrina at Molokini Islet, Hawai‘i. In: Cox EF, Krupp DA, Jokiel PL (eds) Repro duction in Reef Corals, Technical Report No 42. University of Hawai’i, pp 22-24 Hirose M, Kinzie III RA, Hidaka M (2000) Early development of zooxanthella-containing eggs of the corals Pocillopora verrucosa and P. eydouxi with special reference to the distribution of zooxanthellae. Biol Bul 199: 68-75 Kinzie III RA (1993) Spawning in the reef corals Pocillopora verrucosa and P. eydouxi at Sesoko Island, Okinawa. 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