OK, to get things rolling on my Acro/monti/other SPS ID ideas, I thought I'd post some resources here that you can use to help you identify your own corals (by scientific names, at least at this point). I'll also try to put together a glossary of terms that you can use to help you understand all the coral structure that is so important in identifying and classifying corals (that'll come later).
AIMS Data Centre - Data Access Portal -- I haven't figured out how to properly navigate their site, so it is not so easy to use by accessing the site directly. I find that typing something like "aims acropora" or "aims acropora loripes" allows you to search easier on google or the like. Of course, you have to have a rough idea what you're looking for first, so probably not a good place to start.
Coralsee Home -- If you click on the "Key to the Acropora" box it leads you through some steps that help you narrow it down and at the end gives you some possible IDs with probabilities of a match. You need to know a little about the corallite structure but don't need to know all the scientific terms for the structure (pictures are given) so it is good for starting out and also help you to learn what the coral structure words mean (with nice pictures!).
Marine Species Identification Portal -- I've not used this one much but it appears to have ID resources for all kinds of marine life and include some info on coral taxonomy.
Acropora ID mini-class - Reef Central Online Community -- Eric Borneman did a pretty extensive write-up and an interactive coral ID "workshop" back in 2004 and, if you're patient enough to read through it, you may finds some useful information in this thread. I hope to do something similar with interested parties in the future.
Wallace, Staghorn Corals of the World A Revision of the Genus Acropora, Csiro Publishing, Victoria, Australia, 1999.
Veron, Corals of the World, Australian Instute of Marine Science, Townsville, Australia, 2000.
If you know of other resources, please post them. I know there are others out there but tried to stick with the ones that don't charge a fee. If we get enough I'll see about getting this "stickied".
Dave
AIMS Data Centre - Data Access Portal -- I haven't figured out how to properly navigate their site, so it is not so easy to use by accessing the site directly. I find that typing something like "aims acropora" or "aims acropora loripes" allows you to search easier on google or the like. Of course, you have to have a rough idea what you're looking for first, so probably not a good place to start.
Coralsee Home -- If you click on the "Key to the Acropora" box it leads you through some steps that help you narrow it down and at the end gives you some possible IDs with probabilities of a match. You need to know a little about the corallite structure but don't need to know all the scientific terms for the structure (pictures are given) so it is good for starting out and also help you to learn what the coral structure words mean (with nice pictures!).
Marine Species Identification Portal -- I've not used this one much but it appears to have ID resources for all kinds of marine life and include some info on coral taxonomy.
Acropora ID mini-class - Reef Central Online Community -- Eric Borneman did a pretty extensive write-up and an interactive coral ID "workshop" back in 2004 and, if you're patient enough to read through it, you may finds some useful information in this thread. I hope to do something similar with interested parties in the future.
Wallace, Staghorn Corals of the World A Revision of the Genus Acropora, Csiro Publishing, Victoria, Australia, 1999.
Veron, Corals of the World, Australian Instute of Marine Science, Townsville, Australia, 2000.
If you know of other resources, please post them. I know there are others out there but tried to stick with the ones that don't charge a fee. If we get enough I'll see about getting this "stickied".
Dave
