Expert identification of protected corals
Introduction
This is the final report for INT2023-07 Expert identification of protected corals. Published October 2024.Download the publication
Summary
Protected corals provide ecosystem services in the deep sea, but knowledge gaps remain in the distribution and diversity of some gorgonian coral families, which impedes our understanding of the impacts on them from commercial fishing and other human impacts in the New Zealand marine environment.
The work described here, commissioned by the Conservation Services Programme (CSP) of the Department of Conservation, acts on a recommendation of the POP2022-04 ‘Deep diving into decades of uncatalogued corals’ CSP project (Mills et al. 2023), by bringing an international taxonomic expert to New Zealand to confirm and revise identification of protected coral specimens in the NIWA Invertebrate Collection.
Dr Kirrily Moore (KM) from the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, is a taxonomic expert in deep-sea coral species in the gorgonian octocoral families Mopseidae and Victorgorgiidae, plus genera previously contained in family Anthothelidae: Anthothela, Icilogorgia and Solenocaulon (genera now reassigned to families Alcyoniidae and Melithaeidae). During her visit (24 June–5 July 2024) KM identified 240 sample jars (295 colonies) and taught the higher-level identification of these gorgonian groups at a workshop held at the NIWA Wellington campus on 4 July 2024.
Amongst the samples identified were ten described species, six new genera and 15 new species, collected from within the New Zealand Exclusive Economic Zone. There is still work to be done to verify some of the identifications with genetic analyses, and eventual taxonomic descriptions of the identified new genera and species is required. The identifications completed for this project add to and improve our knowledge of the protected coral fauna in the New Zealand region and the wider region within Australian, International and Antarctic waters that connect to our zone.
The authors recommend that two new family level MPI species codes are created for the families Keratoisididae and Mopseidae, and that the taxonomic name and descriptive notes are updated for the code AND, which currently represents the anthothelid corals. It is also recommended that additional protected coral taxonomic experts are invited to New Zealand in future to continue to identify and describe under-studied octocoral groups where we have a lack of understanding of the genus and species level diversity.
Publication information
Mills, S., Bilewitch, J., Moore, K. 2024. INT2023-07 Expert identifications of protected corals: Mopseidae, Anthothela, Victorgorgia and kin. Prepared for Conservation Services Programme, Department of Conservation NIWA Client Report 2024234WN. 56 p.