佛罗里达州的珊瑚礁已经长达100多年的稳定下降了，并且已经进行了大量的研究和精力来尝试了解这种退化的根本原因以及如何缓解它。尽管有所有保护，珊瑚恢复工作和珊瑚产卵工作，但珊瑚礁仍在失去其最具标志性物种的柱状珊瑚之一的风口浪尖。
树突状cylindrus在所有珊瑚物种中都是独一无二的，这些物种具有厚实的大圆形树枝，可以长到十英尺高，其中几个共同形成可以达到一棵树大小的殖民地！当这些大的高大树枝之一掉下来，新的树枝从其侧面涌出时，柱状珊瑚差的方式之一可能发生，厚厚的骨骼和蓬松的息肉和触角形成了在礁石上生长的独特茂密的生活质量。
Unfortunately, the pillar coral’s slow and steady strategy of growing sturdy colonies on the reef in order to survive in areas of high water flow and through heavy storms has meant that this coral doesn’t reproduce very quickly and they have steadily declined in numbers over the past several decades. More recently over the past couple of years a highly lethal disease has been decimating the last vestiges of stony corals in and around Florida, with a nearly 100% mortality rate for all stony coralsexceptelkhorn and staghorn corals of theAcropora属。
支柱珊瑚s were already one of the rarest species on Caribbean coral reefs and even rarer in Florida but the FloridianDendrogyrawere especially hard hit. Due to its very recognizable appearance on the reef, the few isolated large colonies were well known to local coral researchers and divers for years, with many of them having character and even their own names.
las，柱状珊瑚殖民地以前称为“阿奇”，“兔子”和“寂寞的拉里”，屈服于该地区大多数石质珊瑚的快速组织损失，现在该物种在佛罗里达州被宣布为灭绝。Even if not all of the pillar corals are dead yet, it’s only a matter of time – with no mature colonies around there’s no sliver of hope that new recruits will settle out onto local reefs and it can take a decade or more for pillar corals to reach sexual maturity.
野外柱状珊瑚的情况极为严峻，珊瑚礁面临的所有威胁包括温暖温度和酸化，没有迹象表明佛罗里达礁是否足够健康，可以再次维持柱状珊瑚，至少至少要维持柱状珊瑚。在我们的一生中。它不是全部doom and gloom for pillar corals though, the species still persists through many parts of the Caribbean ,and the Florida Aquarium already has a small captive population that they have managed to spawn in a specially designed aquarium system.
There’s been a lot of effort put into breeding corals that are resistant to climate change and disease, andDendrogyrais one of the coral species that could really benefit the most from this sort of genetic enhancement and supervised breeding programs. Not all hope is lost for the future of pillar corals but it’s definitely going to take a lot of work for scientists and researchers to figure out a way to make a new generation ofDendrogyra‘supercorals’ if and when the reefs of Florida can ever be restored to the point where they can support the iconic Pillar coal again. [wlrn]
