Key Largo Florida Keys Grooved Brain Corals Growing Strong

Key Largo Florida Keys offers sightings of Grooved Brain Coral as one of the corals in our environment.
Many folks ask since Hurricane IRMA September 2017 about the state of the living corals on the reef.
We are happy to announce many of the Grooved Brain Corals are making a healthy comeback and thriving.

There are many corals similar to the Grooved Brain Coral.

Size

The grooved brain coral can grow up to three feet or one meter.

It can grow upward at a rate of approximately 3.5 millimeters per year.

Growth can achieve about two metres (6.6 feet) in diameter.

Key Largo Florida Keys

Depth

This coral occurs offshore at depths ranging from 1 to 30 metres or three to one hundred feet deep.

The alga benefits from being in a protective environment in an elevated position.

The coral benefits from the nutrients produced by photosynthesis
by the alga which provides part of its needs for growth and calcification.

The coral also has a relationship with the long-spined urchin.

The grazing of the long-spined urchin helps to reduce the effects of shading.

This also helps reduce the overgrowth of macroalgae.

Where the common name comes from

The system of meandering grooves and ridges on their outer surface is where name comes from.

This surface resembles the appearance of the brain of higher animals.

Brain corals are reef-building species that form large and rounded colonies.

AKA

This coral is also commonly known as “depressed brain coral”.

Another name some use is “Labyrinthine Brain Coral”.

Sites in Key Largo to see Grooved Brain Coral

Many of the sites in Key Largo have beautiful grooved brain coral.

Coral Filled Dive Sites

This page on Sail Fish Scuba website offers a Dive Site List Showing hundreds of images taken by our guides at our actual sites we visit. Looking through these images will allow you to enjoy our living coral reef even if you are hundreds or thousands of miles away.
Please remember to book your next tour in Key Largo with Sail Fish Scuba.

Color

Grooved Brain Coral is seen in tan, yellowish brown, and brownish gray.

When bleaching happens it appears nearly white.

If you want to check on the conditions of our Ocean please visit:
http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?station=MLRF1