Photo of the Week

“See if you can identify the characteristics that we examined on this coral.”

Photo: Beverly Owens

Earlier this week, marine ecologist Dave Packer from NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service taught me how to use a dichotomous key for deep-sea corals. Corals are actually animals, even though many of them look plant-like in shape, so they belong in the Kingdom Animalia, the Phylum Cnidaria, and the Class Anthozoa. We began by discussing animals in the four Orders of deep-sea corals within the Anthozoa that are found off our northeastern coast: Scleractinia (stony corals), Antipatharia (black corals), Alcyonacea (soft corals and sea fans), and Pennatulacea (sea pens). Mr. Packer showed me a piece of coral that we would be “keying out.” By looking at the surface of it, we could tell it was a stony coral and belonged to the Order Scleractinia." - Beverly Owens