. Atoll research bulletin. Coral reefs and islands; Marine biology; Marine sciences. Ill. rt"' I Figure 1. Bringing taxonomy to the reality of the reef. Most useful taxonomy has been done since the advent of scuba diving, which has allowed coral taxonomists to make careful observations underwater. Great Barrier Reef, Australia (Photo Terry Done). occurred in a wide range of environments, from the roots of mangroves to wave- hammered reef crests to the deepest depths of outer slopes. When a colony collected from any one of these environmental extremes was compared with a colony from a very
. Atoll research bulletin. Coral reefs and islands; Marine biology; Marine sciences. Ill. rt"' I Figure 1. Bringing taxonomy to the reality of the reef. Most useful taxonomy has been done since the advent of scuba diving, which has allowed coral taxonomists to make careful observations underwater. Great Barrier Reef, Australia (Photo Terry Done). occurred in a wide range of environments, from the roots of mangroves to wave- hammered reef crests to the deepest depths of outer slopes. When a colony collected from any one of these environmental extremes was compared with a colony from a very different environment, they usually had little or nothing in common. Not only was the growth form different but skeletal details were different also. Yet these details were usually the basis of taxonomic descriptions. It was the lack of gaps in this variation, readily seen underwater (by swimming gradually from one place to another) but also seen under the microscope, that demonstrated links among colonies and indicated the existence (or not) of single species units. OK so far, but this was in stark contrast to what was usually described in taxonomic publications. I decided I didn't like coral taxonomy as a subject and spent most of the following year swimming around reefs, trying to work out what sort of order there was in the apparent chaos of natural variation. Certainly I did not think of this as being "taxonomy": I wasn't a "; These were people who knew about names and usually (so I then thought) had an awesome knowledge of the detail of skeletal structures. I was just "; That probably would have been the end of this story, had I not had the good fortune to meet two people who reset my stage. The first was "Red" Gilmartin. the first Director of the newly formed AIMS. Apart from offering me a job. Red saw the issues: he said my work was taxonomy and that it had to be done before meaningful ecological work on the
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