¿What is a Coral?

What is a Coral? This is a question that you can resolve snorkeling with Us; before that, you can find here some basics about this interesting topic. A coral is a type of marine animal that lives in large colonies. People use to think that corals were plants even rocks the real fact is that coral is formed from the hard outer skeletons of tiny animals called polyps.  And Polyps? Polyps are animals that look like upside down jellyfish. Polyps are made out of an outer cell layer called epidermis (Under this epidermis you find the zooxanthella) and an inner cell layer called gastrodermis Coral polyps produce carbon dioxide and water as byproducts of cellular respiration; The zooxanthellae cells use the carbon dioxide and water to carry out photosynthesis. Sugars, lipids (fats) and oxygen are some of the products of photosynthesis which the zooxanthellae cells produce and are consume by the coral.

Coral Reefs as the ones you find in Providence Island have a huge diversity of polyps; Individual coral polyps within a reef are typically very small approx.  ~1.5 cm in diameter; But because corals are colonial, the size of a colony can be much larger and Reefs, which are usually made up of many colonies. (The largest coral reef is the great barrier reef which spans 2600 Km off the east coast of Australia). In the Seaflower biosphere reserve you can enjoy the silent company of millions of polyps and hundreds of species of coral reefs. Came to Providence Island enjoy snorkeling with us and learn more about Coral reefs.