Ex situ transportation of coral larvae for research, conservation, and aquaculture

Due to the lack of appropriate methods to transport high amounts of larvae ex situ over large distances, the availability of coral larvae was so far mainly limited to their place of origin. For a research project at Rotterdam Zoo, The Netherlands, we transported several thousand larvae of three broadcast spawners (Acropora tenuis, A. digitifera, Diploria strigosa) from the Indo Pacific and the Caribbean to Europe. Beside logistics and packing techniques, post-transport survival rates were mainly influenced by larvae density and transport duration. Our results indicate optimum survival rates of > 90% at densities of 4 larvae ml(-1) when not exceeding a transportation time of 4 days. The ex situ transport of coral larvae over large distances might offer new possibilities for research, conservation, and aquaculture.