Tela Coral was beyond honored to be part of a historic outplanting of Flonduran elkhorn corals (Acropora palmata) on Miami’s reefs. These corals have one parent from Tela and one from Florida and this was the FIRST time regulators have given permission for an international coral outplanting anywhere in the world.

The photo shows one of the eight discs of outplanted corals. Two of the corals are Flondurans and two have only Floridian parents. The “umbrellas” are there to deter predation. Scientists from Andrew Baker’s lab at the University of Miami will remove them in a couple weeks. They will also monitor corals very closely. We send the baby corals a lot of luck and hope they do great in their new home!

A lot of media attended the event. The last line of the AP’s story quoted us:

Hope for the future

If the corals thrive, it could provide a blueprint for working across the Caribbean to share corals.

“This is a project about international collaboration, about the fact that our environment really doesn’t have closed borders, that we can work together to make things better in the world,” said Juli Berwald, co-founder of Tela Coral.

“And it shows that when we talk to each other, when we work together, we can really do something that might be life-changing, not just for us but for the corals and the reefs and all the animals that rely on the reefs.”

Read the full story here: Scientists from Florida Aquarium, UM transplant crossbred corals to help save Miami’s reefs