On this year’s field trip, Victor aims to better understand the mechanisms of symbiont uptake and how those compare to what he previously found with Aiptasia larvae in the lab. Luckily, there was a lot of spawning yesterday and he got coral larvae from three more distinct crosses. With a total of
Coral Fieldwork in Okinawa 2019
Victor and Liz arrived in Okinawa at Sesoko Station right on time to catch the first Acropora digitifera spawning a few hours later. Several colonies produced plenty of gamete bundles, which were fertilized at a high rate of success to produce tens of thousands of larvae. So, together with the Acropora tenuis larvae from Friday night, spawning season is off with bang! More spawning is expected tonight and in the coming nights this week. After a few days of intense larval care, the larvae will be ready for experiments in a few days. The weather is definitely in the rainy season, with torrential downpours, but with such successful spawning already and more to come, spirits are high!
Okinawa Field Work Trip 2018 – by Ira & Diana
On arrival this year the coral spawning had already happened and we could set-up experiments without delay. Thanks to our Japanese collaborators we had many bowls full of larvae to choose from. A big thank you to them for their help and support!
Acropora digitifera larvae were especially healthy this year and the abundance of material resulted in an abundance of cleaning and sampling, which often kept us busy until late in the evening.
But – of course – we made sure not to miss out on beautiful Okinawa snorkeling and delicious food.
Our outdoor activities were supported by the weather, which was a lot better than previously predicted.
A special pleasure was the meeting, greeting and discussions with old and new fellow researchers at the Sesoko Station.
Japanese food: oishi!
There is no need to say that Japanese food is absolutely delicious. We love the Soba noodle soups are at lunch during field work days, all kinds of tempuras, tofu dishes such as Agadashi tofu and the super fresh seafood. There are also many tasty fruits and veggies. The local citrus Shinquesar as juice and ice cream and the Goya bitter melon are our absolute favourite. The Okinawan islands have also many local specialties such as sahimi of many kinds of local fish, peanut tofu as well as (for people with good nerves) goat sashimi and pork knuckles. And let´s not forget the local Aguu pork which is served for example as a fantastic ginger pork set meal including sahimi, soup and seaweed. Oishi!
Ginger pork set meal
Goat Sashimi
Local fish
Seafood Sashimi
Field Work in Okinawa 2017
This year, Liz, Diana, Philipp and Annika joined again our Japanese collaborators from the Hatta lab (Tokyo), Ueno lab (Okazaki) and Maruyama lab (Sendai) at Sesoko Marine Station on Okinawa to collect coral larvae for comparative experiments in the field. Coral were collected on the 1st of June around Sesoko island and transferred to the water tables. Over the next few days, night snorkelling to watch out for spawning on the reef right in front of the station started. As predicted by the team leader Masayuki Hatta, Acropora corals spawned during the night of the 6th of June and after a busy night of gamete collection and mixing sperm and eggs for fertilization, coral embryos developed into planula larvae which were used for experiments. 4 days after fertilization, coral larvae are ready to be ship and, after a fun night out with delicious Japanese food and beer at our favorite Izakaya in Nago City, our Japanese colleagues went back home to continue their experiments at their home institutes. The Guse lab continued to enjoy the snorkelling and working at Sesoko for another week trying to learn as much as possible about the natural coral reef habitats and rearing coral larvae and metamorphosed polyps. We also brought some coral babies home and hope to keep them happy and alive in Heidelberg. Anyways, we all hope to be back in 2018 to witness that amazing event of synchronous coral spawning induced by the lunar cycle that occurs only once every year.
The reef at Sesoko Marine Station
One of our main activities: snorkeling
Collected corals in water table
Coral are setting to get ready for releasing their gametes
Monitoring the spawning & collecting gamtes
Lab work during spawning night
Izakaya night to celebrate a successful coral spawning 2017
Q & A about Aiptasia in Nature Microbiology
Today is World Oceans Day with the 2016 theme being “Healthy Oceans, Healthy Planet”. As part of a the effort by Nature Microbiology to highlight some recent research in marine science, we got the chance to participate with a Q & A section about Aiptasia. Check it out!
OKINAWA 2016: Arigato Gozeimas
By Philipp & Diana
After a busy week taking care of all the Acropora larvae and finalizing our experiments, we went on a final night snorkel with amazing bioluminescence on Saturday. On Sunday, we had our last day at Sesoko which was filled with filtering larvae and packing all of our equipment. We stayed up late to pack the larvae we wanted to bring to Germany as late as possible and finally went to bed after cleaning the lab at 1.30 a.m. On Monday, we got up at 5.30 to get to the airport for our flight back. After a 20 h journey, we got back to the lab in Heidelberg where Liz and Annika waited for us.Together, we unpacked the larvae and put them into new containers and gave them fresh sea water. Most larvae survived and seem to like it in our lab.
Our two weeks in Okinawa went by way too fast. We really enjoyed the field work together with our Japanese collaborators. One highlight was the amazing coral reef by the Sesoko Marine Station and at the South tip of Sesoko. Hopefully, we can come back next year and see some awesome creatures like the octopi, sea snakes, puffer fish and stone fish and cornetfish again. ARIGATO GOZEIMAS.
OKINAWA 2016: Finally the coral babies arrived
By Philipp & Diana:
After waiting for spawning, Annika missed the spawning by two nights. On Thursday night, 2 sick colonies in the water tables spawned. The following day,we went to the East coast of Okinawa to find Mangroves and look for anemones. Unfortunately we did not spot any but we saw some mudhoppers and lots of crabs. That night, a few more colonies spawned and Masayuki and Reyna were able to also collect some larvae in the field.
Interestingly, the following day, all remaining colonies spawned giving us plenty of eggs. On the same day, spawning of A. tenuis and A. gemnifera occured in the field.
Of course that meant that we needed to spend considerable time taking care of all the larvae. Masayuki and his team showed us how to wash them and keep them happy and the following days were spent doing just that.
After a day full of sampling on Sunday, we took Liz to the airport on Monday morning and moved to the guest house at Sesoko. A day later, our Japanese collaborators left Sesoko, leaving just Diana and me to take care of all the larvae. We set up a bunch of infections and had our plate full just taking care of that.
OKINAWA 2016: Still waiting II
Philipp and Diana have safely arrived to join us at Sesoko. By now, we are pretty big group of people united to wait for the day of Acropora spawning. The weather got better and the water temperature has risen to 25 degrees Celsius – just about right for spawning induction. Luckily, there is enough to do: snorkeling, food-shopping, equipment shopping at the Daiso (you can never have enough plastic cups for experiments!), collecting flatworms and other creatures in the tide pools and of setting up little fun experiments. But maybe tonight the waiting is over!?
OKINAWA 2016: Still waiting I
Over the last 3 days, we settled into the routine of waiting. Every night at 8.30 pm we go for a night snorkel to check on the Montipora colonies to spawn in the sea. They are supposed to spawn a few days before Acropora, our object of interest. So far no promising signs though. At 9.30 pm, we start to check our field-collected Acropora colonies in the water tables and continue to do so every 15 min until 10.30 pm. So far no signs. On a positive note: we have time during the day to cruise around, go snorkeling to amazing snorkel-spots such as the South tip of Sesoko island and enjoy the local ice-cream. The number of waiting researchers at the station has increased substantially and so has the amount of food and Formaldehyde in the lab. Did I mention that being bare-feet in the lab is a must?
