First record of the scleractinian coral Psammocora albopicta from Korean waters

Abstract

Only a few scleractinian species have been reported from the high-latitudine outlying coral communities of South Korea (Song 2004). Here, we provide the first record of the reef coral Psammocora albopicta (Fig. 1a; see Online Resource, Fig. S1 for details of the skeletal structure) from Jeju Island (33.4°N), located in the southwest of the Korean peninsula. This species, recently described by Benzoni (2006), has previously been recorded from the Arabian Gulf, the Gulf of Aden, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, and southeast Australia, but this is to date the first record in such a high-latitude area. P. albopicta corals were observed in October 2012 between 5 and 10 m depth at 3 sites around Jeju: Biyangdo, Jigwido, Seogwipo. At each site, only a few colonies ( 50 cm for the maximum length), suggests that their settlement was not recent. Nevertheless, the population could be in expansion which deserves further investigations. Typical circular white patterns on the surface of P. albopicta (see Benzoni 2006), were only observed at one of the sites surveyed, Seogwipo, and on a limited number of colonies. On the specimens observed, this suggests that the presence of this discoloration may have a different origin than previously thought. White rings refer to circular depigmentation of ∼1 cm in diameter (Fig. 1b), without any direct evidence of partial mortality of the colonies. They look very similar to the white rings reported on the