The country’s guidelines for the sustainable utilization of coral resources also stipulates bestcollection practices including size limits, rotation of collection sites and the prohibition of coral collection in marine parks and tourist areas;
Threats/Pressures impacting the conservation of the species
The poorly regulated aquarium trade in live corals poses yet another threat to fragile coral reef ecosystems. in the archipelago, reef degradation is widespread, with causes including indus- trial and sewage pollution from nearby Makassar, extensive bomb fishing, anchor damage and over-harvesting of coral reef resources
Population Trend
Unknown/not recorded
Sub-national Level
Unknown/not recorded
Additional Details (if available)
In one study, 1% of the specimens were recorded as bleached (Hoeksema 1991).
This species is targeted for the aquarium trade. Indonesia is the largest exporter with an annual quota of 48,500 live pieces in 2005. The total number of corals (live and raw) exported for this species in 2005 was 51,518. This species is one of the top ten most traded corals for aquarium industry (Raymakers 2001).
In general, the major threat to corals is global climate change, in particular, temperature extremes leading to bleaching and increased susceptibility to disease, increased severity of ENSO events and storms, and ocean acidification.
Coral disease has emerged as a serious threat to coral reefs worldwide and a major cause of reef deterioration (Weil et al. 2006). The numbers of diseases and coral species affected, as well as the distribution of diseases have all increased dramatically within the last decade;
Name
Emma Hemmerlé
Scientific Name
Heliofungia actiniformis
Common Name(s)
Mushroom coral
Type of Use
Extractive (i.e., the entire organism or parts of the organism are removed from its environment)
If extractive, for the target species, is this use
The Indonesian authorities routinely allocate some of the highest trade quotas in South Sulawesi to Heliofungia actiniformis despite a lack of data on the impacts of current collection practices on this species.
Provide Details of resource rights regime where relevant
some of the fishermen interviewed were licensed, while others were unlicensed; Overall, a much higher number of H. actiniformis than allowed by current quotas is thus being harvested.
The archipelago extends approximately 60 km offshore and consists of about 150 coral cays, as well as a large number of barrier and submerged patch reefs
A predictive model indicated the need for a 5 cm size limit to curb economic overfishing, and protect attached anthocauli stalks capable of maintaining the trade through continued asexual reproduction. In addition, a reduction of exploitation rates for polyps in the 4–11 cm size bracket to 0.5 is urgently needed. Calculations reveal that this would in fact be possible without lowering current profits. Achieving long term sustainability will in addition to a reduction of harvest quotas necessitate an effective protection of spawning stocks through stricter enforcement of existing marine protected areas.
Has the use of the species been recorded as resulting in changes to human health in this record?
Unknown/not recorded
Has the species in use been noted as being of particular disease risk to humans?
Unknown/not recorded
Has the use of the species resulted in changes to animal welfare in this record?
Unknown/not recorded
Are there particular practices which have increased the risk to human or animal health or welfare in the use of this species?
Unknown/not recorded
Does the use of this species increase susceptibility to pathogen spread?
Knittweis, L., & Wolff, M. (2010). Live coral trade impacts on the mushroom coral Heliofungia actiniformis in Indonesia: Potential future management approaches. Biological Conservation, 143(11), 2722-2729. doi: 10.1016/j.biocon.2010.07.019
Semi-structured interviews with fishermen and in situ surveys revealed a size-selective fishery towards small polyps. This resulted in a shift of size-frequency distributions, and reduced overall abun- dances at harvested sites.
The age frequency structure of H. actiniformis polyps showed populations dominated by young, attached individuals at harvested sites; fishermen do not wait for the young polyps to break free from their anthocauli, but frequently beak off entire clusters with the anthocauli still attached. Only the largest polyps which have developed a flat base are kept, whilst the rest are discarded on site.
Based on the results of this investigation, harvest quotas for H. actiniformis should be reduced significantly.
Threats/pressures impacting the species at the scale of this record