Bonaire - Wayaka II

General benthic features

A steep coral wall with terraces of plate and lettuce corals stacked over massive and brain coral heads, dropping into deep blue water (e.g., Image 2).

2

Wayaka II spans a steep wall with abundant plate/lettuce corals, a slope dominated by massive/lobate and brain corals (e.g., Image 3, Image 4), and a shallow zone with rubble and extensive dead branching framework (a frame labeled as dead reef) (e.g., Image 51).

3451

Coral cover

• Reference: Claude CV point count (this site's photos)
• Coral cover: 24% — a blind Claude computer-vision point count of 52 of Anderson's edited photographs (20 points per photo; water, fish, and obstructions excluded). Other computer-vision methods are listed in the method table.

Stressors

The strong cross-habitat contrast is important: coral-dense wall and slope images coexist with a visibly degraded shallow framework field. No broad bleaching signal is apparent on the wall or deeper slope, where many colonies retain pigmented tissue; the exception is one bleached plating colony, stark white atop a mound beside olive-brown plates of the same form (e.g., Image 42).

42

In contrast, one frame shows an extensive shallow field of old, eroded branching coral framework with little visible live coral. This is a meaningful degradation signal, but the photographs alone cannot date the mortality event or determine its cause. No corallivores were evident.

Fish and other fauna

A hawksbill turtle cruised the reef face (e.g., Image 1) and a Caribbean spiny lobster sheltered under a ledge (e.g., Image 17), with a banded coral shrimp (e.g., Image 19), a purple tube-shaped sponge (e.g., Image 40), and a giant anemone (e.g., Image 35) tucked among the coral.

117194035

Turtle, parrotfish, lobster, shrimp, and schooling fishes are documented.

Comparisons with other data

Coral cover — external cross-reference (Reef Check). Two independent measurements, reported side by side and deliberately not averaged. Anderson Mayfield / CRD: 24% hard coral (2017). Reef Check: 43% at Twin Peaks, 0.93 km away, in 1998 (50% in 1997; 4 surveys at 3 and 10 m, 1997–1998). The two are 19 years apart (CRD later). Methods differ (CRD photographic/point-count index vs Reef Check point-intercept transect). Reef Check site positions are approximate; at 0.93 km apart the two surveys may have sampled different patches of the same reef, which is the main caveat on this comparison.