Part of the regional summaries: Fiji - Fulaga, Fiji - Southern Lau (Kabara / Fulaga), and Fiji - Lau
More info
Fiji (NOAA CRW virtual station)A Fulaga fore-reef station, dived to 22.6 m, with 37% coral cover against more algae, on spur-and-groove terrain with plating corals on gentler slopes. Anderson's sheet records huge, dangerous swells, 30 m visibility, rare Pocillopora damicornis, and one sampled colony (F53, 12.5 m) that was healthy with some white branch tips. Surveyed on the Living Oceans Foundation's Global Reef Expedition.
E dua na vanua ni vakadidike ena yasana i tuba ni cakau (fore reef) mai Fulaga, a nunu kina ki na 22.6 m, ka 37% na ubi ni lase (coral cover), e levu cake kina na lumi, ena vanua vakaivakarau ni spur-and-groove kei na lase vakaiteba (plating) ena baba e sega ni titobu sara. Na ivola nei Anderson e vola na ualo levu ka rerevaki, na rairai ni wai ki na 30 m, na Pocillopora damicornis e dau sega ni kune, kei na dua na lase a taura kina na ivakaraitaki (F53, 12.5 m) e bula vinaka ka vulavula vakalailai na mata ni tabana.
AI translation of this summary; the English is authoritative. (low confidence)
CTD-cast midpoint; the cast read 26.5°C throughout
Two other CRD dive sites with their own pages within 5 km shown in orange — click a marker to open its page.
🗺 Detailed map of the Global Reef Expedition dive sites, Fulaga, Fiji (Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation; opens in a new window)
Site description
Setting
FJFU27 is a deep Fulaga fore-reef station in southern Lau, surveyed on 12 June 2013 during the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation's Global Reef Expedition. The expedition's site notes for the Fulaga fore reef describe a gentle slope with scattered mounds and spurs of coral framework running perpendicular to the reef crest, and a ridge of coral build-up, perforated by shore-perpendicular channels, running parallel to it.
General benthic features
The expedition's own site notes for these fore-reef stations describe spur-and-groove structure with plating and foliaceous coral stands on gentler slopes giving way to encrusting growth where the slope approaches vertical; that is the survey team's habitat characterization rather than anything read off imagery for this site.
Coral cover
- Reference: Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, Global Reef Expedition (in situ transect)
- An in situ point-count transect (station CTD cast to 32.9 m) returned 37% live coral cover against 47% total algal cover — algae ahead of coral by roughly four to three.
- Transect mean 37 ± 7.6% SE (n = 5 transects; Living Oceans Foundation per-transect benthic data); the headline above is this all-transect mean.
Stressors
Possible bleaching: on Anderson's sampling sheet, the one colony sampled here (F53, 12.5 m) is recorded as 10% bleached, with "some white tips". The Living Oceans Foundation transects here recorded 3.6% cyanobacteria and no recently dead coral; they carry no bleaching, disease, or crown-of-thorns field. Recent thermal exposure at the Fiji virtual station has averaged an annual maximum of 8.9 degree-heating-weeks over 2021-2025 (NOAA Coral Reef Watch), above the 8 DHW level at which severe bleaching and mortality are expected.
Comparisons with other data
Apart from the Living Oceans Foundation survey shown here, we found no other surveys at this site as of 2026. If you would like to share yours, please email us.
Dive record
Bottom time was 64 minutes. Anderson's sampling sheet records huge, dangerous swells and 30 m visibility on this dive, with Pocillopora damicornis rare at the station; the one colony sampled (F53, 12.5 m) was recorded as healthy but 10% bleached, with average pigmentation, some white tips, and stubbier branches.
No underwater photographs from this station are on file.
Data & links
- Download benthic survey data (CSV) ↗
- Download all LOF-GRE data (933 sites) ↗
- Photo portfolio ↗
- Coral Reef Diagnostics page for this area ↗
Data are from the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation Global Reef Expedition, Coral Reef Diagnostics, and NOAA Coral Reef Watch.
© Coral Reef Diagnostics.