Fiji - Fulaga (FJFU28)

Setting

FJFU28 is a lagoon station inside Fulaga's enclosed lagoon, southern Lau, surveyed on 12 June 2013 by the Global Reef Expedition. The team's notes also record generally low relief, with large-grain sediment deposits. The survey team's bottom time was 63 minutes.

General benthic features

Coral and algae together account for about 83% of the transect; the balance was sand, rubble, soft corals, and other benthos. The expedition's own site notes describe this part of the Fulaga lagoon as a field of large coral pinnacles rising from a sediment-dominated lagoon floor, with the pinnacle tops coral-dominated and community composition differing from pinnacle to pinnacle — that is the survey team's habitat characterization, not an observation from imagery at this site. Per the field notes, the tops of the pinnacles are coral-dominated, mostly Pocillopora, Acropora, and Stylophora; the point-count transect lists Acropora (37%), Porites (8.1%), and Dipsastraea (7.7%) as the leading genera of live coral.

Coral cover

• Reference: Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, Global Reef Expedition (in situ transect)
• An in situ benthic point-count transect (station CTD cast to 28.3 m) recorded 44% live coral cover and 39% total algal cover.
• Transect mean 44 ± 5.7% SE (n = 5 transects; Living Oceans Foundation per-transect benthic data); the headline above is this all-transect mean.

Stressors

The Living Oceans Foundation transects here recorded 7.2% cyanobacteria and no recently dead coral; they carry no bleaching, disease, or crown-of-thorns field. Recent thermal exposure at the Fiji virtual station averages an annual maximum of 8.9 degree-heating-weeks (NOAA Coral Reef Watch, 2021-2025), above the 8 DHW severe-bleaching level.

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.

No underwater photographs from this station are on file.