Indonesia - Komodo NP: Pengah Kecil

Setting

A submerged pinnacle Anderson dived in August 2009 (to 27.1 m) and again on 25 January 2019, when the dive was aborted after 20 minutes in what the log calls every manner of water motion conceivable — upwelling, downwelling, washing-machine, surge, and rip.

General benthic features

Anderson wrote of needing to check the pictures of the coral, and the frames show it. One bright frame shows a slope at effectively continuous cover: mint-green, teal, and tan digitate and corymbose Acropora packed shoulder to shoulder with plating colonies and a lavender foliose plate, crinoids in the gaps, and dozens of orange anthias and a red bigeye in the water in front of it (e.g., Image 2).

2

A dimmer wide frame is denser still and more varied: teal and mustard Acropora, purple-brown foliose plates, rust-red plating colonies with blue growing margins, a pale massive dome — with two long horizontal tabulate plates at the top of the frame that look dead and turf-covered, the only clear mortality in the set (e.g., Image 1).

1

Two frames show foliose corals: a wall of stacked pale gray-lavender foliose tiers above a teal corymbose Acropora and a brown meandroid brain coral, with a small pale pink sea star alongside; and a frame whose lower half is ruffled brown foliose plates with a gray brain coral, a mustard tabulate plate, and chartreuse branching coral above — almost certainly the vase-like foliaceous corals Anderson admired but could not name (e.g., Image 3, Image 5).

35

A close frame shows broad brown plating sheets with white tubercles, a teal Acropora recruit, a blue vase sponge, and red encrusting sponge (e.g., Image 4).

4

Anderson's log also lists Seriatopora hystrix, Stylophora pistillata, Pocillopora verrucosa, Pocillopora acuta, diverse and abundant Acropora, Montipora, and stinging hydroids (with a sting to show for it).

Coral cover

• Reference: Claude CV point count (this site's photos)
• Coral cover: 30% — a blind Claude computer-vision point count of 37 of Anderson's edited photographs (20 points per photo; water, fish, and obstructions excluded). Other computer-vision methods are listed in the method table.
• No computer-vision method yet estimates coral cover accurately on new images, so treat this as indicative rather than a measurement.

Stressors

No bleaching, disease, or man-made objects. No crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS) or other corallivores were evident.

Fish and other fauna

Anderson logged two turtles on the 2019 dive.

Comparisons with other data

Reef Check surveyed a station named Pengah Kecil (Sector 1) SW Side, 1.75 km away. Within 5 km, six independent stations (Reef Check and WWF-US / WWF-Indonesia) recorded station-year means of 8.8–51% hard coral cover between 2016 and 2020; the nearest, Reef Check at Pengah Kecil (Sector 1) SW Side, 1.75 km away, read a mean of 48% in 2020.

Dive record

Dived on 25 January 2019 (third dive of the day), 15:25-15:45, 20 minutes, max 18.3 m, 26.8°C (dive-computer average); Anderson had to abort the dive early on account of the currents. An earlier dive here, on 18 August 2009, reached 27.1 m (66 minutes).