Timor-Leste

Spalding et al. (2001) give East Timor no separate account or reef-area figure. Its coast appears on the maps of their Indonesia chapter, and Timor falls in the sub-region they call the Moluccas and Irian Jaya, which includes a chain of small archipelagos along the southern edge of the Banda Sea running east from Timor to the Aru Islands. They describe that sub-region as one of complex bathymetry and deep, mostly clear oceanic water, with islands a few tens of kilometers apart sometimes separated by more than 1,000 m. In the Timor Sea, surface currents flow west throughout the year, and a 1990 image in the same chapter shows Luang and Ukenao atolls lying east of East Timor. Souter et al. (2021) report that by December 2020 the Allen Coral Atlas had produced detailed satellite-derived reef maps of the Timor and Arafura Seas.

All nine Timor-Leste pins, eight sites plus the Haruine night dive, are around Atauro Island, dived between 29 January and 1 February 2024. The sites run from a 2 m snorkel garden at Compass Reef and the shallow Inner Reef to a steep coral ridge at Raiketa, the upper terrace of Biqueli Wall, and the deep, dim Pinnacle, dived to 35.7 m. Haruine was dived by day and after dark, and the night dive has its own pin.

Branching Acropora is the dominant community. Raiketa, Haruine, and Biqueli Wall all show near-continuous tan staghorn thickets, often under dense clouds of damselfish, fusiliers, and anthias; at Haruine thousands of small blue damselfish hovered over the thickets. Watuwai, dived on 29 January, has no surviving photographs. Inner Reef had a broad mix of growth forms, with columnar and lobate Porites, branching and plating Acropora, mauve Pocillopora, and large tube-sponge clusters. Cabbage Patch is named for a colossal dome of folded foliose coral on a sand slope. Pinnacle differed from the rest: a turf-covered framework with scattered Porites heads, plating corals, big finger sponges, tube sponges, and many gray feathery hydroid plumes.

Photo-derived cover estimates ranged from 20% at Pinnacle to 46% at Raiketa; Inner Reef (45%) and Haruine (41%) were the other stations above 40%. Every photographed site except Pinnacle mixed dense coral with rubble, sand, or older framework; at Biqueli Wall, a single live table coral stood in a broad field of coralline-crusted dead Acropora rubble. Bleached colonies were photographed at six sites, though no reef-wide bleaching was apparent: soft corals at Raiketa; two branching colonies at Biqueli Wall; a mushroom coral and a table colony at Haruine; four colonies, two of them soft corals, at Pinnacle; one branching colony at Cabbage Patch; and, at Compass Reef, one partly bleached colony and two colonies with paled crowns. Inner Reef had pale-to-white patches and small lesions in about a fifth of the reviewed frames (pale patches and lesions counted together; computer vision found bleaching alone in 6.7% of photos), a crown-of-thorns seastar, and a derelict rope draped over a massive colony, and a large Porites at Cabbage Patch had recent basal tissue loss.

Giant clams were wedged into the framework at Inner Reef, and Compass Reef combined a dense mixed coral garden with a seagrass-fringed flat of small massive colonies.

Spalding et al. (2001) la fó relatóriu separadu ka númeru área ahu-ruin nian ba Timor-Leste (East Timor). Ninia kosta mosu iha mapa sira kapítulu Indonézia nian, no Timor tama iha sub-rejiaun ne'ebé sira bolu Moluccas and Irian Jaya, ne'ebé inklui kadeia arkipélagu ki'ik sira iha rohan súl Tasi Banda nian (Banda Sea), ne'ebé la'o husi Timor ba leste to'o Illa Aru (Aru Islands). Sira deskreve sub-rejiaun ne'e nu'udar fatin ho batimetria kompleksu no bee oseániku kle'an ne'ebé barak liu moos, ho illa sira ne'ebé dook malu de'it kilómetru sanulu balun, maibé dala ruma fahe malu husi tasi ne'ebé kle'an liu 1,000 m. Iha Tasi Timor (Timor Sea), korrente tasi nian iha superfísie suli ba oeste durante tinan tomak, no imajen ida husi 1990 iha kapítulu hanesan hatudu atol Luang no Ukenao, ne'ebé iha Timor-Leste nia leste. Souter et al. (2021) relata katak to'o Dezembru 2020, Allen Coral Atlas prodús ona mapa ahu-ruin detalladu ne'ebé bazeia ba satélite ba Tasi Timor no Tasi Arafura (Arafura Sea).

Pin sia hotu-hotu iha Timor-Leste, fatin ualu no mós mergullu kalan iha Haruine, mak iha Illa Ataúru (Atauro Island) nia leet, ho mergullu entre 29 Janeiru no 1 Fevereiru 2024. Fatin sira ne'e hahú husi jardín snorkel ho kle'an 2 m iha Compass Reef no Inner Reef ne'ebé la kle'an, to'o foho-lolon ahu-ruin ne'ebé tuun maka'as iha Raiketa, teras leten husi Biqueli Wall, no Pinnacle ne'ebé kle'an no nakukun, ne'ebé mergullu to'o 35.7 m. Iha Haruine, mergullu iha loron no mós iha kalan, no mergullu kalan nian iha nia pin rasik.

Ahu-ruin Acropora ho sanak mak komunidade ne'ebé domina. Raiketa, Haruine, no Biqueli Wall hotu hatudu ai-laran ahu-ruin staghorn kór kafé-mutin ne'ebé besik kontínuu, dala barak iha nuvem maka'as husi ikan damselfish, fusilier, no anthias nia okos; iha Haruine, ikan damselfish ki'ik azul rihun ba rihun nanis iha ai-laran sira-nia leten. Watuwai, ne'ebé ema sisi iha 29 Janeiru, la iha foto ida ne'ebé sei iha. Inner Reef iha mistura forma kresimentu ne'ebé luan, ho Porites kolunar no lobadu, Acropora ho sanak no hanesan bikan, Pocillopora kór mauve, no grupu boot esponja-tubu nian. Cabbage Patch hetan naran husi kubu boot tebes husi ahu-ruin folioza ne'ebé dobra iha rai-henek nia lolon. Pinnacle la hanesan fatin seluk: estrutura ne'ebé du'ut-tasi (turf) taka, ho ulun Porites ne'ebé fahe-malu, ahu-ruin hanesan bikan, esponja liman-fuan boot, esponja-tubu, no idroide (hydroid) kór sinzentu hanesan fulun barak.

Estimativa kobertura husi foto hahú husi 20% iha Pinnacle to'o 46% iha Raiketa; Inner Reef (45%) no Haruine (41%) mak estasaun seluk ne'ebé liu 40%. Fatin hotu ne'ebé iha foto, exetu Pinnacle, kahur ahu-ruin maka'as ho fatuk-ahu kanek, rai-henek, ka estrutura tuan; iha Biqueli Wall, ahu-ruin meza moris ida de'it hamriik iha natar luan husi kanek Acropora mate ne'ebé koralina taka. Foto hatudu kolónia mutin (bleaching) iha fatin neen, maske la iha ahu-ruin mutin ne'ebé luan iha ahu-ruin tomak: ahu-ruin maran iha Raiketa; kolónia ho sanak rua iha Biqueli Wall; ahu-ruin kogumelu ida no kolónia meza ida iha Haruine; kolónia haat, rua husi ne'e ahu-ruin maran, iha Pinnacle; kolónia ho sanak ida iha Cabbage Patch; no, iha Compass Reef, kolónia ida ne'ebé mutin parsiál no kolónia rua ne'ebé nia leten sai kor-mutin. Inner Reef iha mancha mutin-mutin to'o mutin no kanek ki'ik iha besik parte ida husi lima husi foto ne'ebé haree ona (mancha mutin no kanek sira konta hamutuk; vizaun komputador hetan branqueamentu de'it iha 6.7% husi foto sira), fitun-tasi crown-of-thorns ida, no tali abandonadu ida ne'ebé tara iha kolónia masivu ida nia leten, no Porites boot ida iha Cabbage Patch lakon tesidu foin dadaun iha nia ain.

Kima boot (giant clams) tama metin iha estrutura Inner Reef nian, no Compass Reef kombina jardín ahu-ruin mistura ne'ebé maka'as ho rai-tetuk ne'ebé du'ut-tasi (seagrass) haleu, ho kolónia masivu ki'ik sira.