Endangered
Oulophyllia crispa
Oulophyllia crispa
Oulophyllia crispa is a stony coral in the family Merulinidae (order Scleractinia), recorded as Endangered.
Appearance
The polyps only expand at night. They are large and fleshy and have white-tipped tentacles. The colour of this coral is usually some shade of brown, grey or green, sometimes with contrasting oral discs.
Range and habitat
This coral is found in the tropical western and central Indo-Pacific region. Its range extends from the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden and East Africa to Australia, Japan, the East China Sea and the island groups of the West Pacific Ocean. It is found on reefs at depths down to about 30 metres (100 ft), mostly occurring on subtidal rocks and in lagoons.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Habits
A stony-coral colony is fixed. Growth, bleaching, and death happen in place. Collection and gear damage remove the skeleton as well as the tissue.
The colony stays where it settled. Water quality, light, and a stable bottom decide whether tissue remains on the skeleton.
In crisis
Although this coral has a wide range, it is generally uncommon and seems to be decreasing in abundance, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has rated its conservation status as being "near threatened".
CITES lists this taxon on Appendix II. Confirm the current appendix on the CITES checklist.
Warm-water bleaching, sedimentation, destructive fishing, and the curio trade sit behind many stony-coral badges. That is the group backdrop — confirm the official criteria for this name on the Red List.
Oulophyllia crispa is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Oulophyllia crispa, Wikidata item Q3936633. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
