Harry Erhardt

Not many divers are interested in identification of corals, even though this identification forms one of the basic of reef health monitoring. Because of the lack of interest, it is no wonder that books dealing specifically with corals are rare. This one is an excellent and authoritative book on hard and soft corals, gorgonians and sea anemones, which covers the huge region of the Indian and Pacific oceans, from the Red Sea to the west coast of the Americas

The book has the standard hardcover IKAN publication format, with more than 1000 photos printed on 304 pages of gloss art papers. The book commences with a general introduction to corals and coral reefs, and followed by pages of pages of corals organised in the standard IKAN publication way, with each species of the creatures defined in one to three pictures and a small text. It also contains picture stories, like in the other IKAN publications. The eleven picture stories provide essays on man's influence on coral colonies, the commercialism of red coral, coral farming, propagation of soft corals, corals unde the microscope, coral bleaching, coral spawning, and the obiquitous Crown-of-Thorns starfish.

… (mehr)