Nancy Gladson Diersing

Nancy Gladson Diersing: member of the Research Staff at the Florida D.E.P. Florida Marine Research Institute in Marathon, FL. Her background includes ten years as a classroom and field educator. With a master's degree in zoology, she has been very active in Florida Bay studies, and in her four years with FMRI worked on the Florida Bay Project.

In the Atlantic transition zone where tidal flow permits coral and other invertebrate larvae to enter the bay, hard-bottom communities are found in depths of 4-7 feet of water. These habitats are swept by tidal currents and thus retain only a thin layer of loose sediments on the rocky limestone substrate. Typically, this community consists of sea whips, sea plumes, and other gorgonian corals which grow attached to the hard bottom. Although the feeding polyps of these soft corals use their stinging tentacles to obtain microscopic food from the surrounding water, the coral depends upon food produced by algal cells which are living within their polyp tissues. These symbiotic algal cells require sunlight to manufacture food, some of which is available to the host colonial coral animal. Thus, gorgonian corals thrive best in clear water where the symbiotic algae are able to supplement the coral’s nutrition.