Coral reefs are living, dynamic ecosystems — and just like any organism, they can get sick.
In this 1-day course, you’ll learn to identify coral diseases and other signs of compromised health such as overgrowth, competition, and predation. You’ll practice advanced reef-survey techniques beyond the standard Ecological Monitoring Program (EMP) to assess coral health and contribute meaningful data to global monitoring initiatives.
Coral disease outbreaks are one of the greatest threats to tropical reefs. In Koh Tao, conditions like White Syndrome, Brown Band Disease, and Skeletal Eroding Band can spread quickly, especially after heatwaves or sedimentation events.
Our Coral Disease & Compromised Health Monitoring course trains you to recognize these patterns and understand the ecological and environmental drivers behind them — so you can help monitor, mitigate, and protect affected reefs.
What you’ll learn:
- Identify coral diseases and stress indicators such as tissue loss, discoloration, or banding.
- Recognize compromised health caused by algal overgrowth, predation by Drupella snails or Crown-of-Thorns starfish, and competitive interactions between corals and sponges.
- Apply refined survey methods to record, map, and quantify disease prevalence.
- Understand how temperature stress, nutrient loading, and pollution influence coral vulnerability.
This course is ideal if you want to:
- Build advanced coral assessment skills to complement your EMP training.
- Join long-term coral-health monitoring and reef-recovery research.
- Deepen your understanding of how reef stress, competition, and resilience interact.
