Question: How hard is it to identify coral reefs in water ?

Sarah-Jane Walsh answered on 17 Jun 2013:

It depends to what level you want to identify them. Telling apart the different family groups is quite easy some are large and boulder like, some have lots of branches, so telling those apart is quite easy.

However identifying down to the species level is quite tough. For example i work a lot with a group of corals called Acropora, they are branching corals but there are over 300 species all looking really similar. Sometimes we have to cut off a branch to identify it genetically or down the microscope.

I usually take lots of close up photos which i can then compare in the identification guides. Its still easy to make mistakes though!