Coral is and will always be coral

 On today's adventures, we got the opportunity to see corals in two very different forms, the first of which being in the wild while on a snorkel trip to a reef called "Hens and Chickens", and the other being corals hundreds of thousands of years old fossilized into rocks at Windley Key State Park. The first of these trips was snorkeling at the Hens and Chickens reef, where we saw several different species of very beautiful and colorful corals. These corals came in several different forms, for example, there were several types of sea fans and sea rods flowing in the water column, as well as some brain corals that were stationary on the sea floor. The main difference between these two main groups of corals is that the brain corals are calcified and therefore do not move whereas the sea fans and rods were not calcified and were able to easily flow with the current of the water as well as move from the waves.

Shown below is a photo of some brain corals taken during our snorkeling trip as well as a clearer photo of a sea rod coral taken by a scuba diver at the same reef. As you can tell from the photos the two different species of coral are very different in appearance and structure.

The second half of today's adventure brought us to Windley Key State Park, where we saw the second form of corals, those being ancient fossilized ones from hundreds of thousands of years ago. These corals have been fossilized under several feet of rock that have been dug up in order to create a highly sought after stone called key largo limestone or keystone that is used as siding on some buildings and some other structures. This limestone has fossilized corals imbeded within them which gives it a very unique look and texture. These fossilized corals are only the calcified corals as the other forms of coral do not have enough sturdy material to be fossilized, unlike the calcified corals which have a hard exterior. These fossilized corals show in relatively good detail the exterior and interior calcified portions of the coral. These fossilized corals were mostly brain corals and other similar species. 

As explained above and shown in these two photos, it is very easy to get an idea of the surface and interior structure of the fossilized calcified corals by observing the different marks within the stone to gain a better understanding of the structure and function of many of these aincent corals. It is believed that most of these corals are very similar to the same corals that we have around our planet today suggesting that most species of corals have not changed or evolved very significantly over the past several hundred thousand years.