Corals diversity at waters of Southern Ambon Island, Maluku

Ambon Island is surrounded by coral reefs ecosystem, however, the study related to the species of corals was scarcely held. Corals identification is essential to inform about corals diversity. The aims were to inventory the species of corals in the Southern of Ambon Island, and to analyze the species similarity among the stations. The study was held on January-February 2020 at waters of Southern Ambon. The Underwater Photo Transect method was applied then the data collected were classified into taxa composition (family, genus, and species). The Sorensen Similarity Indice was utilized to discover the species comparison among the stations. The number of species at the waters were 131, that were classified into 13 families, i.e., Acroporidae (2 genera, 30 species), Agariciidae (5 genera, 13 species), Caryophyllidae (1 genus, 2 species), Dendrophyllidae (2 genera, 2 species), Faviidae (13 genera, 39 species), Fungiidae (4 genera, 11 species), Merulinidae (3 genera, 4 species), Mussidae (2 genera, 9 species), Oculinidae (1 genus, 2 species), Pectiniidae (3 genera, 4 species), Pocilloporidae (3 genera, 5 species), Poritidae (1 genus, 7 species), Siderastreidae (2 genera, 3 species). The similarity indice is categorized as high (above 0.5). The similarity indice of the stations was not extremely varied.