TPW TV -- CARIBBEAN CONNECTION - Learn of an important 
connection between the fishes and coral of the Caribbean 
and Texas Gulf ... ahead on Passport to Texas.

This is Passport to Texas

Sometimes freezes kill fish and coral in the Gulf. If 
researchers prove a connection between the same species 
in warmer Caribbean waters, they'll have a resource for 
restoring losses. TV Producer Bruce Biermann says the TPW 
TV show examines this issue.

63 -- This is our 25th year going to Mexico. Texas A&M 
University has been studying the waters off the coast of the 
Yucatan, and the waters off the Texas coast, and comparing down 
to a very small genetic level the fish and the coral. What we're 
just really looking for is trying to get genetic evidence that 
supports that the current that comes out of the Caribbean into 
the Gulf of Mexico is the ultimate source of populations in the 
Gulf of Mexico. I followed Texas A & M to the Caribbean waters 
off the coast of the Yucatan. They were doing studies on a couple 
kinds of fish and a couple kinds of coral. Taking samples. Then 
they came back up here to Texas to our coral reef - the Flower 
Garden Bank - which is a hundred miles of the Texas Louisiana 
Border. And they took the exact same species of samples from 
there, compared them, and sure enough at a genetic level they are 
absolutely identical. We have two different alleles for this gene, 
and it's found in all three sites, which means that these three 
sites are, in fact, interconnected - that there is genetic 
exchange that takes place. There really is a Caribbean 
connection.

The Caribbean Connection airs on PBS stations this week.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife ... I'm Cecilia Nasti.











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