Deep-sea corals are an important component of benthic ecosystems, but are potentially very vulnerable to ecological disturbance due to their extreme longevity and slow growth rates. Among the slowest growing genera are the ‘Black Corals’ (Family Antipatharia), which can have lifespans of millennia. The waters around New Zealand contain a variety of black corals, including species that grow at shallow depths in the southern Fjords. However, while growth rates in black corals have been reported for many other parts of the world, New Zealand's black corals have received little attention. Here we present a series of high-resolution radiocarbon dates for coral colonies of the genera Antipathella, Leiopathes and Antipathes. Our results illustrate some corals have lifespans of up to 3000 years and slow but highly variable growth (averaging 10–100 μm/yr) for genera Leiopathes and Antipathes and fast growth (averaging 2–3 cm/yr) for genera Antipathella, with no obvious regional variability in growth rates over time. Our results are broadly consistent with other black coral growth rate studies, and reinforce that New Zealand's black corals likely have low resilience to any disturbance.

深海珊瑚是底栖生态系统的重要组成部分，但由于它们的极长寿命和缓慢的生长速度，可能很容易受到生态干扰。生长最慢的属之一是“黑珊瑚”（Antipatharia家族），其寿命可达几千年。新西兰周围的水域包含各种黑色珊瑚，包括生长在峡湾南部较浅深度的物种。但是，尽管世界其他许多地方都报道了黑珊瑚的生长速度，但新西兰的黑珊瑚却鲜有受到关注。在这里，我们介绍了Antipathella，Leiopathes和Antipathes属珊瑚群落的一系列高分辨率放射性碳数据。。我们的研究结果说明了一些珊瑚有高达3000年，缓慢但充满变数增长的寿命（平均为10-100微米/年）的属Leiopathes和Antipathes为属快速增长（平均2-3厘米/年）Antipathella，没有随着时间的推移，增长率的明显区域差异。我们的研究结果与其他黑珊瑚的生长速度研究大体上一致，并强调了新西兰的黑珊瑚对任何干扰的适应力很低。