Topography and spatial arrangement of reef-building corals on the fringing reefs of North Jamaica may influence their response to disturbance from bleaching
Knowledge of factors that are important in reef resilience helps us understand how reefs react following major environmental disturbances such as hurricanes and bleaching. Here we test factors that might have influenced Jamaican reef resilience to, and subsequent recovery from, the 2005 bleaching ev...
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Veröffentlicht in: | Marine environmental research 2010-04, Vol.69 (3), p.158-162 |
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Sprache: | eng |
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Zusammenfassung: | Knowledge of factors that are important in reef resilience helps us understand how reefs react following major environmental disturbances such as hurricanes and bleaching. Here we test factors that might have influenced Jamaican reef resilience to, and subsequent recovery from, the 2005 bleaching event, and which might help inform management policy for reefs in the future: reef rugosity and contact of corals with macroalgae. In addition, we test in the field, on Dairy Bull reef, whether aggregated
Porites astreoides colonies exhibit enhanced growth when exposed to superior competition from
Acopora palmata, as has been found by experiment with the Indo-Pacific corals
Porites lobata and the superior competitor
Porites rus [Idjadi, J.A., Karlson, R.H., 2007. Spatial arrangement of competitors influences coexistence of reef-building corals. Ecology 88, 2449–2454].
There were significant linear relationships between rugosity and the increase in smallest size classes for
Sidastrea siderea,
Colpophyllia natans,
P. astreoides and
Agaricia species, and between rugosity and cover of the branching coral
Acropora cervicornis. Linear extension rates of
A. cervicornis and radial growth rates of
P. astreoides were significantly lower (
p
<
0.025;
F
>
6) when in contact with macroalgae. Aggregated colonies of
P. astreoides in contact with one another, one of which was in contact with the faster growing competitor
A. palmata showed significantly greater growth rates than with just two aggregated
P. astreoides colonies alone. These findings suggest that three dimensional topography and complexity is important for reef resilience and viability in the face of environmental stressors such as bleaching. Our findings also support the idea that aggregated spatial arrangements of corals can influence the outcome of interspecific competition and promote species coexistence, important in times of reef recovery after disturbance. |
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ISSN: | 0141-1136 1879-0291 |
DOI: | 10.1016/j.marenvres.2009.09.007 |