Rapid Ecological Assessment (REA) surveys at 465 sites on 11 reefs in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI) inventoried coral species, their relative abundances, and their distributions during 2000 around the 10 islands were in depths of~20 m, and three surveys on the submerged Raita Bank were in depths of 30-35 m. Data from 401 REA sites met criteria for quantitative analysis. Results include 11 first records for stony coral species in the Hawaiian Archipelago and 29 range extensions to the NWHI. Several species may be new to science. There are now 57 stony coral species known in the shallow subtropical waters of the NWHI, similar to the 59 shallow and deep-water species known in the better-studied and more tropical main Hawaiian Islands. Coral endemism is high in the NWHI: 17 endemic species (30%) account for 37-53% of the abundance of stony corals on each reef of the NWHI. Three genera (Montipora, Porites, Pocillopora) contain 15 of the 17 endemic species and most of the endemic abundance. Seven Acropora species are now known from the central NWHI despite their near absence from the main Hawaiian Islands. Coral abundance and diversity are highest at the large, open atolls of the central NWHI (French Frigate, Maro, Lisianski) and decline gradually through the remaining atolls to the northwest (Pearl and Hermes, Midway, and Kure). Stony corals are also less abundant and less diverse off the exposed basalt islands to the southeast (Nihoa, Necker, La Perouse, Gardner), where soft corals (Sinularia, Palythoa) are more abundant. Exposure to severe wave action appears to limit coral development off these small islands and surrounding deep platforms. Temperature extremes and natural accumulation of lagoon sediments may contribute to decline of coral species and abundance at the northwestern end of the chain. Some NWHI land areas were severely degraded by logging, alien species, mining, agriculture, and military use since the late nineteenth century, but the islands today support millions of seabirds and migratory shorebirds; endangered land and water birds; terrestrial plants; and nesting and feeding grounds of threatened sea turtles and endangered Hawaiian monk seals. By contrast, the adjacent reef and shore areas have been relatively unaffected by human activity, although parts of some reefs have been exposed to marine debris (especially trawl and drift nets), invasive species (especially at harbors and on marine debris), chemical contaminants, fisheries, bioprospecting, coral bleaching, and ship groundings.Most knowledge of Hawaiian corals is restricted to reefs around the eight inhabited Coral Species and Distributions in the NW Hawaiian Islands . Maragos et al. 213 main Hawaiian Islands (from Ni'ihau to Hawai'i) and is still based largely on the studies of Dana (1846) and Vaughan (1907). Major compilations of corals from the main Hawaiian Islands since then include Edmondson (1933Edmondson ( , 1946, Maragos (1977Maragos ( , 1995, and Veron (2000), who included descriptions and photographs of e...

Corals of the Hawaiian Archipelago are well situated in the North Pacific Gyre (NPG) to record how bomb-produced radiocarbon has been sequestered and transported by the sea. While this signal can be traced accurately through time in reef-building corals and used to infer oceanographic processes and determine the ages of marine organisms, a comprehensive and validated record has been lacking for the Hawaiian Archipelago. In this study, a coral core from Kure Atoll in the northwestern Hawaiian Islands was used to create a high-resolution bomb 14C record for the years 1939–2002, and was then used with other 14C measurements in fish otoliths and seawater to explore differences and similarities in the bomb 14C signal throughout the Hawaiian Archipelago. The Kure Atoll sample series produced a well-defined bomb 14C curve that, with some exceptions, was similar to other coral 14C records from the Hawaiian Archipelago. Subtle differences in the coral 14C records across the region may be explained by the large-scale ocean circulation patterns and decadal cycles of the NPG. The most rapid increase of 14C, in the 1950s and 1960s, showed similar timing across the Hawaiian Archipelago and provides a robust basis for use of bomb 14C dating to obtain high-precision age determinations of marine organisms. Reference otoliths of juvenile fish demonstrated the use of the post-peak 14C decline period as a viable reference in the age validation of younger and more recently collected fishes, and effectively extended the utility of bomb 14C dating to the latest 30 yr.

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Concerns over worldwide declines in marine resources have prompted the search for innovative solutions for their conservation and management, particularly for coral reef ecosystems. Rapid advances in sensor resolution, coupled with image analysis techniques tailored to the unique optical problems of marine environments have enabled the derivation of detailed benthic habitat maps of coral reef habitats from multispectral satellite imagery. Such maps delineate coral reefs' main ecological communities, and are essential for management of these resources as baseline assessments. UNESCO's World Heritage Central Pacific Project plans to afford protection through World Heritage recognition to a number of islands and atolls in the central Pacific Ocean, including the Phoenix Archipelago in the Republic of Kiribati. Most of these islands however lack natural resource maps needed for the identification of priority areas for inclusion in a marine reserve system. Our project provides assistance to UNESCO's World Heritage Centre and the Kiribati Government by developing benthic and terrestrial habitat maps of the Phoenix Islands from high-resolution multispectral imagery. The approach involves: (i) the analysis of new Quickbird multispectral imagery; and (ii) the use of MARXAN, a simulated annealing algorithm that uses a GIS interface. Analysis of satellite imagery was performed with ENVI ® , and includes removal of atmospheric effects using ATCOR (a MODTRAN4 radiative transfer model); de-glinting and water column correction algorithms; and a number of unsupervised and supervised classifiers. Previously collected ground-truth data was used to train classifications. The resulting habitat maps are then used as input to MARXAN. This algorithm ultimately identifies a proportion of each habitat to be set aside for protection, and prioritizes conservation areas. The outputs of this research are being delivered to the UNESCO World Heritage Centre office and the Kiribati Government as baseline assessments of these resources and to assist in marine reserve planning.