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Abstract

Abstract13 Counteracting the worldwide trend of coral reef degeneration is a major challenge for the 14 scientific community. A crucial management approach to minimizing stress effects on healthy 15 reefs and helping the recovery of disturbed reefs is reef protection. However, the current rapid 16 decline of the world's reefs suggests that protection might be insufficient as a viable stand-alone 17 management approach for some reefs. We thus suggest that the ecological restoration of coral 18 reefs (CRR) should be considered as a valid component of coral reef management, in addition to 19 protection, if the applied method is economically applicable and scalable.20 This theoretical study examines the potential applicability and outcomes of restocking grazers as 21 a restoration tool for coral reef recovery -a tool that has not been applied so far in reef 22 restoration projects. We studied the effect of restocking grazing fish as a restoration method 23 using a mathematical model of degrading reefs, and analyzed the financial outcomes of the 24 restocking intervention. The results suggest that applying this restoration method, in addition to 25 protection, can facilitate reef recovery. Moreover, our analysis suggests that the restocking 26 approach almost always becomes profitable within several years. Considering the relatively low 27 cost of this restoration approach and the feasibility of mass production of herbivorous fish, we 28 suggest that this approach should be considered and examined as an additional viable restoration 29 tool for coral reefs. 30PeerJ reviewing PDF |