Approach to the Functional Importance of Acropora cervicornis in Outplanting Sites in the Dominican Republic

Abstract

Coral restoration has been recognized as an increasingly important tool for coral conservation in recent years. In the Caribbean, the endangered staghorn coral, Acropora cervicornis has been studied for restoration for over two decades with most studies focusing on evaluating simple metrics of success such as colony growth and survivorship in both nurseries and outplanted sites. However, for reef restoration to aid in the recovery of ecological function in outplanted sites, there is a need to measure the functional ecology of the impact of outplanting. Here, we present and identify positive ecological processes and ecological functions (such as increased fish biomass, coral cover, and increased in structural complexity) relative to active reef restoration. In the Southeastern Reefs Marine Sanctuary in the Dominican Republic, we monitored the percentage of benthic cover and fish biomass alongside active reef restoration over the period of 12 months in four zones. Subsequently, we developed multidimensional analyses in conjunction with generalized linear models (GLM) and linear models. Our results show there is a remarkable spatial and temporal differentiation favoring greater ecological function in restored areas. We observed the most noticeable patterns of change in the benthos and coral species composition. We found a positive relationship between amounts of outplanted colonies with the total fish biomass for the three outplanted sites. We highlight that Scarus iseri, a parrotfish critical for grazing maintenance, was the species with the greatest benefit. Our results provide evidence of the functional importance of Acropora cervicornis in coral reef active restoration efforts.

Capture, Culture and Release of Postlarvae Fishes: Proof-of-Concept as a Tool Approach to Support Reef Management

“…and Acathurus sp. (Shantz et al, 2017;Calle-Triviño et al, 2021). Despite, the highest contributions of grunts and herbivorous fishes (surgeonfishes and parrotfishes) in both study sites our results suggest that there is a good chance of using these species to enhance research and may be considered in the context of restoration both structurally and functionally.…”

Ecological impacts of coral gardening outplanting in the Maldives

“…For example, a large-scale coral restoration project in Seychelles demonstrated a positive correlation between the presence of coral recruits and juveniles and outplanted corals (Montoya-Maya et al 2016). Recent research on single species outplanting in the Caribbean showed greater ecological functions in restored areas using a complex assessment of ecological indicators (Calle-Triviño et al 2021). For the Maldives, comparable studies date back to the 1990s, where whole colonies were transplanted to artificial substrates which were then rapidly colonized by fish.…”

All-inclusive coral reef restoration: How the tourism sector can boost restoration efforts in the caribbean

“…Global climate action, the establishment of marine protected areas, sustainable fishing practices, and effective management of water systems all are critical tools for reef recovery. Alongside these efforts, coral restoration has the potential to further help recovery of damaged or depleted reefs (Wilkinson and Souter, 2008;Young et al, 2012) and there is increasing recognition that it should play a strategic role in protecting critical ecosystem services (Abelson, 2006;Edwards, 2010;Chamberland et al, 2015;Schopmeyer et al, 2017;Calle-Triviño et al, 2018;Calle-Triviño et al, 2021). Numerous reef restoration projects have been developed in recent years to alleviate bottlenecks of recovery for Caribbean coral communities (Bayraktarov et al, 2020), leading to numerous advancements in techniques to growing and reproducing corals in aquarium settings.…”