Distributions and habitat associations of deep-water corals in Norfolk and Baltimore Canyons, Mid-Atlantic Bight, USA

Brooke, Sandra; Watts, Martin; Heil, A.D.; Rhode, Mike; Mienis, Furu; Duineveld, G.C.A.; Davies, Andrew J.; Ross, Steve W.

doi:10.1016/j.dsr2.2016.05.008

Cited by 26 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 60 publications

(65 reference statements)

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“…Depth is one of the more prominent parameters influencing assemblage structure (e.g., Howell et al, 2002;Quattrini et al, 2014). Other significant parameters include magnetivity and topography (Boschen et al, 2015), temperature (Mortensen and Buhl-Mortensen, 2004;Wei et al, 2010;Morgan et al, 2015), turbidity (Mamouridis et al, 2011;Brooke et al, 2017), pH (Brooke et al, 2017), oxygen (Wishner et al, 1990;Levin, 2002;De Leo et al, 2017), substrate size and type (Mortensen and Buhl-Mortensen, 2004), and stochastic processes and environmental filtering (Quattrini et al, 2016). Thus, the high habitat heterogeneity that is becoming known on many seamounts, with numerous available habitats, may then contribute to high biodiversity on seamounts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fine Scale Assemblage Structure of Benthic Invertebrate Megafauna on the North Pacific Seamount Mokumanamana

et al. 2019

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Changes in benthic megafaunal assemblage structure have been found across gradients of environmental variables for many deep-sea habitats, but patterns remain under-investigated on seamounts. To assess the extent of variability in benthic communities at the scale of within a single seamount, and to assess environmental drivers of assemblage changes, Mokumanamana, also known as Necker Island, a seamount in the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument with no known history of human impacts, was surveyed. Replicate 1 km transects were conducted along depth contours at 50 m depth intervals from 200-700 m on three sides of Mokumanamana using the AUV Sentry. Megafaunal abundance and substrate parameters were obtained from 26,119 total images. The dominant megafaunal taxa were sponges, corallimorpharians, cup corals, and benthic ctenophores. Sea pens and alcyonacean octocorals were also abundant. Overall, abundance and diversity of megafauna increased with depth. Beta-diversity through species substitution with depth was very high. Beta-diversity was also high between the sides and likewise defined almost exclusively by species substitution. Crossed ANOSIM by depth and side showed community structure differed on Mokumanamana for both factors. NMDS and cluster analyses of Mokumanamana show nine assemblages that were defined by depth and reflect differences between sides of the seamount. Environmental modeling with DISTLM indicates sediment, oxygen, substrate variability and roughness, POC, and surface currents are correlated with these assemblage differences. These results suggest that microhabitats on seamounts can promote unique assemblages along depth gradients as well as on different sides of a feature, and this diversity may be easily overlooked without fine-scale sampling. These findings have implications for management and conservation of seamounts as well as future ecological studies of seamounts, as seamounts are generally sampled on much coarser spatial scales.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fine Scale Assemblage Structure of Benthic Invertebrate Megafauna on the North Pacific Seamount Mokumanamana

et al. 2019

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“…In tropical coral reefs, corals are often more abundant on vertical surfaces, where competition with algae and sedimentation rates may be reduced (Birkeland, 1977;Rogers, Fitz, Gilnack, Beets, & Hardin, 1984;Sheppard, 1982). Rich and abundant communities of suspension feeders on vertical walls have also been reported for deeper waters (Haedrich & Gagnon, 1991), but it is only in recent years that technological advances, particularly the increasing use of remotely operated vehicles (ROV), have allowed for more detailed descriptions of such environments (Bell, Alt, & Jones, 2016;Huvenne et al, 2011;Johnson et al, 2013) As a result, large vertical reefs of overhanging scleractinians (Brooke & Ross, 2014;Fabri et al, 2014;Huvenne et al, 2011;Van den Beld et al, 2017) and walls inhabited by Alcyonacea (Brooke et al, 2017;Edinger et al, 2011;Quattrini et al, 2015) or dominated by other community types such as bivalves (Johnson et al, 2013;Ludvigsen, Sortland, Johnsen, & Singh, 2007) and sponges (Bell et al, 2016;Brooke et al, 2017;Genin, Paull, & Dillon, 1992) are being discovered. Some of these steep walls have been reported as harbouring the highest abundances of corals or bivalves in the area (Gasbarro, Wan, & Tunnicliffe, 2018;Johnson et al, 2013;Morris, Tyler, Masson, Huvenne, & Rogers, 2013) with high numbers of other associated species also observed (Robert, Jones, Tyler, Rooij, & Huvenne, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cold‐water coral assemblages on vertical walls from the Northeast Atlantic

Robert

Jones

Georgiopoulou

et al. 2019

Diversity and Distributions

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Aim In this study, we assess patterns of cold‐water coral assemblages observed on deep‐sea vertical walls. Similar to their shallow‐water counterparts, vertical and overhanging walls in the deep sea can host highly diverse communities, but because of their geometry, these habitats are generally overlooked and remain poorly known. These vertical habitats are however of particular interest, because they can protect vulnerable coral ecosystems from trawling activities. As such, it is important to understand their ecology and assess their global importance. Location Vertical walls on complex geomorphic features, in particular walls of the Rockall Bank Slope Failure Escarpment, Whittard and Explorer Canyons, Northeast Atlantic. Methods Video analysis of remotely operated vehicle transects carried out at five sites is used to investigate differences in species composition and diversity across walls and to compare those to nearby cold‐water coral sites on flat terrain. A high‐resolution photogrammetric reconstruction is further employed to examine whether wall complexity plays a role in promoting niche differentiation at very fine spatial scales. Results The investigated walls showed differences in species assemblage both across walls and in comparison to flat sites, with the fine‐scale heterogeneity engendered by walls allowing niche differentiation between closely related taxa. Main Conclusions Vertical walls represent an important cold‐water coral habitat with differences in species composition across walls within a region, illustrating their role in driving diversity patterns. Based on publicly available bathymetric datasets and a catalogue of broad‐scale terrain features, globally over 8,000 features are likely to have vertical walls and cold‐water corals, which highlight the need to consider deep‐sea vertical habitats in current conservation efforts.

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“…Indeed, the L. pertusa reefs in this area inhabit the MOW-ENACW boundary (Somoza et al, 2014;Serrano et al, 2017a,b). The majority of L. pertusa colonies found in the North Atlantic coincide with a range of relatively low to moderate DO values (∼1.5-5 ml•l −1 ), which occurs between 300 and 1600 m water depth (Davies et al, 2010;Somoza et al, 2014;Brooke et al, 2017).…”

Section: Oxygen Concentrationmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…The different thermal tolerances have been also used to explain the dominance of M. oculata in warmer Mediterranean waters and L. pertusa in colder regions of the NE Atlantic. However, L. pertusa also forms important reefs off SE USA and the Gulf of Mexico (Reed et al, 2006;Brooke and Schroeder, 2007;Mienis et al, 2012a;Georgian et al, 2014), highlighting also the importance of different geographic populations (Brooke and Schroeder, 2007;Georgian et al, 2014;Brooke et al, 2017). The scleractinian CWC Dendrophyllia cornigera also reduced respiration and calcification rates when temperature was experimentally lowered to 8 • C (Gori et al, 2014).…”

Section: Sea Temperaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of Water Masses on the Biodiversity and Biogeography of Deep-Sea Benthic Ecosystems in the North Atlantic

et al. 2020

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Circulation patterns in the North Atlantic Ocean have changed and reorganized multiple times over millions of years, influencing the biodiversity, distribution, and connectivity patterns of deep-sea species and ecosystems. In this study, we review the effects of the water mass properties (temperature, salinity, food supply, carbonate chemistry, and oxygen) on deep-sea benthic megafauna (from species to community level) and discussed in future scenarios of climate change. We focus on the key oceanic controls on deep-sea megafauna biodiversity and biogeography patterns. We place particular attention on cold-water corals and sponges, as these are ecosystem-engineering organisms that constitute vulnerable marine ecosystems (VME) with high associated biodiversity. Besides documenting the current state of the knowledge on this topic, a future scenario for water mass properties in the deep North Atlantic basin was predicted. The pace and severity of climate change in the deep-sea will vary across regions. However, predicted water mass properties showed that all regions in the North Atlantic will be exposed to multiple stressors by 2100, experiencing at least one critical change in water temperature (+2 • C), organic carbon fluxes (reduced up to 50%), ocean acidification (pH reduced up to 0.3), aragonite saturation horizon (shoaling above 1000 m) and/or reduction in dissolved oxygen (>5%). The northernmost regions of the North Atlantic will suffer the greatest impacts. Warmer and more acidic oceans will drastically reduce the suitable habitat for ecosystem-engineers, with severe consequences such as declines in population densities, even compromising their long-term survival, loss of biodiversity and reduced biogeographic distribution that might compromise connectivity at large scales. These effects can be aggravated by reductions in carbon fluxes, particularly in areas where food availability is already limited. Declines in benthic biomass and biodiversity will diminish ecosystem services such as habitat provision, nutrient

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Distributions and habitat associations of deep-water corals in Norfolk and Baltimore Canyons, Mid-Atlantic Bight, USA

Cited by 26 publications

References 60 publications

Fine Scale Assemblage Structure of Benthic Invertebrate Megafauna on the North Pacific Seamount Mokumanamana

Fine Scale Assemblage Structure of Benthic Invertebrate Megafauna on the North Pacific Seamount Mokumanamana

Cold‐water coral assemblages on vertical walls from the Northeast Atlantic

Influence of Water Masses on the Biodiversity and Biogeography of Deep-Sea Benthic Ecosystems in the North Atlantic

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