Latitudinal shifts in coral reef fishes: why some species do and others do not shift

Abstract

Climate change is resulting in rapid poleward shifts in the geographical distribution of many tropical fish species, but it is equally apparent that some fishes are failing to exhibit expected shifts in their geographical distribution. There is still little understanding of the species‐specific traits that may constrain or promote successful establishment of populations in temperate regions. We review the factors likely to affect population establishment, including larval supply, settlement and post‐settlement processes. In addition, we conduct meta‐analyses on existing and new data to examine relationships between species‐specific traits and vagrancy. We show that tropical vagrant species are more likely to originate from high‐latitude populations, while at the demographic level, tropical fish species with large body size, high swimming ability, large size at settlement and pelagic spawning behaviour are more likely to show successful settlement into temperate habitats. We also show that both habitat and food limitation at settlement and within juvenile stages may constrain tropical vagrant communities to those species with medium to low reliance on coral resources.

Predicting Success of Range-Expanding Coral Reef Fish in Temperate Habitats Using Temperature-Abundance Relationships

“…There seems to be more variability in the T peak than Slope value. However, a suite of factors including likelihood of advection of larvae to a location (e.g., Booth and Parkinson, 2011;Feary et al, Each value is derived from all available abundance series (n) for each species. Recruit density (1,000 m −2 ) is per survey during the peak settlement period (January-May).…”

“…As a result of strengthening western boundary currents under climate change, many coral reef fishes are expected to expand their ranges polewards (Figueira and Booth, 2010;Wernberg et al, 2012;Feary et al, 2014;Vergés et al, 2016). This influx into temperate ecosystems may lead to novel interactions and affect the structure and function of temperate marine communities (Vergés et al, 2014;Luiz et al, 2016).…”

“…To date, there is still relatively little understanding of factors that constrain or facilitate species' geographic responses to climate change, including those of marine fishes (Li et al, 2011;Yang et al, 2011;Blois et al, 2013;Liancourt et al, 2013). Feary et al (2014) and Booth et al (2018a,b) showed that species metrics such as large body size, high swimming ability, large size at settlement and pelagic spawning behavior are more likely to occur in species expatriating into temperate habitats.…”

A new record of the indo-Pacific Whitespotted surgeonfish, Acanthurus guttatus, in the eastern tropical Pacific (Isla del Coco, Costa Rica)

“…Acanthuridae is considered among the tropical fish families with high proportion of vagrant species (Feary et al, 2013). Briggs (1961) reported four species of surgeonfish with a transpacific distribution.…”

Vagrancy in paradise: documentation of the chevron butterflyfish Chaetodon trifascialis in Kaneohe Bay, Oahu, Hawaiian islands

“…A review of geographical distribution shifts in 52 fish families found that butterflyfish (family: Chaetodontidae) had a significantly higher proportion of vagrants than expected by species richness given each family's total number of species (Feary & Pratchett, 2014). For example, in the Azores and Madeira Islands off the western African coast, only vagrant butterflyfish species have been observed and there are no known permanent populations (Kulbicki et al, 2013).…”