Mesophotic coral ecosystems are threatened and ecologically distinct from shallow water reefs

Rocha, Luiz A.; Pinheiro, Hudson T.; Shepherd, Bart; Papastamatiou, Yannis P.; Luiz, Osmar J.; Pyle, Richard L.; Bongaerts, Pim

doi:10.1126/science.aaq1614

Cited by 235 publications

(290 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…Furthermore, coral species depth ranges are often evaluated using global estimates, potentially overestimating local ranges by giving overly high weighting to single colonies encountered at the range extremes that might occur in only one geographic location (Rocha et al. ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resolving the depth zonation paradox in reef‐building corals

Roberts

Bridge

Caley

et al. 2019

Ecology

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Changes in abundance across a natural environmental gradient provide important insights into a species' realized ecological niche. In reef-building corals, a species' niche is often defined using its depth range. However, most reef-building coral species occur over a broad depth range, a fact that is incompatible with the strong zonation found in coral assemblages across depth. We resolve this paradox by modeling the abundance distributions of 110 coral species across a 45 m depth gradient to show that most are in fact depth specialists and reveal that depth range alone is incapable of capturing a species' depth use. We then highlight the significance of our results by demonstrating how depth range greatly overestimates the potential number of species with a refuge at depth from global warming. Our findings illustrate both the limitations of the simple metric of depth range and the ecological insights that can be gained by moving beyond it.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resolving the depth zonation paradox in reef‐building corals

Roberts

Bridge

Caley

et al. 2019

Ecology

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“…, Rocha et al. ). Historically, MCEs have been considered more stable than shallow reefs (Lesser et al.…”

Section: Species Recorded During Four Rebreather Dives On Mesophotic mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Mesophotic coral ecosystems (MCEs) represent the deeper portions of coral reefs and a transition zone between photic and aphotic realms, found between 30 and 150 m depth (Weiss , Rocha et al. ). In recent years, improvements in technical diving have allowed researchers to explore and study MCEs more than ever before and have resulted in the discovery of several previously unknown species and descriptions of unique habitats and communities (Pyle , Pinheiro et al.…”

Section: Species Recorded During Four Rebreather Dives On Mesophotic mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In a recent expedition to the Bahamas, diving with closed‐circuit rebreathers down to 135 m depth, we observed impacts of Hurricane Matthew and bleaching events from shallow to lower mesophotic habitats of the coral reef system (Rocha et al. ). Mathew passed through the Bahamas on 5 and 6 October 2016 as a category 4 hurricane, with winds ranging from 100 to 195 km/h.…”

Section: Species Recorded During Four Rebreather Dives On Mesophotic mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We also recorded bleached corals down to a depth of 120 m in the Bahamas (Rocha et al. ) as in the Great Barrier Reef (Frade et al. ).…”

Section: Species Recorded During Four Rebreather Dives On Mesophotic mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ecological insights from environmental disturbances in mesophotic coral ecosystems

et al. 2019

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Mesophotic coral ecosystems (MCEs) have historically been considered more stable than shallow reefs and thus suggested to provide refuge to coral reef communities against natural and anthropogenic impacts. Despite this assumption, a growing body of literature has shown that deep reefs are not immune to natural disturbance. Here, based on our in situ observations, we propose that disturbance may actually represent an important mechanism for maintaining biodiversity in MCEs, as is the case for shallow reefs. Our observations suggest that disturbances can provide microhabitat and space necessary for the recruitment and occurrence of different species, increasing overall diversity. Since bioerosion rates are lower at depth, and most well‐developed coral reefs on MCEs are formed by dense aggregations of a single or a few species, intermediate levels of disturbance could represent a critical driver of community structure balancing. Therefore, instead of long‐term stability, intermediate disturbances should be expected on MCEs. However, high frequency and intensity of natural disturbances, or their association with anthropogenic stressors, might have stronger negative impacts on MCEs than on shallower reefs due to slower coral growth and calcification rates.

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Spatio‐temporal distribution of mutton snapper and dog snapper spawning aggregations in the South‐west Atlantic

França

Olavo

Rezende

et al. 2021

Aquatic Conservation

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1. Sites and periods of spawning aggregations of two important fishery resources, the mutton snapper, Lutjanus analis, and the dog snapper, Lutjanus jocu, were identified and validated along the Brazilian north-east coast (latitude 8-15 S) using exploratory analysis of catch per unit effort (CPUE) data, gonadosomatic index analysis, and gonad histology.2. The CPUE analysis for both species allowed the identification of outliers and far outliers, representing fisheries with exceptional catches, which were used as proxies of possible aggregation.3. The presence of pre-spawning and recent spawning signs (hydrated oocytes and post-ovulatory follicles) in the ovary of females caught at sites with recurrent records of high CPUE allowed the validation of spawning activity at those specific sites for each species. All aggregation sites identified in this study were located on

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Mesophotic coral ecosystems are threatened and ecologically distinct from shallow water reefs

Cited by 235 publications

References 27 publications

Resolving the depth zonation paradox in reef‐building corals

Resolving the depth zonation paradox in reef‐building corals

Ecological insights from environmental disturbances in mesophotic coral ecosystems

Spatio‐temporal distribution of mutton snapper and dog snapper spawning aggregations in the South‐west Atlantic

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