Document Type
Article
Date of Original Version
2015
Abstract
Isolating the relative effects of episodic disturbances and chronic stressors on long-term community change is challenging. We assessed the impact of an episodic disturbance associated with human visitation (boat anchoring) relative to other drivers of long-term change on coral reefs. A one-time anchoring event at Crab Cove, British Virgin Islands, in 2004 caused rapid losses of coral and reef structural complexity that were equal to the cumulative decline over 23 years observed at an adjacent site. The abundance of small site-attached reef fishes dropped by approximately one quarter after the anchoring event, but this drop was not immediate and only fully apparent two years after the anchoring event. There was no obvious recovery from the impact, and no evidence that this episodic impact accelerated or retarded subsequent declines from other causes. This apparent lack of synergism between the effect of this episodic human impact and other chronic stressors is consistent with the few other long-term studies of episodic impacts, and suggests that action to mitigate anchor damage should yield predictable benefits.
Citation/Publisher Attribution
Forrester GE, Flynn RL, Forrester LM, Jarecki LL (2015) Episodic Disturbance from Boat Anchoring Is a Major Contributor to, but Does Not Alter the Trajectory of, Long-Term Coral Reef Decline. PLoS ONE 10(12): e0144498. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0144498
Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0144498
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Comment
Linda M. Forrester is from the Department of Biological Sciences.
Graham E. Forrester, Rebecca L. Flynn and Lianna L. Jarecki are from the Department of Natural Resources Science.
Supplementary Data
Supplementary data from this publication has been deposited in Dryad. Available: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.11bn8