Environmental drivers of coral reef carbonate production and bioerosion: a multi-scale analysis

The resilience of coral reefs depends on the balance between reef growth and reef breakdown, and their responses to changing environmental conditions. Across the 2500-km Hawaiian Archipelago, we quantified rates of carbonate production, bioerosion, and net accretion at regional, island, site, and wi...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ecology (Durham) 2017-10, Vol.98 (10), p.2547-2560
Main Authors: Silbiger, Nyssa J., Donahue, Megan J., Brainard, Russell E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Algae
Alkalinity
Archipelagoes
Bioerosion
Biogeochemistry
carbonate production
Chlorophyll
Coral reefs
Deposition
Environmental changes
Environmental conditions
Erosion
Herbivorous fish
Islands
latitudinal gradients
local variability
multiple stressors
Multiscale analysis
net accretion
Scales
Seaweeds
spatial scale
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The resilience of coral reefs depends on the balance between reef growth and reef breakdown, and their responses to changing environmental conditions. Across the 2500-km Hawaiian Archipelago, we quantified rates of carbonate production, bioerosion, and net accretion at regional, island, site, and within-site spatial scales and tested how these rates respond to environmental conditions across different spatial scales. Overall, there were four major outcomes from this study: (1) bioerosion rates were generally higher in the populated Main Hawaiian Islands (MHI) than the remote, protected Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI), while carbonate production rates did not vary significantly between the two regions; (2) variability in carbonate production, bioerosion, and net accretion rates was greatest at the smallest within-reef spatial scale; (3) carbonate production and bioerosion rates were associated with distinct sets of environmental parameters; and (4) the strongest correlates of carbonate production, bioerosion, and net accretion rates were different between the MHI region and the NWHI region: in the MHI, the dominant correlates were percent cover of macroalgae and herbivorous fish biomass for carbonate production and bioerosion, respectively, whereas in the NWHI, the top correlates were total alkalinity and benthic cover. This study highlights the need to understand accretion and erosion processes as well as local environmental conditions to predict net coral reef responses to future environmental changes.
ISSN:0012-9658
1939-9170
DOI:10.1002/ecy.1946