Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-2lccl Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T14:36:21.582Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - Reef fishes: density dependence and equilibrium in populations?

from Part I - Nonequilibrium and Equilibrium in Populations and Metapopulations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 March 2013

By
Graham E. Forrester  and
Mark A. Steele
Edited by
Klaus Rohde
Klaus Rohde
Affiliation:
University of New England, Australia
Get access

Summary

Summary

Small colorful coral reef fishes have been excellent subjects for ecological field experiments (Sale, 2002). They have provided substantial insight about the strength of density-dependent interactions and their underlying biological causes. In this chapter we first summarize what we know about the biological mechanisms of density-dependent regulation in coral reef fishes, highlighting one pervasive mechanism – competition for structural refuges used to avoid predators. We then summarize the evidence for ongoing coral declines and the progressive loss of architectural complexity on reefs. We argue that as reefs become architecturally simpler they provide fewer refuges from predation, and so the carrying capacity for many fish populations is declining. As a result of ongoing competition for gradually diminishing supply of refuges, we hypothesize that some species of reef fishes will continue to experience density-dependent mortality even as their populations decline globally. This hypothesis contradicts conventional views on the regulation of marine populations, which hold that density-dependent interactions should diminish in importance as populations decline (Figures 1.1 and 1.2).

Background: the development of ideas about density dependence in reef fishes

A long-standing controversy in ecology has revolved around the relative effects of density-dependent and density-independent processes on population dynamics (Murdoch, 1994; Cappuccino & Price, 1995). Although it is necessary for long-term persistence, recognizing that density dependence need not have a strong effect at all times on the dynamics of a population was a key step in resolving a major historical controversy over density dependence and density independence as mutually exclusive alternatives (Andrewartha & Birch, 1954; Nicholson, 1957). In fact, both sorts of processes affect most populations (Turchin et al., 1995). Ideas about populations of reef fishes and other marine species have followed a similar path, following early controversy over which processes control dynamics (Doherty, 1991; Jones, 1991).

Type
Chapter
Information
The Balance of Nature and Human Impact , pp. 7 - 20
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Achord, S., Levin, P. S., & Zabel, R. W. (2003). Density-dependent mortality in Pacific salmon: the ghost of impacts past?Ecology Letters, 6, 335–342.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alvarez-Filip, L., Dulvy, N. K., Gill, J. A., Cote, I. M., & Watkinson, A. R. (2009). Flattening of Caribbean coral reefs: region-wide declines in architectural complexity. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B, 276, 3019–3025.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Andrewartha, H. G., & Birch, L. C. (1954). The Distribution And Abundance of Animals. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Ault, T. R., & Johnson, C. R. (1998). Spatially and temporally predictable fish communities on coral reefs. Ecological Monographs, 68, 25–50.Google Scholar
Bellwood, D. R., Hoey, A. S., Ackerman, J. L., & Depczynski, M. (2006). Coral bleaching, reef fish community phase shifts and the resilience of coral reefs. Global Change Biology, 12, 1587–1594.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caley, M. J., Carr, M. H., Hixon, M. A., et al. (1996). Recruitment and the local dynamics of open marine populations. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 27, 477–500.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caley, M. J., & John, J. (1996). Refuge availability structures assemblages of tropical reef fishes. Journal of Animal Ecology, 65, 414–428.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cappuccino, N., & Price, P. W. (1995). Population Dynamics: New Approaches and Synthesis. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Chesson, P. (1998). Spatial scales in the study of reef fishes: a theoretical perspective. Australian Journal of Ecology, 23, 209–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connell, J. H. (1985). The consequences of variation in initial settlement vs postsettlement mortality in rocky intertidal communities. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 93, 11–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connolly, S. R., Menge, B. A., & Roughgarden, J. (2001). A latitudinal gradient in recruitment of intertidal invertebrates in the northeast Pacific Ocean. Ecology, 82, 1799–1813.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connolly, S. R., & Roughgarden, J. (1998). A latitudinal gradient in Northeast Pacific intertidal community structure: evidence for an oceanographically based synthesis of marine community theory. American Naturalist, 151, 311–326.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Doherty, P. J. (1983). Tropical territorial damselfishes: is density limited by aggression or recruitment? Ecology, 64, 176–190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doherty, P. J. (1991). Spatial and temporal patterns of recruitment. In Sale, P. F. (Ed.), The Ecology of Fishes on Coral Reefs (pp. 261–293). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feary, D. A., Almany, G. R., Jones, G. P., & McCormick, M. I. (2007). Coral degradation and the structure of tropical reef fish communities. Marine Ecology-Progress Series, 333, 243–248.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forrester, G. E. (1990). Factors influencing the juvenile demography of a coral reef fish. Ecology, 71, 1666–1681.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forrester, G. E., & Steele, M. A. (2000). Variation in the presence and cause of density-dependent mortality in three species of reef fishes. Ecology, 81, 2416–2427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forrester, G. E., & Steele, M. A. (2004). Predators, prey refuges, and the spatial scaling of density-dependent prey mortality. Ecology, 85, 1332–1342.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forrester, G. E., Steele, M. A., Samhouri, J. F., Evans, B., & Vance, R. R. (2008a). Spatial density dependence scales up but does not produce temporal density dependence in a coral reef fish. Ecology, 89, 2980–2985.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forrester, G. E., Steele, M. A., Samhouri, J. F., & Vance, R. R. (2008b). Settling larvae of a small coral-reef fish discriminate reef features at large, but not small, spatial scales. Limnology and Oceanography, 53, 1956–1962.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fretwell, S. D., & Lucas, H. L. (1969). On territorial behavior and other factors influencing habitat distribution in birds. Acta Biotheoretica, 19, 16–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaines, S. D., & Roughgarden, J. (1985). Larval settlement rate: a leading determinant of structure in an ecological community of the marine intertidal zone. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, 82, 3707–3711.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gardner, R. H., Kemp, M. W., Kennedy, V. S., & Petersen, J. E. (2001). Scaling Relations in Experimental Ecology. New York: Columbia University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gardner, T. A., Cote, I. M., Gill, J. A., Grant, A., & Watkinson, A. R. (2003). Long-term region-wide declines in Caribbean corals. Science, 301, 958–960.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Graham, N. A. J., Wilson, S. K., Jennings, S., et al. (2007). Lag effects in the impacts of mass coral bleaching on coral reef fish, fisheries, and ecosystems. Conservation Biology, 21, 1291–1300.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gratwicke, B., & Speight, M. R. (2005). Effects of habitat complexity on Caribbean marine fish assemblages. Marine Ecology-Progress Series, 292, 301–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gresh, T., Lichatowich, J., & Schoonmaker, P. (2000). An estimation of historic and current levels of salmon production in the Northeast Pacific ecosystem: evidence of a nutrient deficit in the freshwater systems of the Pacific Northwest. Fisheries, 25, 15–21.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gutierrez, L. (1998). Habitat selection by recruits establishes local patterns of adult distribution in two species of damselfishes: Stegastes dorsopunicans and S. planifrons. Oecologia, 115, 268–277.Google ScholarPubMed
Hixon, M. A., & Carr, M. H. (1997). Synergistic predation, density dependence, and population regualtion in marine fish. Science, 277, 946–949.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hixon, M. A., & Jones, G. P. (2005). Competition, predation, and density-dependent mortality in demersal marine fishes. Ecology, 86, 2847–2859.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hixon, M. A., Webster, M. S., & Sale, P. F. (2002). Density dependence in marine fishes: coral-reef populations as model systems. In Sale, P. F. (Ed.), Coral Reef Fishes: Dynamics and Diversity in a Complex Ecosystem (pp. 303–325). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holbrook, S. J., Forrester, G. E., & Schmitt, R. J. (2000). Spatial patterns in abundance of a damselfish reflect availability of suitable habitat. Oecologia, 122, 109–120.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Holbrook, S. J., & Schmitt, R. J. (2002). Competition for shelter space causes density-dependent predation mortality in damselfishes. Ecology, 83, 2855–2868.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, J. B. C. (1997). Reefs since Columbus. Coral Reefs, 16, S23–S32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, D. W. (2006). Predation, habitat complexity, and variation in density-dependent mortality of temperate reef fishes. Ecology, 87, 1179–1188.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jones, G. P. (1991). Postrecruitment processes in the ecology of coral reef fish populations: a multifactorial perspective. In Sale, P. F. (Ed.), The Ecology of Fishes on Coral Reefs (pp. 293–328). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Jones, G. P., McCormick, M. I., Srinivasan, M., & Eagle, J. V. (2004). Coral decline threatens fish biodiversity in marine reserves. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, 101, 8251–8253.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kingsford, M. J., Leis, J. M., Shanks, A., et al. (2002). Sensory environments, larval abilities and local self-recruitment. Bulletin of Marine Science, 70, 309–340.Google Scholar
Lamb, R. W., & Johnson, D. W. (2010). Trophic restructuring of coral reef fish communities in a large marine reserve. Marine Ecology-Progress Series, 408, 169–180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Larkin, G. A., & Slaney, P. A. (1997). Implications of trends in marine-derived nutrient influx to south coastal British Columbia salmonid production. Fisheries, 22, 16–24.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, A. R. (1997). Effects of experimental coral disturbance on the structure of fish communities on large patch reefs. Marine Ecology-Progress Series, 161, 37–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Luckhurst, B. E., & Luckhurst, K. (1978). Analysis of the influence of substrate variables on coral reef fish communities. Marine Biology, 49, 317–323.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Menge, B. A. (2000). Recruitment vs. postrecruitment processes as determinants of barnacle population abundance. Ecological Monographs, 70, 265–288.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Menge, B. A., & Sutherland, J. P. (1987). Community regulation: variation in disturbance, competition, and predation in relation to environmental stress and recruitment. The American Naturalist, 130, 730–757.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muko, S., Sakai, K., & Iwasa, Y. (2001). Dynamics of marine sessile organisms with space-limited growth and recruitment: application to corals. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 210, 67–80.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Munday, P. L. (2004). Habitat loss, resource specialization, and extinction on coral reefs. Global Change Biology, 10, 1642–1647.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Munro, J. L. (1983). Caribbean Coral Reef Fishery Resources (Vol. 7). Manila, Philippines: International Center for Living Aquatic Resources Management.Google Scholar
Murdoch, W. W. (1994). Population regulation in theory and practice. Ecology, 75, 271–287.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Myers, R. A., Hart, P. J. B., & Reynolds, J. D. (2002). Recruitment: understanding density-dependence in fish populations. In Hart, P. J. B. & Reynolds, J. D (Eds.), Handbook of Fish Biology and Fisheries Vol. 1: Fish Biology (pp. 123–148). Oxford: Blackwell Scientific.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nicholson, A. J. (1957). The self adjustment of populations to change. Cold Spring Harbor Symposium in Quantitative Biology, 22, 153–172.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norstrom, A. V., Nystrom, M., Lokrantz, J., & Folke, C. (2009). Alternative states on coral reefs: beyond coral-macroalgal phase shifts. Marine Ecology-Progress Series, 376, 295–306.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Osenberg, C. W., Mary, C. M., Schmitt, R. J., et al. (2002). Rethinking ecological inference: density dependence in reef fishes. Ecology Letters, 5, 715–721.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Overholtzer-McLeod, K. L. (2006). Consequences of patch reef spacing for density-dependent mortality of coral-reef fishes. Ecology, 87, 1017–1026.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Paddack, M. J., Reynolds, J. D., Aguilar, C., et al. (2009). Recent region-wide declines in Caribbean reef fish abundance. Current Biology, 19, 590–595.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pratchett, M. S., Munday, P. L., Wilson, S. K., et al. (2008). Effects of climate-induced coral bleaching on coral-reef fishes – ecological and economic consequences. In Gibson, R. N., Atkinson, R. J. A. & Gordon, J. D. M. (Eds.), Oceanography and Marine Biology: An Annual Review, Vol. 46 (pp. 251–296). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pratchett, M. S., Wilson, S. K., & Baird, A. H. (2006). Long-term monitoring of the Great Barrier Reef. Journal of Fish Biology, 69, 1269–1280.Google Scholar
Prugh, L. R., Stoner, C. J., Epps, C. W., et al. (2009). The rise of the mesopredator. Bioscience, 59, 779–791.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rastetter, E. B., King, A. W., Cosby, B. J., et al. (1992). Aggregating fine-scale ecological knowledge to model coarser-scale attributes of ecosystems. Ecological Applications, 2, 55–70.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rose, K. A., Cowan, J. H., Winemiller, K. O., Myers, R. A., & Hilborn, R. (2001). Compensatory density dependence in fish populations: importance, controversy, understanding and prognosis. Fish and Fisheries, 2, 293–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sale, P. F. (2002). Coral Reef Fishes: Dynamics and Diversity in a Complex Ecosystem. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Sale, P. F. (2011). Our Dying Planet: An Ecologist’s View of the Crisis we Face. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Sale, P. F., Douglas, W. A., & Doherty, P. J. (1984). Choice of microhabitats by coral-reef fishes at settlement. Coral Reefs, 3, 91–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Samhouri, J. F., Vance, R. R., Forrester, G. E., & Steele, M. A. (2009). Musical chairs mortality functions: density-dependent deaths caused by competition for unguarded refuges. Oecologia, 160, 257–265.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sandin, S. A., & Pacala, S. W. (2005). Demographic theory of coral reef fish populations with stochastic recruitment: comparing sources of population regulation. American Naturalist, 165, 107–119.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sano, M., Shimizu, M., & Nose, Y. (1984). Changes in structure of coral reef fish communities by destruction of hermatypic corals: observational and experimental views. Pacific Science, 38, 51–79.Google Scholar
Schmitt, R. J., Holbrook, S. J., & Osenberg, C. W. (1999). Quantifying the effects of multiple processes on local abundance: a cohort approach for open populations. Ecology Letters, V2, 294–303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schutte, V. G. W., Selig, E. R., & Bruno, J. F. (2010). Regional spatio-temporal trends in Caribbean coral reef benthic communities. Marine Ecology-Progress Series, 402, 115–122.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shima, J. S., & Osenberg, C. W. (2003). Cryptic density dependence: effects of covariation between density and site quality in reef fish. Ecology, 84, 46–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stallings, C. D. (2008). Indirect effects of an exploited predator on recruitment of coral-reef fishes. Ecology, 89, 2090–2095.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Steele, M. A., & Forrester, G. E. (2005). Small-scale field experiments accurately scale up to predict density dependence in reef fish populations at large-scales. Proceedings of the National Academy Of Sciences of the USA, 102, 13513–13516.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sweatman, H. P. A. (1983). Influence of conspecifics on choice of settlement sites by larvae of two pomacentrid fishes (Dascyllus aruanus and D. reticulatus) on coral reefs. Marine Biology, 75, 225–229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Syms, C., & Jones, G. P. (2000). Disturbance, habitat structure, and the dynamics of a coral-reef fish community. Ecology, 81, 2714–2729.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Turchin, P., Cappuccino, N., & Price, P. W. (1995). Population regulation: old arguments and a new synthesis. In Cappuccino, N. & Price, P. W. (Eds.), Population Dynamics: New Approaches and Synthesis (pp. 19–40). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vance, R. R., Steele, M. A., & Forrester, G. E. (2010). Using an individual-based model to quantify scale transition in demographic rate functions: deaths in a coral reef fish. Ecological Modelling, 221, 1907–1921.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Victor, B. C. (1983). Recruitment and population dynamics of a coral reef fish. Science, 219, 419–420.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
White, J. W. (2007). Spatially correlated recruitment of a marine predator and its prey shapes the large-scale pattern of density-dependent prey mortality. Ecology Letters, 10, 1054–1065.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
White, J. W., Samhouri, J. F., Stier, A. C., et al. (2010). Synthesizing mechanisms of density dependence in reef fishes: behavior, habitat configuration, and observational scale. Ecology, 91, 1949–1961.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilson, J., & Osenberg, C. W. (2002). Experimental and observational patterns of density-dependent settlement and survival in the marine fish Gobiosoma. Oecologia, 130, 205–215.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilson, S. K., Burgess, S. C., Cheal, A. J., et al. (2008). Habitat utilization by coral reef fish: implications for specialists vs. generalists in a changing environment. Journal of Animal Ecology, 77, 220–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×