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Testing animal-assisted cleaning prior to transplantation in coral reef restoration.

ABSTRACT: Rearing coral fragments in nurseries and subsequent transplantation onto a degraded reef is a common approach for coral reef restoration. However, if barnacles and other biofouling organisms are not removed prior to transplantation, fish will dislodge newly cemented corals when feeding on biofouling organisms. This behavior can lead to an increase in diver time due to the need to reattach the corals. Thus, cleaning nurseries to remove biofouling organisms such as algae and invertebrates is necessary prior to transplantation, and this cleaning constitutes a significant time investment in a restoration project. We tested a novel biomimicry technique of animal-assisted cleaning on nursery corals prior to transplantation at a coral reef restoration site in Seychelles, Indian Ocean. To determine whether animal-assisted cleaning was possible, preliminary visual underwater surveys were performed to quantify the fish community at the study site. Then, cleaning stations consisting of nursery ropes carrying corals and biofouling organisms, set at 0.3 m, 2 m, 4 m, 6 m and 8 m from the seabed, were placed at both the transplantation (treatment) site and the nursery (control) site. Remote GoPro video cameras recorded fish feeding at the nursery ropes without human disturbance. A reef fish assemblage of 32 species from 4 trophic levels (18.8% herbivores, 18.8% omnivores, 59.3% secondary consumers and 3.1% carnivores) consumed 95% of the barnacles on the coral nursery ropes placed 0.3 m above the seabed. Using this cleaning station, we reduced coral dislodgement from 16% to zero. This cleaning station technique could be included as a step prior to coral transplantation worldwide on the basis of location-specific fish assemblages and during the early nursery phase of sexually produced juvenile corals.

SUBMITTER: Frias-Torres S

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4592152 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Testing animal-assisted cleaning prior to transplantation in coral reef restoration.

Frias-Torres Sarah S van de Geer Casper C

PeerJ 20150929

Rearing coral fragments in nurseries and subsequent transplantation onto a degraded reef is a common approach for coral reef restoration. However, if barnacles and other biofouling organisms are not removed prior to transplantation, fish will dislodge newly cemented corals when feeding on biofouling organisms. This behavior can lead to an increase in diver time due to the need to reattach the corals. Thus, cleaning nurseries to remove biofouling organisms such as algae and invertebrates is neces ...[more]

PMID: 26468440

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Project description:Coral transplantation has been used in reef restoration for several decades, but information on the type of projects, their scope, scale, and success is mostly limited to published scientific studies and technical reports. Many practitioners do not have the capacity to share their progress in peer-reviewed literature, yet likely have a wealth of information to share on how to improve the efficiency of transplantation efforts. In order to incorporate non-published data on coral transplantation projects and gain an overview of the general features of these projects, we conducted an initial systematic online survey of projects run by various practitioners. Surveyed projects (n = 50) covered most of the tropical belt and ranged in size from a few hundred transplanted corals to >5000 transplants. The most frequent source of coral fragments were corals already broken from some previous impact ("corals of opportunity"; 58% of projects), followed by fragments stored in different types of aquaculture systems (42% of projects). The use of sexual reproduction was very limited. Fast-growing, branching corals were used in 96% of projects, being by far the most common transplanted growth form. About half of the projects mentioned undertaking maintenance of the transplantation plots. The majority of projects undertook subsequent monitoring (80%), yet the available data indicates that duration of monitoring efforts was not adequate to evaluate long-term success. The findings underline that while some general principles for successful coral restoration projects are reasonably well established, others need to be mainstreamed better in order to improve the effectiveness of coral transplantation for reef restoration. This relates in particular to sustainable funding, adequate site assessment, and long-term monitoring using established protocols. Additional information is needed to better understand and address potential challenges with regards to the sourcing of transplants and use of slow-growing species. A better integration of practitioners is necessary to improve the understanding of coral transplantation effectiveness. The results underline a need to develop and use monitoring protocols that allow gauging and comparing the effectiveness of coral transplantation among various projects, as well as for accessible platform(s) to allow the exchange of experiences made in different projects. Regular surveys of restoration projects are recommended to collate and share information among practitioners. We provide a number of recommendations for items to include in future surveys.

Project description:The global decline of coral reefs has driven considerable interest in active coral restoration. Despite their importance and dominance on mature reefs, relatively few coral restoration projects use slower growth forms like massive and encrusting coral species. Micro-fragmentation can increase coral cover by orders of magnitude faster than natural growth, which now allows cultivation of slow growing massive forms and shows promise and flexibility for active reef restoration. However, the major causes of variation in growth and survival of outplanted colonies remain poorly understood. Here, we report simple outplanting assays to aid in active reef restoration of slower growing species and increase the likelihood of restoration success. We used two different micro-fragmentation assays. Pyramid assays were used to examine variation associated with fragment size (ranging from ≈1-9 cm2), nursery residence time (for both in-situ and ex-situ nurseries), and 2D vs. 3D measurements of growth. Block assays were used to examine spatial variation among individual performance at outplanting sites in the field. We found 2D and 3D measurements correlated well, so measured survivorship and growth using top-down planar images for two of the main Hawaiian reef building corals, the plating Montipora capitata and the massive Porites compressa. Pyramid assays housed and outplanted from the in-situ nursery showed no effect of residence time or size on overall survivorship or growth for either species. Results from the ex-situ nursery, however, varied by species, with P. compressa again showing no effect of nursery residence time or size on survivorship or growth. In contrast, nursery culture resulted in improved survivorship of small M. capitata fragments, but net growth showed a weak positive effect of nursery time for medium fragments. Small fragments still suffered higher mortality than either medium or large fragments. Due to their lower mortality, medium fragments (≈3 cm2) appear to be the best compromise between growth and survivorship for outplanting. Likewise, given weak positive gains relative to the investment, our results suggest that it could be more cost-effective to simply outplant medium fragments as soon as possible, without intermediate culture in a nursery. Furthermore, the block assay revealed significant differences in survivorship and growth among sites for individuals of both species, emphasizing the importance of considering spatial variation in coral survival and growth following outplanting. These results highlight the value of using short-term micro-fragmentation assays prior to outplanting to assess size, and location specific performance, optimizing the efficiency of active reef restoration activities and maximizing the probability of success for active coral restoration projects.

Project description:Coral reefs worldwide are degrading due to climate change, overfishing, pollution, coastal development, coral bleaching, and diseases. In areas where the natural recovery of an ecosystem is negligible or protection through management interventions insufficient, active restoration becomes critical. The Reef Futures symposium in 2018 brought together over 400 reef restoration experts, businesses, and civil organizations, and galvanized them to save coral reefs through restoration or identify alternative solutions. The symposium highlighted that solutions and discoveries from long-term and ongoing coral reef restoration projects in Spanish-speaking countries in the Caribbean and Eastern Tropical Pacific were not well known internationally. Therefore, a meeting of scientists and practitioners working in these locations was held to compile the data on the extent of coral reef restoration efforts, advances and challenges. Here, we present unpublished data from 12 coral reef restoration case studies from five Latin American countries, describe their motivations and techniques used, and provide estimates on total annual project cost per unit area of reef intervened, spatial extent as well as project duration. We found that most projects used direct transplantation, the coral gardening method, micro-fragmentation or larval propagation, and aimed to optimize or scale-up restoration approaches (51%) or provide alternative, sustainable livelihood opportunities (15%) followed by promoting coral reef conservation stewardship and re-establishing a self-sustaining, functioning reef ecosystems (both 13%). Reasons for restoring coral reefs were mainly biotic and experimental (both 42%), followed by idealistic and pragmatic motivations (both 8%). The median annual total cost from all projects was $93,000 USD (range: $10,000 USD-$331,802 USD) (2018 dollars) and intervened a median spatial area of 1 ha (range: 0.06 ha-8.39 ha). The median project duration was 3 years; however, projects have lasted up to 17 years. Project feasibility was high with a median of 0.7 (range: 0.5-0.8). This study closes the knowledge gap between academia and practitioners and overcomes the language barrier by providing the first comprehensive compilation of data from ongoing coral reef restoration efforts in Latin America.

Project description:BackgroundRestoration is increasingly implemented to reestablish habitat structure and function following physical anthropogenic disturbance, but scientific knowledge of effectiveness of methods lags behind demand for guidelines. On coral reefs, recovery is largely dependent on coral reestablishment, and substratum stability is critical to the survival of coral fragments and recruits. Concrete is often used to immobilize rubble, but its ecological performance has not been rigorously evaluated, and restoration has generally fallen short of returning degraded habitat to pre-disturbance conditions. Fragments of erect branching sponges mediate reef recovery by facilitating rubble consolidation, yet such natural processes have been largely overlooked in restoring reefs.MethodsOn two reefs in Curacao, four treatments - coral rubble alone, rubble seeded with sponge fragments, rubble bound by concrete, and concrete "rubble" bound by concrete - were monitored over four years to investigate rubble consolidation with and without sponges and the ecological performance of treatments in terms of the number and diversity of coral recruits. Species specific rates of sponge fragment attachment to rubble, donor sponge growth and tissue replacement, and fragment survival inside rubble piles were also investigated to evaluate sponge species performance and determine rates for sustainably harvesting tissue. FINDINGS/SIGNIFICANCE: Rubble piles seeded with sponges retained height and shape to a significantly greater degree, lost fewer replicates to water motion, and were significantly more likely to be consolidated over time than rubble alone. Significantly more corals recruited to sponge-seeded rubble than to all other treatments. Coral diversity was also greatest for rubble with sponges and it was the only treatment to which framework building corals recruited. Differences in overall sponge species performance suggest species selection is important to consider. Employing organisms that jump start successional pathways and facilitate recovery can significantly improve restoration outcomes; however, best practices require techniques be tailored to each system.

Dataset Information

Testing animal-assisted cleaning prior to transplantation in coral reef restoration.

Publications

Testing animal-assisted cleaning prior to transplantation in coral reef restoration.

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