Dataset: Edmunds et al. 2024 Oecologia: Coral Cover

Name: Percentage cover of the benthos by live coral at 10 m depth at sites in Moorea Moorea, French Polynesia from 2008 to 2021
Published: 2024-01-23
Keywords: Scleractinia, Coral reef, recruitment, oceans

Cite This Dataset

DOI:10.26008/1912/bco-dmo.918265.1

Spatial Extent: N:-17.388 E:-149.808 S:-17.472 W:-149.84

Moorea, French Polynesia

Temporal Extent: 2008 - 2021

Project:

Moorea Coral Reef Long-Term Ecological Research site (MCR LTER)

Program:

Long Term Ecological Research network (LTER)

Principal Investigator:

Peter J. Edmunds (California State University Northridge, CSUN)

Scientist:

Scott Burgess (Florida State University, FSU)

Stephane Maritorena (University of California-Santa Barbara, UCSB-ERI)

Version:

Version Date:

2024-01-23

Restricted:

Validated:

Yes

Current State:

Final no updates expected

Percentage cover of the benthos by live coral at 10 m depth at sites in Moorea Moorea, French Polynesia from 2008 to 2021

Abstract:

Data Abstract: These data describe the percentage cover of the benthos by live coral at 10 m depth at sites LTER1 and LTER2 in Moorea. Results paper abstract, Edmunds et al. (2024, doi:10.1007/s00442-024-05517-y): * [See "Related Datasets" section for access to related datasets discussed here] Understanding population dynamics is a long-standing objective of ecology, but the need for progress in this area has become urgent. For coral reefs, achieving this objective is impeded by a lack of information on settlement versus post-settlement events in determining recruitment and population size. Declines in coral abundance are often inferred to be associated with reduced densities of recruits, which could arise from mechanisms occurring at larval settlement, or throughout post-settlement stages. This study uses annual measurements from 2008 to 2021 of coral cover, the density of coral settlers (S), the density of small corals (SC), and environmental conditions, to evaluate the roles of settlement versus post-settlement events in determining rates of coral recruitment and changes in coral cover at Moorea, French Polynesia. Coral cover, S, SC, and the SC:S ratio (a proxy for post-settlement success), and environmental conditions, were used in generalized additive models (GAMs) to show that: (a) coral cover was more strongly related to SC and SC:S than S, and (b) SC:S was highest when preceded by cool seawater, low concentrations of Chlorophyll a, and low flow speeds, and S showed evidence of declining with elevated temperature. Together, these results suggest that changes in coral cover in Moorea are more strongly influenced by post-settlement events than settlement. The key to understanding coral community resilience may lie in elucidating the factors attenuating the bottleneck between settlers and small corals.

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Archival Copy

Version Date	Archive	Persistent Identifier	Date Assigned
2024-01-23	Marine Biological Laboratory/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library (MBLWHOI DLA)	10.26008/1912/bco-dmo.918265.1	2024-02-28

Methods & Sampling

The ecological methods are described in detail in Edmunds et al. (2024, doi:10.1007/s00442-024-05517-y), and are briefly summarized below.

The study utilized the time series of the Moorea Coral Reef LTER, as they relate to coral community dynamics on the north shore fore reef. Annual measurements of coral cover, the density of coral settlers, and the density of small corals were used together with records of the environmental conditions to which they were exposed. Analyses focused on 2008–2021, which captured the final years of the last population outbreak of the crown of thorns (COTs) sea star, the coral population recovery that took place between 2010 and 2019, and coral mortality attributed to bleaching in 2019. Biological data came from two sites (LTER1 and LTER2) that are ~ 3 km apart, with environmental data from the same or similar sites (temperature), one of the two sites (flow at LTER1), or from 4.5 km resolution remote sensing data (Chlorophyll a).

Coral cover was measured annually (April except for 2020 [August] and 2021 [May]) at 10-m depth along a 50 m, permanently marked transect at LTER 1 and LTER 2. Along each transect, 40 photoquadrats (0.5 × 0.5 m) were photographed at positions that were randomly selected in 2005, but fixed thereafter. Pictures were illuminated with strobes, and analyzed using CPCe or CoralNET software with manual annotation of 200 randomly located points on each image. Substrata beneath the points were categorized to coral genus, and the percentage cover for all corals (scleractinians and Millepora) and Pocillopora spp., is reported. The changes in cover of corals (scleractinians and Millepora) provided a holistic summary of the coral community consistent with how we have described it elsewhere and how it is described in the broader scientific literature on coral reefs. The separate summary for Pocillopora spp. provided a measure of coral cover that is the product of the most abundant coral settlers found on tiles deployed in the same habitat (i.e., pocilloporids). The density of small corals (≤ 4-cm diameter) was quantified in the field annually, shortly after the photoquadrats were recorded (but not in 2020 due to COVID-19), and was completed using quadrats (0.5 × 0.5 m) placed in the same positions as the photoquadrats. The benthos, including beneath branching corals, was inspected for small corals that were recorded to genus, and the densities of all corals and Pocillopora spp. are reported in units of corals 0.25 m^-2.

* See "Related Datasets" section for access to related dataset pages which include dataset-specific methodology.

Problems/Issues

None

Data Processing Description

Images analysed with software:

CPCe (Kohler and Gill 2006) Coral point count with excel extensions (CPCe): A visual basic program for the determination of coral and substrate coverage using random point count methodology. Comput Geosci 32:1259-1269 doi: 10.1016/j.cageo.2005.11.009

CoralNET software (Beijbom et al. 2015) Towards automated annotation of benthic survey images: variability of human experts and operational modes of automation. PLoS ONE 10 doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0130312

Data were aggregated by year and quadrat at each site LTER1 and LTER2.

BCO-DMO Processing

* Sheet "Data by quadrat" of file "Coral_Cover.xlsx" was imported into the BCO-DMO data system with values "nd" as missing data values.
** Missing data values are displayed differently based on the file format you download. They are blank in csv files, "NaN" in MatLab files, etc.
* Column names adjusted to conform to BCO-DMO naming conventions designed to support broad re-use by a variety of research tools and scripting languages. [Only numbers, letters, and underscores. Can not start with a number]
* dataset references to Edmunds et al 2023 changed to 2024 since that was the year associated with the DOI after final publication. Edmunds et al. (2024, doi:10.1007/s00442-024-05517-y)

Data Files

File
918265_v1_coral-cover.csv (Comma Separated Values (.csv), 33.32 KB) MD5:0cbdeb0903f9ed35b177c0d0c3e9c828 Primary data file for dataset ID 918265, version 1

Supplemental Files

File

Site list
filename: site_locations.csv

(Comma Separated Values (.csv), 215 bytes)
MD5:d13ffaef5e5725529594f401de6a97cc

Site location list in Moorea (LTER0,LTER1,LTER2) for datasets related to Edmunds et al. (2024, doi:10.1007/s00442-024-05517-y) and Edmunds et al. (2020, doi:10.1093/icesjms/fsaa015).  

Columns:

location, geolocation name

site, site identifier

lat_dd, site latitude, decimal degrees

lon_dd, site longitude, decimal degrees

lat_deg_decmin, site latitude, degrees decimal minutes

lon_deg_decmin, site longitude, degrees decimal minutes

More Information about this dataset

Funding Sources

Funding Source	Award Number
NSF Division of Ocean Sciences	OCE-2224354

Deployments

None available yet

Instruments

Underwater Camera

Supplied Name:

Supplied Description:

Instrument Type

Generic Name: Underwater Camera

Community Identifier: http://vocab.nerc.ac.uk/collection/L05/current/180/

Generic Description:

All types of photographic equipment that may be deployed underwater including stills, video, film and digital systems.

Parameters

Date and time formats are described in python strftime() syntax.

Supplied Name	Supplied description	Supplied Units	Standard Name
Year	Year in which data were collected	unitless	year
Site	Site where data were collected, either LTER1 or LTER2	unitless	site
Depth	Depth from which data originated, 10 = 10 m depth	meters (m)	depth
Quad	Quadrat identifier	unitless	sample_descrip
Pocillopora	Percentage cover of Pocillopora corals	percent (%)	percent_cover
All_stony_corals	Percentage cover of all stony corals (scleractinians + Millepora)	percent (%)	percent_cover

Database

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Dataset: Edmunds et al. 2024 Oecologia: Coral Cover