Dataset: Species percent cover from species resilience and recovery experiments in the rocky intertidal zone of the Oregon Coast from 2011 to 2024

The purpose of this experiment is to test the recovery rates of rocky intertidal communities to single or repeated disturbance and thereby measure the succession and resilience of the community, respectively. We initiated the experiment series in the low zone in 2011 by haphazardly locating, then permanently marking five pairs of 0.5 x 0.5 m low intertidal plots. In spring/early summer each year from 2011- 2024, we photographed, then cleared one plot of each pair of all macrobiota, including macrophytes and sessile invertebrates ('removal plots'). Adjacent uncleared reference plots were left intact (controls). We also added sucession plots in the early 2020s that were cleared once and allowed to recover (sucession plots). Removals were allowed to recover without further intrusion for 12 mo, when they were photographed and recleared for the next year's observations.  Plot locations did not change. Mid and high experiments were added in the early 2020s as well to compare how recovery and resilience differed between intertidal zones. 

Percent cover of each species was estimated by inspecting photographs. The 0.5 x 0.5 m quadrats were subdivided into 0.1x0.1m subquadrats, each consisting of 4% cover. Abundances of each taxon were estimated by eye for each subquadrat, and totals were obtained by adding across all 25 subquadrats.  We grouped species into functional groups for analysis (see Supplemental Files for taxon ids and more category information):