A Decision Framework for Interventions to Increase the Persistence and Resilience of Coral Reefs (2019) / Chapter Skim
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6 The Tropical Western Atlantic and Caribbean as a Case Study for Coral Interventions
6 The Tropical Western Atlantic and Caribbean as a Case Study for Coral Interventions
Pages 145-162
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From page 145... ...
In this chapter, the committee synthesizes the information about selecting and modeling interventions from the preceding chapters as it applies to the tropical western Atlantic and Caribbean. Specifically, which interventions may be particularly appropriate for consideration in this region given their context dependencies is explored (as discussed in Chapter 2)
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From page 146... ...
TROPICAL WESTERN ATLANTIC AND CARIBBEAN REEF ECOSYSTEMS: GEOGRAPHY, DIVERSITY, ECOLOGY, AND RESILIENCE The tropical western Atlantic and Caribbean region, including the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, Florida, the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Bermuda, and Brazil (hereafter referred to as "the wider Caribbean") is an important reef area globally.
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From page 147... ...
. At the species level, reefs in the tropical western Atlantic are far less diverse than their analogs in the western Pacific; for example, there are only two species of Acropora (plus one hybrid)
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From page 148... ...
, including the recent emergence of stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD) , described below.
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From page 149... ...
. This suggests that the basic ecosystem dynamics of competition between fast-growing algae and slow-growing corals remain a powerful controlling force set by herbivory and growth rates, that local reef impacts due to fishing, land use, and tourism are common, and that local management still has an important role to play in potentially slowing or even reversing Caribbean degradation (Mcleod et al., 2019)
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From page 150... ...
Rates of mortality are high in susceptible species and can reach 100%, resulting in locally severe impacts on species diversity and potentially widespread reductions in genotypic diversity. The outbreak has prompted an interagency rescue effort -- the Florida Reef Tract Rescue Project -- to collect genotypes from ahead of the disease front and maintain them in ex situ land-based facilities until reintroduction and restoration can occur with a high chance of success.
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From page 151... ...
. The relatively rapid and sudden appearance of the disease outside the Florida Reef Tract highlights the high interconnectivity of wider Caribbean reefs and the capacity for the rapid spread of diseases (which, with invasive species, is a risk factor for some interventions considered in this report)
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From page 152... ...
. As noted above, some wider Caribbean reefs have low coral cover and rampant disease, lack rapidly growing branching corals, and show very low coral recruitment.
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From page 153... ...
Making distinctions among different areas within the larger Caribbean region would require models with location-specific parameterizations including downscaled climate models and local stakeholder and management input. Ongoing Acute Disease Outbreak The presence of diseases, such as SCTLD, has the potential to change the way that thermal stress interventions are applied on Caribbean reefs, and provides a sobering lesson on the complexities of implementing interventions in the face of multiple stressors.
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From page 154... ...
The coral disease responses currently being executed in Florida include some activities that are starting points for coral interventions, such as the relocation of corals from outside the disease endemic zone to ex situ land-based facilities to preserve genetic diversity in advance of the disease spreading. Responses are now being considered that would have faced higher resistance until very recently, such as removals of infected colonies to reduce pathogen loading (currently being attempted in the U.S.
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From page 155... ...
It should also be emphasized that these interventions are not intended as a substitute for conventional management actions, which continue to be essential across the Caribbean, with particular attention being paid to maintaining water quality and herbivory in local management jurisdictions. The importance of this point is supported by the fact that much of the decline of Caribbean reefs occurred prior to the onset of major bleaching events (Gardner et al., 2003)
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From page 156... ...
Identifying heat tolerant or disease resistant coral genotypes among the Caribbean standing stock to provide opportunities for assisted gene flow, managed breeding, and genetic interventions: Understanding the intraspecific range of thermotolerance would be helped by obtaining a better understanding of population structure of Caribbean species among habitats, localities, and regions. Moreover, quantitative data on the environmental differences among habitats would help with the interpretation of these data.
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From page 157... ...
preserving diverse assemblages more capable of resisting the multiple stresses experienced in the most degraded Caribbean reefs. A limiting factor in the success of these efforts is the relatively low natural levels of sexual reproduction and coral recruitment in some areas of the wider Caribbean region that might severely limit the success of managed breeding programs.
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From page 158... ...
Testing whether heat-tolerant corals sourced from distant locations can survive equally well as their local counterparts under nonbleaching conditions remains an open question, not just for the Caribbean, but for translocations in other regions as well. Leveraging restoration activities to test pre-exposure methods to increase stress tolerance of outplanted corals: Existing restoration activities in the region provide an opportunity to test pre-exposure interventions designed to increase thermal tolerance.
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From page 159... ...
Such approaches can increase heat tolerance by promoting different algal symbionts (or microbiome communities) as well as other potential effects, such as front-loading of coral heat-tolerance genes (Barshis et al., 2013)
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From page 160... ...
could be identified. Developing regional and multinational coordination and agreements to meet the scale of the challenge: The large number of jurisdictions in the Caribbean suggests that it may be beneficial if a program to manage and coordinate intervention efforts regionally were established and supported, perhaps as a working group of the Coral Restoration Consortium.1 Some of these efforts have already begun, for example, the multi-nstitution i Florida Reef Tract Rescue Project currently ongoing for SCTLD within Florida (Florida DEP, 2019)
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From page 161... ...
Conclusion: Coral reef managers in the tropical western Atlantic/ Caribbean region have a variety of interventions available to them depending on the localized management context and the specific objectives of stakeholders and decision makers. Available actions include leveraging existing restoration and propagation infrastructure, increasing sexual reproduction and genetic diversity of corals (managed breeding, gamete and larval capture and seeding, coral cryopreservation)
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