Department of Mathematical Sciences, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, L69 7ZL, UK.
Ecol Lett. 2012 Feb;15(2):151-8. doi: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2011.01720.x. Epub 2011 Dec 21.
Coral reefs have been affected by natural and anthropogenic disturbances. Coral cover has declined on many reefs, and macroalgae have increased on some. The existence of alternative stable states with high or low coral cover has been widely debated, but not clearly established. We evaluate the evidence for alternative stable states in benthic coral-reef dynamics in the Caribbean, Kenya and Great Barrier Reef (GBR), using stochastic semi-parametric models based on large numbers of time series of cover of hard corals, macroalgae and other components. Only the GBR showed a consistent short-term regional decline in coral cover. There was no evidence for regional increases in macroalgae. The equilibrium distributions of our models were close to recently observed distributions, and differed among regions. In all three regions, the equilibrium distributions were unimodal rather than bimodal, and thus did not suggest the existence of alternative stable states on a regional scale, under current conditions.
珊瑚礁受到自然和人为干扰的影响。许多珊瑚礁的珊瑚覆盖率下降，而一些珊瑚礁的大型藻类增加。具有高或低珊瑚覆盖率的替代稳定状态的存在已经被广泛讨论，但尚未明确确定。我们使用基于大量硬珊瑚、大型藻类和其他成分覆盖的时间序列的随机半参数模型，评估加勒比海、肯尼亚和大堡礁（GBR）中底栖珊瑚礁动态的替代稳定状态的证据。只有 GBR 显示出珊瑚覆盖率的短期区域下降。没有证据表明区域内大型藻类的增加。我们模型的平衡分布接近最近观察到的分布，并且在不同地区有所不同。在所有三个地区，平衡分布都是单峰而不是双峰，因此在当前条件下，并不表明在区域范围内存在替代稳定状态。
