Centre for Marine Bio-Innovation, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Centre for Marine Bio-Innovation, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia ; Advanced Environmental Biotechnology Centre, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore.
PLoS One. 2014 Jan 28;9(1):e87545. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0087545. eCollection 2014.
The early post-settlement stage is the most sensitive during the life history of reef building corals. However, few studies have examined the factors that influence coral mortality during this period. Here, the impact of fouling on the survival of newly settled coral spat of Acropora millepora was investigated by manipulating the extent of fouling cover on settlement tiles using non-toxic, wax antifouling coatings. Survival of spat on coated tiles was double that on control tiles. Moreover, there was a significant negative correlation between percentage cover of fouling and spat survival across all tiles types, suggesting that fouling in direct proximity to settled corals has detrimental effects on early post-settlement survival. While previous studies have shown that increased fouling negatively affects coral larval settlement and health of juvenile and adult corals, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to show a direct relationship between fouling and early post-settlement survival for a broadcast spawning scleractinian coral. The negative effects of fouling on this sensitive life history stage may become more pronounced in the future as coastal eutrophication increases. Our results further suggest that targeted seeding of coral spat on artificial surfaces in combination with fouling control could prove useful to improve the efficiency of sexual reproduction-based coral propagation for reef rehabilitation.
早期定居后阶段是造礁石珊瑚生活史中最敏感的阶段。然而，很少有研究探讨这个时期影响珊瑚死亡率的因素。在这里，我们通过使用无毒的蜡质防污涂料来控制定居瓦片上的污损覆盖程度，来研究污损对新定居的鹿角杯形珊瑚幼体（Acropora millepora）存活的影响。涂有涂料的瓦片上的幼体存活率是对照组瓦片的两倍。此外，所有瓦片类型上的污损覆盖百分比与幼体存活率之间存在显著的负相关关系，表明直接靠近定居珊瑚的污损对早期定居后生存有不利影响。虽然之前的研究表明，污损增加会对珊瑚幼虫的定居和幼年及成年珊瑚的健康产生负面影响，但据我们所知，这是第一项表明污损与有性繁殖的石珊瑚早期定居后存活率之间存在直接关系的研究。随着沿海富营养化的增加，污损对这个敏感的生活史阶段的负面影响可能会更加明显。我们的研究结果进一步表明，在人工表面上有针对性地播种珊瑚幼体，并结合污损控制，可能有助于提高基于有性繁殖的珊瑚繁殖对珊瑚礁修复的效率。
