Jokiel Paul L, Rodgers Kuʻulei S, Brown Eric K, Kenyon Jean C, Aeby Greta, Smith William R, Farrell Fred
Hawai'i Coral Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (CRAMP), Hawai'i Institute of Marine Biology , Kāne'ohe, HI , USA.
Kalaupapa National Historic Park , Kalaupapa, HI , USA.
PeerJ. 2015 May 12;3:e954. doi: 10.7717/peerj.954. eCollection 2015.
Nine coral survey methods were compared at ten sites in various reef habitats with different levels of coral cover in Kāne'ohe Bay, O'ahu, Hawai'i. Mean estimated coverage at the different sites ranged from less than 10% cover to greater than 90% cover. The methods evaluated include line transects, various visual and photographic belt transects, video transects and visual estimates. At each site 25 m transect lines were laid out and secured. Observers skilled in each method measured coral cover at each site. The time required to run each transect, time required to process data and time to record the results were documented. Cost of hardware and software for each method was also tabulated. Results of this investigation indicate that all of the methods used provide a good first estimate of coral cover on a reef. However, there were differences between the methods in detecting the number of coral species. For example, the classic "quadrat" method allows close examination of small and cryptic coral species that are not detected by other methods such as the "towboard" surveys. The time, effort and cost involved with each method varied widely, and the suitability of each method for answering particular research questions in various environments was evaluated. Results of this study support the finding of three other comparison method studies conducted at various geographic locations throughout the world. Thus, coral cover measured by different methods can be legitimately combined or compared in many situations. The success of a recent modeling effort based on coral cover data consisting of observations taken in Hawai'i using the different methods supports this conclusion.
在夏威夷欧胡岛卡内奥赫湾的不同珊瑚礁栖息地，对九种珊瑚调查方法进行了比较，这些栖息地的珊瑚覆盖率各不相同。不同地点的平均估计覆盖率从不到10%到超过90%不等。所评估的方法包括线状样带法、各种视觉和摄影带状样带法、视频样带法以及视觉估计法。在每个地点都布置并固定了25米长的样带线。精通每种方法的观察员测量了每个地点的珊瑚覆盖率。记录了每条样带运行所需的时间、处理数据所需的时间以及记录结果的时间。还列出了每种方法的硬件和软件成本。这项调查的结果表明，所有使用的方法都能对珊瑚礁上的珊瑚覆盖率提供一个良好的初步估计。然而，这些方法在检测珊瑚物种数量方面存在差异。例如，经典的“样方”方法能够仔细检查小型和隐秘的珊瑚物种，而其他方法如“拖板”调查则无法检测到这些物种。每种方法所涉及的时间、精力和成本差异很大，并且评估了每种方法在各种环境中回答特定研究问题的适用性。这项研究的结果支持了在世界不同地理位置进行的其他三项比较方法研究的发现。因此，在许多情况下，通过不同方法测量的珊瑚覆盖率可以合理地合并或比较。最近一项基于珊瑚覆盖率数据的建模工作取得了成功，该数据由在夏威夷使用不同方法进行的观测组成，这支持了这一结论。
