Coral ‘arks’: a triage model for marine resource management based on coral resilience
Dr Alison Jones and Dr Ray BerkelmansCentre for Environmental Management, Central
Queensland University, RockhamptonThe Australian Institute of Marine Science, Townsville
Marine Reserves
Marine reserves play an important part in helping to protect tropical reefs cope with climate change (Hannah, 2008; Mumby, 2007)
Marine reserves as management tools
• Many reserves in areas vulnerable to coral bleaching (McClanahan, 2008)
• Marine reserves protect fish stocks (Russ, 2008)
• Evidence that they have no positive effect on ecosystem response to large-scale disturbance (Graham, 2008)
• Will marine reserves protect corals from climate changes?
Corals are the cornerstones of marine ecosystems
Healthy reefs support greater marine life
Eroded reefs support less marine life
Coral have survived past climate-driven extinctions (Kiessling, 2007)
Mod
ern
cora
ls
1 2 3
So, how did they survive these extinctions….?
Species survival – the ark principle
Now, let’s get this right….only two of each
species please…
Marine refuges may act as coral ‘arks’
Marine systems can recover following catastrophic disturbance if small pockets of diverse corals
survive to re-populate surrounding reefs
Characterising ‘refugia’ – the Keppels
Deep and shallowStress tolerant zooxanthellae
High coral cover
High coral species diversity
High light
Cool temperature
The Triage Principle for management
‘The assignation of priority on the basis of where
resources are most likely to achieve
success’……Merriam Webster Dictionary
Reefs that won’t survive no matter what
Reefs that will survive in spite of intervention
Reefs that have a better chance of survival with intervention
Refuges: the key to Australia’s maritime security?
“Don’t you think they’d be better off in the water…?”
Acknowledgements
We wish to thank the volunteers too numerous to mention, the Australian Navy and AIMS for assistance with fieldwork
for this project. GIS data in this presentation was supplied by GeoScience Australia through the Australian Government,,
the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and the Fitzroy Basin Association. The ‘refugia’ project was the idea of Dr
Ray Berkelmans. Nick Floyd (Lowy Institute Fellow) had the idea of extending this to augment Australia’s Asia-Pacific
regional maritime security
References
• Graham, N. A. J., T. R. McClanahan, et al. (2008). "Climate Warming, Marine Protected Areas and the Ocean-Scale Integrity of Coral Reef Ecosystems." PLoS ONE 3 (8)
• Hannah, L. (2008). "Protected Areas and Climate Change." Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1134 (1): 201-212
• Maxmen, A. (2008). "Refuge for the resilient." Science News 173 (15): 238
• Russ, G. R., A. J. Cheal, et al.(2008). "Rapid increase in fish numbers follows creation of world's largest marine reserve network." Current Biology 18 (12): 514-515
• Mumby, P. J., A. R. Harborne, J. Williams, C. V. Kappel, D. R. Brumbaugh, F. Micheli, K. E. Holmes, C. P. Dahlgren, C. B. Paris and P. G. Blackwell (2007). "Trophic cascade facilitates coral recruitment in a marine reserve." PNAS 104 (20): 8362-8367