NDLI: Temporal clustering of tropical cyclones on the Great Barrier Reef and its ecological importance

Content Provider	Springer Nature Link
Author	Wolff, Nicholas H. Wong, Aaron Vitolo, Renato Stolberg, Kristin Anthony, Kenneth R. N. Mumby, Peter J.
Copyright Year	2016
Abstract	Tropical cyclones have been a major cause of reef coral decline during recent decades, including on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). While cyclones are a natural element of the disturbance regime of coral reefs, the role of temporal clustering has previously been overlooked. Here, we examine the consequences of different types of cyclone temporal distributions (clustered, stochastic or regular) on reef ecosystems. We subdivided the GBR into 14 adjoining regions, each spanning roughly 300 km, and quantified both the rate and clustering of cyclones using dispersion statistics. To interpret the consequences of such cyclone variability for coral reef health, we used a model of observed coral population dynamics. Results showed that clustering occurs on the margins of the cyclone belt, being strongest in the southern reefs and the far northern GBR, which also has the lowest cyclone rate. In the central GBR, where rates were greatest, cyclones had a relatively regular temporal pattern. Modelled dynamics of the dominant coral genus, Acropora, suggest that the long-term average cover might be more than 13 % greater (in absolute cover units) under a clustered cyclone regime compared to stochastic or regular regimes. Thus, not only does cyclone clustering vary significantly along the GBR but such clustering is predicted to have a marked, and management-relevant, impact on the status of coral populations. Additionally, we use our regional clustering and rate results to sample from a library of over 7000 synthetic cyclone tracks for the GBR. This allowed us to provide robust reef-scale maps of annual cyclone frequency and cyclone impacts on Acropora. We conclude that assessments of coral reef vulnerability need to account for both spatial and temporal cyclone distributions.
Starting Page	613
Ending Page	623
Page Count	11
File Format	PDF
ISSN	07224028
Journal	Coral Reefs
Volume Number	35
Issue Number	2
e-ISSN	14320975
Language	English
Publisher	Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Publisher Date	2016-01-22
Publisher Place	Berlin, Heidelberg
Access Restriction	One Nation One Subscription (ONOS)
Subject Keyword	Hurricane Typhoon Temporal variability Dispersion Acropora Disturbance Freshwater & Marine Ecology Oceanography
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Aquatic Science

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1	Ministry of Education (GoI), Department of Higher Education	Sanctioning Authority	https://www.education.gov.in/ict-initiatives
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4	Project PI / Joint PI	Principal Investigator and Joint Principal Investigators of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in Prof. Saswat Chakrabarti will be added soon
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