Stories from our work on coral reef resilience, kelp forest dynamics, and ocean conservation.
This paper describes coral guard crabs in the family Trapeziidae, small crustaceans that live symbiotically within branching corals in the tropical Pacific Ocean, protecting their hosts from predators and sediment while being completely dependent on the coral for survival.
This is a quick guide explaining how small coral guard crabs (Trapeziidae family) protect their coral hosts from predators and sediment, creating a mutually beneficial relationship that helps maintain coral reef ecosystems.
Scientists studied how temperature affects both the metabolism and predation rates of California spiny lobsters, finding that lobsters can actually increase their food consumption faster than their metabolic demands rise—but only within a middle range of temperatures.
Scientists used underwater 3D photography to measure coral colonies and found it provides more accurate measurements of coral growth and better predictions of which corals harbor the most diverse communities of fish and invertebrates compared to traditional measuring techniques.
Scientists studied how variation in body size affects the strength of interactions between lobsters and sea urchins across different spatial and temporal scales.
Scientists used mathematical modeling to show that dead coral skeletons left behind by certain types of disturbances can actually make coral reefs more vulnerable to regime shifts from coral-dominated to algae-dominated states by providing shelter for competing algae.
Researchers used mathematical models to show that predators can sometimes help coral reefs by eating the wrong fish - specifically by consuming competitively dominant fish species that provide poor benefits to corals, allowing higher-quality mutualist fish to thrive instead.
Scientists used computer modeling to explore how fish living in coral colonies affect their host corals' ability to survive bleaching events. They found that while fish waste can promote coral growth, it can also make corals more vulnerable to bleaching under certain conditions.
Scientists analyzed 362 large carnivore species worldwide to understand which conservation strategies actually work, finding that fewer than 10% of populations are recovering and only 12 species have genuinely improved their extinction risk status.
Scientists compared spiny lobster populations around California marine reserves after 10 years of protection and found that reserves not only boosted lobster numbers inside by up to 465%, but also dramatically increased catches for fishers working just outside reserve boundaries.
Scientists discovered that sea urchins cause devastating kelp forest collapse when their grazing overwhelms kelp production, but kelp detritus (dead kelp pieces) can prevent this collapse by feeding urchins and reducing their appetite for living kelp.
Scientists studied how urbanization affects marine and freshwater ecosystems by comparing biodiversity and ecosystem functions across six pairs of urban and less-urban watersheds in Puget Sound, Washington. Surprisingly, they found that while freshwater biodiversity declined with urbanization, coastal marine biodiversity actually increased.
Scientists analyzed 40 years of data from the North Sea ecosystem and discovered that fishing and warming have caused an irreversible regime shift, meaning the ecosystem has fundamentally changed and cannot return to its previous state even if pressures are reduced.
Researchers used computer simulations to show that more precise monitoring of harvested natural resources becomes increasingly valuable when populations approach critical collapse thresholds, and that adaptive monitoring strategies could help prevent irreversible population crashes.
Scientists tested whether remote coral reefs are more resilient to climate change than those near human populations. Surprisingly, they found no relationship between isolation and resistance to disturbance, and some evidence that reefs near developed areas may actually recover faster.
Researchers developed a mathematical model to understand how storm intensity affects giant kelp forests and the underwater communities that depend on them, finding that severe storms lead to more understory algae and fewer sessile animals on the seafloor.
This paper develops theoretical models to understand how food web structure - the feeding relationships between species at different trophic levels - influences species-area relationships on islands and isolated habitats.
Researchers studied how coral colony density and predation by fish affect the growth and survival of small staghorn corals, finding that predators devastate young corals regardless of how crowded they are together.
This study examined whether Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) established in 2012 along California's coast actually benefit the local spiny lobster fishery through 'spillover' - lobsters moving from protected areas into fishing zones.
This paper explores how differences in perception, not just differences in values, drive conflicts in conservation and resource management. Named after the Kurosawa film, the 'Rashomon effect' describes how different observers can have plausible but conflicting interpretations of the same events.
Scientists studying lionfish invasion in Caribbean Panama found that native fish predators are actually more abundant than the invasive lionfish, and that lionfish don't have worse impacts on prey fish than native predators do.
Researchers studied how parrotfish grazing behavior varies across different Caribbean reef sites, finding that the same fish species feed at dramatically different rates depending on where they live, which could affect how well reefs recover from damage.
This paper argues that climate policies like the Green New Deal should integrate ocean-based solutions with terrestrial approaches, creating what the authors call a 'Teal Deal' that combines land and sea strategies for renewable energy, transportation, food security, and habitat restoration.
Scientists studied 18 years of data from California kelp forests to understand how the stability of giant kelp affects the stability of the diverse community living beneath it. They found that when giant kelp populations are stable, the understory communities are also more stable, primarily because stable kelp supports higher species diversity.
Researchers found that fishing practices can hide local population collapses by creating spatial mismatches between what managers see at large scales versus what's actually happening in small areas, using Pacific herring as a case study.
Scientists studied Pacific herring populations around Haida Gwaii, British Columbia over 65 years to understand how fishing, climate, and population changes affected the stability of interconnected herring groups that historically provided reliable resources to predators and fishermen.
Scientists created a comprehensive framework showing how human activities change animal behavior, which can cascade through ecosystems to affect fundamental processes like nutrient cycling and pathogen transfer, though most of these ecological consequences remain largely unstudied.
Researchers discovered that the distinctive bare sand rings visible around coral patches from satellite imagery - called grazing halos - are created by herbivorous fish that venture out to graze on seagrass but stay close to the reef to avoid predators.
Scientists argue that ocean recovery efforts are failing because they treat recovery goals as fixed targets, when in reality marine ecosystems and human societies are constantly changing due to climate change and other factors.
Researchers analyzed metabolic rate data from 25 fish studies to determine how fish metabolism scales with body size, finding strong evidence for a scaling coefficient of 0.89 rather than the commonly assumed values of 0.67, 0.75, or 1.0.
This paper examines how the International Long-Term Ecological Research Network (ILTER), with more than 100 coastal and marine research sites worldwide, could serve as a platform for integrated global ocean observation by combining biological, physical, and chemical monitoring.
Researchers studied how purple sea urchin behavior and size affect their survival when faced with California spiny lobster predators, finding that smaller, more active urchins are most vulnerable to being eaten.
Using experimental seagrass communities, researchers discovered that when organisms disperse between habitat patches matters as much as how much they disperse, with consequences for understanding how dispersal maintains biodiversity.
Using mathematical models, researchers showed that the spatial arrangement of habitat patches creates persistent patterns in where organisms end up settling, even when colonizers arrive randomly from the surrounding environment.
Researchers tested whether the number of fish already on a reef or their arrival order matters more for determining whether new fish successfully colonize, finding that both factors influence survival but in different ways.
When marine management requires expensive stakeholder participation, it creates 'inertia' that makes ecosystems harder to shift between different states, potentially trapping them in degraded conditions even after pressures are reduced.
Scientists developed a new method to identify tipping points where marine ecosystems suddenly shift in response to environmental changes and human activities. They tested this approach on two decades of data from the California Current ecosystem off the U.S. West Coast.
Researchers discovered that managing predators and their prey simultaneously can produce faster ecosystem recovery than addressing each species separately, challenging traditional single-species management approaches.
Researchers surveyed experts on Pacific herring food webs to understand how different types of knowledge - scientific, traditional, and local - can be integrated into conservation planning for complex marine ecosystems.
Researchers analyzed ten predation experiments on coral reefs to understand how mesopredators affect the diversity of young reef fish communities. They found that predators reduced fish abundance by 60% on average, but this reduction was primarily due to generalist feeding behavior rather than selective targeting of specific species.
Marine scientists studied whether larger predator fish have stronger effects on their prey than smaller ones of the same species. Surprisingly, they found that small and large hawkfish had similar impacts on prey fish communities in coral reefs.
As large predators recover from decades of depletion, they create new conservation challenges by potentially threatening other protected species, competing with fisheries, and altering ecosystems in unexpected ways.
Scientists developed a new statistical method to separate true ecological differences in species composition between habitats from differences that are simply due to sampling fewer individuals in some locations.
This research examines why many efforts to restore apex predator populations fail or stall, identifying three key challenges beyond the well-known problems of slow life histories and continued hunting: the difficulty of predicting ecosystem interactions, the critical importance of timing in recovery efforts, and the need for adaptive management strategies.
This paper examines how mutualisms - cooperative relationships between species - operate within broader ecological communities, using African acacia trees and their ant partners as a primary example to show why understanding the full community context is essential for explaining these interactions.
Scientists studied how genetic differences in trees and fish work together to control entire aquatic ecosystems, finding that the productivity of cottonwood trees determines how strongly stickleback fish affect their prey.
This study synthesizes scientific knowledge about marine ecosystem tipping points into seven practical principles for resource managers, based on evidence that explicitly addressing tipping points leads to improved management outcomes.
Scientists induced metamorphosis in axolotls (salamanders that normally remain aquatic their whole lives) to test whether the transformation affects their legendary ability to regenerate lost limbs. They found that metamorphosis reduces regeneration speed by half and causes limb defects.
Scientists studied how different ways of fishing Pacific herring affect both the fish populations and the seabirds, whales, and other predators that depend on them for food. They found that harvesting herring eggs has much less impact on herring populations than catching adult fish.
Researchers studied how predatory fish affect the tiny, hidden creatures living inside coral colonies, finding that predators dramatically reduce the abundance and diversity of beneficial animals that help corals survive.
Researchers measured how predator density affects the rate at which reef fish predators consume their prey, finding that individual predators become less effective hunters when more predators are present.
Scientists conducted a field experiment in French Polynesia to test how predatory fish and habitat characteristics independently affect coral reef fish communities, finding that predators and habitat size have separate effects on fish diversity and abundance.
Scientists studied coral reef fish communities across 35 locations in the Pacific Ocean and discovered that isolated reefs have unusually high ratios of predators to prey fish, the opposite of what happens in most ecosystems where predators disappear first from remote areas.
Ecologists are misusing statistical significance tests when analyzing computer simulation models, producing meaningless p-values that can be manipulated by simply running more simulations. The researchers argue scientists should focus on the actual size of differences between model scenarios instead of statistical significance.
Researchers documented the illegal catch found aboard a shark fishing vessel seized in the Galápagos Marine Reserve, revealing 379 sharks from seven species, with 89% being juveniles and 64% female.
Researchers tested competitive interactions among three juvenile coral reef fish species to understand whether competition follows a predictable hierarchy and how this affects community assembly on reefs.
Scientists studying coral reef fish found that when predatory hawkfish arrive to colonize reefs matters just as much as how many show up, dramatically changing which fish species survive and thrive in reef communities.
Marine biologists documented two rare mass die-off events of surgeonfish in French Polynesia following exceptional recruitment pulses, where hundreds of newly settled fish developed white lesions and died, suggesting disease rather than predation as the cause of mortality.
Scientists discovered that common methods used to study how multiple predators affect prey survival are systematically biased, leading to overestimation of predator interactions in ecological studies. The bias occurs because current methods assume predators maintain constant feeding rates, but in reality feeding rates change as prey become depleted during experiments.
Scientists discovered that two species of small crustaceans living on coral reefs work together in a synergistic partnership to defend their coral homes from predatory sea stars, with their combined efforts being more effective than the sum of their individual defensive abilities.
This comprehensive review examines why some animals can regenerate lost limbs and appendages while others cannot, exploring how fundamental traits like body size, age, metabolic rate, and life history influence regenerative capacity across the animal kingdom.
Scientists studied how multiple species of crabs and shrimp living on coral reefs work together to keep their coral homes clean by removing harmful sediment, finding that more species of cleaners leads to cleaner corals.
Researchers conducted a comprehensive review to understand what estuarine and coastal ecosystems are worth to humanity, finding that while we have good economic valuations for some services like those provided by coral reefs and salt marshes, many critical benefits from seagrass beds and sand dunes remain unvalued despite massive global losses of these habitats.
Scientists tested how coral colony density and predators affect coral growth by creating experimental reefs in a lagoon and found that both higher coral density and predator exclusion significantly boosted growth rates.
Scientists studied how the timing of when fish arrive at a reef and the complexity of their habitat affects competition between young coral reef fish, finding that early arrival gives fish a major survival advantage but only in simple habitats.
Researchers discovered that tiny sea slugs called nudibranchs can indirectly increase toxic cyanobacterial blooms on coral reefs by preying on sea hares - the herbivores that would otherwise graze down the harmful bacteria.
Researchers in French Polynesia found that predators dramatically reduce both the number and variety of young coral reef fish by eating them indiscriminately soon after they settle on reefs, rather than targeting specific species.
Researchers discovered that a little-studied snail called Dendropoma maximum severely damages reef-building corals, reducing their growth by up to 81% and survival by up to 52%. This overlooked species could be reshaping coral reef communities across the Indo-Pacific.
Scientists tested whether adding new coral reef habitat attracts more fish larvae overall (like a 'field of dreams') or simply redirects them away from existing sites. They found evidence for both effects occurring simultaneously.
Researchers found that small crabs living on coral reefs act as bodyguards, protecting their coral hosts from harmful mucus-producing snails that can reduce coral growth by 50%. The crabs completely eliminated the negative effects of the snails on coral growth.
This paper synthesizes mechanisms that create density-dependent mortality in reef fishes, examining how behavior, habitat structure, and the scale of observation all influence whether and how strongly crowding affects survival.
Researchers tested whether clove oil, a commonly used fish anesthetic, harms corals when used to collect fish from coral colonies. They found that typical field concentrations caused temporary stress responses but did not affect coral survival or growth over the study period.
Researchers found that the timing of when young reef fish arrive at a coral reef dramatically affects their chances of survival, with fish that arrive earlier gaining a competitive advantage over later arrivals through increased aggression and territory control.
Small reef fish use crown-of-thorns starfish as habitat, sheltering among their venomous spines despite the starfish's role as a destructive coral predator. This reveals unexpected ecological complexity in interactions with 'pest' species.
Follow our work on coral reef resilience and kelp forest ecosystems
