ePrints

Extinction vulnerability of coral reef fishes

Lookup NU author(s): Nicholas Graham, Professor Simon Jennings, Michael MacNeil, Dr Tim McClanahan, Professor Nick Polunin, Dr Shaun Wilson

Downloads

Full text for this publication is not currently held within this repository. Alternative links are provided below where available.

Abstract

P>With rapidly increasing rates of contemporary extinction, predicting extinction vulnerability and identifying how multiple stressors drive non-random species loss have become key challenges in ecology. These assessments are crucial for avoiding the loss of key functional groups that sustain ecosystem processes and services. We developed a novel predictive framework of species extinction vulnerability and applied it to coral reef fishes. Although relatively few coral reef fishes are at risk of global extinction from climate disturbances, a negative convex relationship between fish species locally vulnerable to climate change vs. fisheries exploitation indicates that the entire community is vulnerable on the many reefs where both stressors co-occur. Fishes involved in maintaining key ecosystem functions are more at risk from fishing than climate disturbances. This finding is encouraging as local and regional commitment to fisheries management action can maintain reef ecosystem functions pending progress towards the more complex global problem of stabilizing the climate.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Graham NAJ, Chabanet P, Evans RD, Jennings S, Letourneur Y, MacNeil MA, McClanahan TR, Öhman MC, Polunin NVC, Wilson SK

Publication type: Letter

Publication status: Published

Journal: Ecology Letters

Year: 2011

Volume: 14

Issue: 4

Pages: 341-348

Print publication date: 14/02/2011

ISSN (print): 1461-023X

ISSN (electronic): 1461-0248

Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1461-0248.2011.01592.x

DOI: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2011.01592.x

Share