Theory for the Dynamics of Coral Reef Fishes with Applications to Hypothesis Testing

University Of California-Davis, Davis CA

Investigators

Abstract

Recent syntheses of coral reef fish ecology encourage a pluralistic view of mechanisms of population and community dynamics where variation in larval supply and density dependent interactions at or after settlement are both expected to have important effects. Theoretical models used to develop the concepts of the scale transition and the storage effect imply that variation in larval supply and density dependence should have interactive effects on population and community dynamics leading, for example, to stabilization of population dynamics and maintenance of diversity on large spatial scales in ways that would not be predicted from the separate effects of variation in larval supply and density dependence. Such interactions also have important consequences for the ability of experimental and observational data to (1) detect density dependence, (2) identify the scales and mechanisms of population regulation, and (3) offer meaningful explanations for the high biological diversity of coral reef systems. This project will development a metapopulation model of reef fish systems that incorporates stochastic variation in demographic rates, spatio-temporal variation in recruitment, stage-structure within local populations, and multispecies density-dependent interactions. This model will provide a general theoretical framework useful for developing hypotheses about the combined effects of the multiple processes and scales inherent to reef-fish systems. These effects will be studied in relation to important outcomes such as population density, population regulation and diversity maintenance. Specific predictions will be developed as diagnostic tools for understanding how observable patterns in reef fish systems are related to the underlying processes on both local and metapopulation scales. Significant effort will be expended on formulating specific experimental hypotheses that can be tested in the field.