Cryptic effects of habitat declines: coral-associated fishes avoid coral-seaweed interactions due to visual and chemical cues.
Cryptic effects of habitat declines: coral-associated fishes avoid coral-seaweed interactions due to visual and chemical cues.
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DOI：
10.1038/srep18842
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发表时间：
2016-01-04
影响因子：
4.6
通讯作者：
Dixson DL
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Brooker RM;Brandl SJ;Dixson DL
随着环境条件从珊瑚所需的环境条件转向那些适合海藻猖獗生长的环境条件，以海藻为主的珊瑚礁正变得越来越常见。珊瑚相关生物对海藻的反应不仅将影响它们在环境变化后的命运，还可能影响它们赖以生存的珊瑚群落的轨迹。然而，珊瑚相关生物对海藻的行为反应知之甚少。这项研究调查了专职和机会性捕食珊瑚的蝴蝶鱼协会(Chaetodontidae)与硬性珊瑚之间的相互作用，以确定鱼类是否继续与接触海藻的珊瑚互动，或者是否避开它们。在自然条件下，所有物种几乎都只与无海藻的珊瑚相互作用。在一项有控制的斑块珊瑚礁实验中，鱼避开了与海藻身体接触的珊瑚，而不考虑饮食偏好。当视觉海藻线索被移除时，蝴蝶鱼继续避开与化感作用的丝状星云珊瑚接触的珊瑚，这表明珊瑚和海藻相互作用产生的化学线索是排斥的。这些发现表明，由于珊瑚和海藻相互作用产生的有害视觉和化学线索，与珊瑚相关的生物可能难以找到资源，因为没有海藻的珊瑚数量减少。
Seaweed-dominated coral reefs are becoming increasingly common as environmental conditions shift away from those required by corals and toward those ideal for rampant seaweed growth. How coral-associated organisms respond to seaweed will not only impact their fate following environmental change but potentially also the trajectories of the coral communities on which they rely. However, behavioral responses by coral-associated organisms to seaweeds are poorly understood. This study examined interactions between a guild of obligate and opportunistic coral-feeding butterflyfishes (Chaetodontidae) and scleractinian corals to determine whether fishes continue to interact with corals in contact with seaweed or if they are avoided. Under natural conditions, all species interacted almost exclusively with seaweed-free corals. In a controlled patch reef experiment, fishes avoided corals in physical contact with seaweed, irrespective of dietary preferences. When visual seaweed cues were removed, butterflyfish continued to avoid corals that had been in contact with the allelopathic Galaxaura filamentosa, suggesting that chemical cues produced by coral-seaweed interactions are repellent. These findings suggest that, due to deleterious visual and chemical cues produced by coral-seaweed interactions, coral-associated organisms may struggle to locate resources as seaweed-free corals decline in abundance.