Seasonal dynamics of fish assemblages on breakwaters and natural rocky reefs in a temperate estuary: consistent assemblage differences driven by sub-adults.

ABSTRACT: Development of infrastructure around cities is rapidly increasing the amount of artificial substrate (termed artificial reef, 'AR') in coastal marine habitats. However, effects of ARs on marine communities remain unknown, because it is unclear whether ARs can maintain similar communities to natural reefs. We investigated whether well-established (> 30 years old) breakwaters could consistently approximate fish assemblages on interspersed rocky reefs in a temperate estuary over 6 consecutive seasons using regular visual surveys between June 2009 (winter) and November 2010 (spring). We examined whether assemblage differences between reef types were driven by differences in juvenile recruitment, or were related to differences in older life-stages. Assemblages on both reef types were dominated

SUBMITTER: Fowler AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3784400 | biostudies-literature | 2013

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature