Presence of cleaner wrasse increases the recruitment of damselfishes to coral reefs.

ABSTRACT: Mutualisms affect the biodiversity, distribution and abundance of biological communities. However, ecological processes that drive mutualism-related shifts in population structure are often unclear and must be examined to elucidate how complex, multi-species mutualistic networks are formed and structured. In this study, we investigated how the presence of key marine mutualistic partners can drive the organisation of local communities on coral reefs. The cleaner wrasse, Labroides dimidiatus, removes ectoparasites and reduces stress hormones for multiple reef fish species, and their presence on coral reefs increases fish abundance and diversity. Such changes in population structure could be driven by increased recruitment of larval fish at settlement, or by post-settlement processes such as

SUBMITTER: Sun D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4571678 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature