Effects of depth on reef fish communities: Insights of a "deep refuge hypothesis" from Southwestern Atlantic reefs.

ABSTRACT: Deeper reefs are often considered to be less susceptible to local and global disturbances, such as overfishing, pollution and climate change, compared to shallow reefs and therefore could act as refugia for shallow water species. Hence, the interest on deeper reefs has happened at a time when shallow reefs are undergoing unprecedented changes. Here we investigated the hypothesis that fish community differed from shallow to deeper reefs due to factors apart from habitat structure and quality and therefore discuss for the first-time insights of a "deep refuge hypothesis" from Brazilian reefs. We collected data on fish community, benthic community and physiological conditions of two coral species on shallow (< 6 m) and deep reefs (> 25 m). No significant difference on substratum composition w

SUBMITTER: Pereira PHC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6157832 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature