Protection from illegal fishing and shark recovery restructures mesopredatory fish communities on a coral reef.

ABSTRACT: The recovery of communities of predatory fishes within a no-take marine reserve after the eradication of illegal fishing provides an opportunity to examine the role of sharks and other large-bodied mesopredatory fishes in structuring reef fish communities. We used baited remote underwater video stations to investigate whether an increase in sharks was associated with a change in structure of the mesopredatory fish community at Ashmore Reef, Western Australia. We found an almost fourfold increase in shark abundance in reef habitat from 0.64 hr^-1 ± 0.15 SE in 2004, when Ashmore Reef was being fished illegally, to 2.45 hr^-1 ± 0.37 in 2016, after eight years of full-time enforcement of the reserve. Shark recovery in reef habitat was accompanied by a two and a half-

SUBMITTER: Speed CW 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6787830 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature