High ecological resilience of the sea fan Gorgonia ventalina during two severe hurricanes.

ABSTRACT: Since about the turn of the millennium, octocorals have been increasing in abundance on Caribbean reefs. The mechanisms underlying this trend have not been resolved, but the emergent species assemblage appears to be more resilient than the scleractinians they are replacing. The sea fan Gorgonia ventalina is an iconic species in the contemporary octocoral fauna, and here its population dynamics are described from St. John, US Virgin Islands, from 2013 to 2019. Mean densities of G. ventalina at Yawzi Point (9-m depth) varied from 1.4-1.5 colonies m^-2, and their mean heights from 24-30 cm; nearby at Tektite (14-m depth), they varied from 0.6-0.8 colonies m^-2 and from 25-33 cm. These reefs were impacted by two Category 5 hurricanes in 2017, but neither the d

SUBMITTER: Edmunds PJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7666550 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature