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Marine Ecology Progress Series

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MEPS is a leading hybrid research journal on all aspects of marine, coastal and estuarine ecology. Priority is given to outstanding research that advances our ecological understanding.

Online: ISSN 1616-1599

Print: ISSN 0171-8630

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3354/meps

Impact Factor2.1 (JCR 2025 release)

Article Acceptance Rate52.2% (2024)

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Volume contents
Mar Ecol Prog Ser 621:1-17 (2019)

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3354/meps12980

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Global biogeography of coral recruitment: tropical decline and subtropical increase

ABSTRACT:

Despite widespread climate-driven reductions of coral cover on tropical reefs, little attention has been paid to the possibility that changes in the geographic distribution of coral recruitment could facilitate beneficial responses to the changing climate through latitudinal range shifts. To address this possibility, we compiled a global database of normalized densities of coral recruits on settlement tiles (corals m-2) deployed from 1974 to 2012, and used the data therein to test for latitudinal range shifts in the distribution of coral recruits. In total, 92 studies provided 1253 records of coral recruitment, with 77% originating from settlement tiles immersed for 3-24 mo, herein defined as long-immersion tiles (LITs); the limited temporal and geographic coverage of data from short-immersion tiles (SITs; deployed for <3 mo) made them less suitable for the present purpose. The results from LITs show declines in coral recruitment, on a global scale (i.e. 82% from 1974 to 2012) and throughout the tropics (85% reduction at <20° latitude), and increases in the sub-tropics (78% increase at >20° latitude). These trends indicate that a global decline in coral recruitment has occurred since 1974, and the persistent reduction in the densities of recruits in equatorial latitudes, coupled with increased densities in sub-tropical latitudes, suggests that coral recruitment may be shifting poleward.

KEYWORDS

Coral settlement Poleward range shift Range extension Equatorial retraction Retrospective analyses Global warming
Rocky sea bottom intersperesed with small coral colonies and grey square settlement plates.

Coral settlement plates that are used to systematically enumerate the number of baby corals arriving on a reef in Palmyra Atoll National Wildlife Refuge. 
Photo: Nichole Price

Coral reefs are retreating from increasingly warmer waters at the equator and establishing new reefs in more temperate regions, according to new research. Price and her coauthors found that the number of young corals on tropical reefs has declined by 85% – and doubled on subtropical reefs – during the last four decades. The researchers examined latitudes up to 35°, and found that the expansion of coral reefs is perfectly mirrored north and south of the equator. The paper assesses where and when “refugee corals” will likely arrive in the future – in some places, bringing new resources and opportunities such as fishing and tourism and offering hope for reef ecosystems.

N. N. Price (Corresponding Author)

  • Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, East Boothbay, ME 04544, USA
nprice@bigelow.org

S. Muko (Co-author)

  • Graduate School of Fisheries Science and Environmental Studies, Nagasaki University, Nagasaki, 852-8521, Nagasaki City, Japan

L. Legendre (Co-author)

  • Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Laboratoire d’Océanographie de Villefranche, LOV, 06230 Villefranche-sur-Mer, France

R. Steneck (Co-author)

  • University of Maine, School of Marine Sciences, Darling Marine Center, Walpole, ME 04353, USA

M. J. H. van Oppen (Co-author)

  • Australian Institute of Marine Science, PMB No. 3, Townsville MC, QLD 4810, Australia
  • School of BioSciences, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC 3010, Australia

R. Albright (Co-author)

  • Australian Institute of Marine Science, PMB No. 3, Townsville MC, QLD 4810, Australia
  • Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford, CA 94305, USA

P. Ang Jr. (Co-author)

  • Marine Science Laboratory, School of Life Sciences, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, NT Hong Kong, SAR, China

R. C. Carpenter (Co-author)

  • Department of Biology, California State University, Northridge, CA 91330-8303, USA

A. P. Y. Chui (Co-author)

  • Marine Science Laboratory, School of Life Sciences, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, NT Hong Kong, SAR, China

T.-Y. Fan (Co-author)

  • National Museum of Marine Biology and Aquarium, Pingtung 944, Taiwan

R. D. Gates (Co-author)

  • Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, University of Hawaii, Kaneohe, HI 96744, USA

S. Harii (Co-author)

  • Sesoko Station, Tropical Biosphere Research Center, University of the Ryukyus, Motobu-cho, Okinawa 905-0227, Japan

H. Kitano (Co-author)

  • Open Biology Unit, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, Onna, Okinawa 904-0495, Japan

H. Kurihara (Co-author)

  • Faculty of Science, Biology Program, University of the Ryukyus, Okinawa 903-0213, Japan

S. Mitarai (Co-author)

  • Marine Biophysics Unit, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, Onna, Okinawa 904-0495, Japan

J. L. Padilla-Gamiño (Co-author)

  • School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98105, USA

K. Sakai (Co-author)

  • Sesoko Station, Tropical Biosphere Research Center, University of the Ryukyus, Motobu-cho, Okinawa 905-0227, Japan

G. Suzuki (Co-author)

  • Research Center for Subtropical Fisheries, Seikai National Fisheries Research Institute, Ishigaki, Okinawa 907-0451, Japan

P. J. Edmunds (Co-author)

  • Department of Biology, California State University, Northridge, CA 91330-8303, USA

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