Long-term monitoring of coral reef fish assemblages in the Western central pacific

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  • Adel Heenan
    University of Hawaii, ManoaNOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Ivor D Williams
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Tomoko Acoba
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Annette DesRochers
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Randall K Kosaki
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Troy Kanemura
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Marc O Nadon
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu
  • Russell E Brainard
    NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, Honolulu

Throughout the tropics, coral reef ecosystems, which are critically important to people, have been greatly altered by humans. Differentiating human impacts from natural drivers of ecosystem state is essential to effective management. Here we present a dataset from a large-scale monitoring program that surveys coral reef fish assemblages and habitats encompassing the bulk of the US-affiliated tropical Pacific, and spanning wide gradients in both natural drivers and human impact. Currently, this includes >5,500 surveys from 39 islands and atolls in Hawaii (including the main and Northwestern Hawaiian Islands) and affiliated geo-political regions of American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, and the Pacific Remote Islands Areas. The dataset spans 2010-2017, during which time, each region was visited at least every three years, and ~500-1,000 surveys performed annually. This standardised dataset is a powerful resource that can be used to understand how human, environmental and oceanographic conditions influence coral reef fish community structure and function, providing a basis for research to support effective management outcomes.

Keywords

  • Journal Article
Original languageEnglish
Article number170176
JournalScientific data
Volume4
Early online date5 Dec 2017
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Dec 2017
Externally publishedYes
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