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Connectivity, biodiversity conservation and the design of marine reserve networks for coral reefs

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Abstract

Networks of no-take reserves are important for protecting coral reef biodiversity from climate change and other human impacts. Ensuring that reserve populations are connected to each other and non-reserve populations by larval dispersal allows for recovery from disturbance and is a key aspect of resilience. In general, connectivity between reserves should increase as the distance between them decreases. However, enhancing connectivity may often tradeoff against a network’s ability to representatively sample the system’s natural variability. This “representation” objective is typically measured in terms of species richness or diversity of habitats, but has other important elements (e.g., minimizing the risk that multiple reserves will be impacted by catastrophic events). Such representation objectives tend to be better achieved as reserves become more widely spaced. Thus, optimizing the location, size and spacing of reserves requires both an understanding of larval dispersal and explicit consideration of how well the network represents the broader system; indeed the lack of an integrated theory for optimizing tradeoffs between connectivity and representation objectives has inhibited the incorporation of connectivity into reserve selection algorithms. This article addresses these issues by (1) updating general recommendations for the location, size and spacing of reserves based on emerging data on larval dispersal in corals and reef fishes, and on considerations for maintaining genetic diversity; (2) using a spatial analysis of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park to examine potential tradeoffs between connectivity and representation of biodiversity and (3) describing a framework for incorporating environmental fluctuations into the conceptualization of the tradeoff between connectivity and representation, and that expresses both in a common, demographically meaningful currency, thus making optimization possible.

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Acknowledgements

This special issue arose from a workshop entitled “Connectivity and population resilience—sustaining coral reefs during the coming century” held 13-16 October 2007 in Townsville, Australia. We thank the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University and the Connectivity Working Group of the global University of Queensland—World Bank—Global Environment Facility project, Coral Reef Targeted Research and Capacity Building for Management for their support. McCook gratefully acknowledges support from the Pew Fellowship Program in Marine Conservation. We thank M. Hisano for computer programming assistance, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority for providing spatial data, and two anonymous reviewers for comments and suggestions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Marine and Tropical Biology and/or ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD, 4811, Australia

    G. R. Almany, S. R. Connolly, G. P. Jones, M. Mills, R. L. Pressey & D. H. Williamson

  2. Department of Biological Sciences, Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research, University of Windsor, 401 Sunset Avenue, Windsor, ON, N9B 3P4, Canada

    D. D. Heath & J. D. Hogan

  3. Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, PO Box 1379, Townsville, QLD, 4810, Australia

    L. J. McCook

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  1. G. R. Almany
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  2. S. R. Connolly
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  3. D. D. Heath
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  4. J. D. Hogan
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  9. D. H. Williamson
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Correspondence to G. R. Almany.

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Almany, G.R., Connolly, S.R., Heath, D.D. et al. Connectivity, biodiversity conservation and the design of marine reserve networks for coral reefs. Coral Reefs 28, 339–351 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00338-009-0484-x

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