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Exposure to degraded coral habitat depresses oxygen uptake rate during exercise of a juvenile reef fish

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Abstract

Coral reef ecosystems are currently under unprecedented stress due to anthropogenic induced climate change. Such stress causes coral habitats to degrade, which has been found to negatively impact the behaviour of some reef fishes. However, it is unknown whether the same chemical stresses from degraded habitats that impacts fish behaviour also impacts energy supporting swimming performance traits of fishes during the pelagic-to-reef life-history bottleneck. Here, we exposed newly settled juvenile Ambon damselfishes (Pomacentrus amboinensis) to either water that had passed over healthy or degraded coral for 24 h. Fishes were then swum at an ecologically relevant swimming speed for 200 min, and oxygen uptake rates were measured periodically. In general, fish swimming in water from degraded coral depressed oxygen uptake rates by 21%, which suggests that degraded habitats can have strong effects on fish physiology during this ecologically-critical time window.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the staff at Lizard Island Research Station for technical support, students for helping to sort fish, W. Morris and R. Warburton for construction of the swim respirometer, I. Bouyoucos for advice on statistical analyses, and anonymous reviewers for helpful feedback.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Australian Research Council Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD, Australia

    Adam T. Downie & Jodie L. Rummer

  2. Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA

    Caroline M. Phelps

  3. Division of Tropical Health and Medicine, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD, Australia

    Rhondda Jones

  4. College of Science and Engineering, James Cook University, Townsville, QLD, Australia

    Jodie L. Rummer & Mark I. McCormick

  5. Department of Biology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK, Canada

    Douglas P. Chivers

  6. Department of Biomedical Sciences, WCVM, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK, Canada

    Maud C. O. Ferrari

Authors
  1. Adam T. Downie
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  2. Caroline M. Phelps
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  3. Rhondda Jones
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  4. Jodie L. Rummer
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  5. Douglas P. Chivers
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  6. Maud C. O. Ferrari
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  7. Mark I. McCormick
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Contributions

Conceptualization: ATD, MIM, DPC, MCOF; Experimentation: ATD, CMP; Data Analysis: RJ, ATD; Writing: ATD with substantial input from MIM, DPC, MCOF, RJ, CMP, JLR; Funding: MIM, JLR.

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Correspondence to Adam T. Downie.

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Downie, A.T., Phelps, C.M., Jones, R. et al. Exposure to degraded coral habitat depresses oxygen uptake rate during exercise of a juvenile reef fish. Coral Reefs 40, 1361–1367 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00338-021-02113-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00338-021-02113-x

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