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Title: Three decades of degradation lead to diminished impacts of severe hurricanes on Caribbean reefs
Abstract

Major tropical storms are destructive phenomena with large effects on the community dynamics of multiple biomes. On coral reefs, their impacts have been described for decades, leading to the expectation that future storms should have effects similar to those recorded in the past. This expectation relies on the assumption that storm intensities will remain unchanged, and the impacted coral reef communities are similar to those of the recent past; neither assumption is correct. This study quantified the effects of two category five hurricanes on the reefs of St. John,U.S.Virgin Islands, where 31 yr of time‐series analyses reveal chronic coral mortality, increasing macroalgal abundance, and five major hurricanes that caused acute coral mortality. Contextualized by these trends, the effects of the most recent storms, Hurricanes Irma and Maria (September 2017), on coral cover were modest. While mean absolute coral cover declined 1–4% depending on site, these effects were not statistically discernable. Following decades of increasing abundance of macroalgae, this functional group responded to the recent hurricanes with large increases in abundance on both absolute and relative scales. Decades of chronic mortality have changed the coral assemblages of St. John to create degraded communities that are resistant to severe storms.

 
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Award ID(s):
1801335
NSF-PAR ID:
10454686
Author(s) / Creator(s):
 
Publisher / Repository:
Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Ecology
Volume:
100
Issue:
3
ISSN:
0012-9658
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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