Community structure of corals and reef fishes at multiple scales

Connolly, Sean R.;Hughes, Terry P.;Bellwood, David R.;Karlson, Ronald H.

Abstract

Distributions of numerical abundance and resource use among species are fundamental aspects of community structure. Here, we characterise these patterns for tropical reef fishes and corals across a 10,000km biodiversity gradient. Numerical abundance and resource-use distributions have similar shapes, but they emerge at markedly different scales. These results are consistent with a controversial null hypothesis for community structure, according to which abundance distributions arise from the interplay of multiple stochastic environmental and demographic factors. Our findings underscore the importance of robust conservation strategies that are appropriately scaled to the broad suite of environmental processes that help sustain biodiversity.

Journal

Science

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N/A

Volume

309

ISBN/ISSN

1095-9203

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Issue

5739

Pages Count

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Publisher

American Association for the Advancement of Science

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EISSN

N/A

DOI

10.1126/science.1113281