Abstract

Marine fishery reserves (MFRs) offer advantages for the management of tropical and temperate fisheries that can effectively augment conventional management programs. The effectiveness of MFRs to support fisheries in surrounding environments depends 1) on their ability to maintain or rebuild spawning stock biomass; and 2) upon the rate of export of propagules and/or adults out of the reserve. Inherent protection of important fish habitats within the reserve should help sustain ecological structure and function. Various ontogenetic stages of both fishery and non-fishery species have been shown to use particular habitats, presumably because they offer some evolutionary advantage. Habitat characteristics have been shown to influence settlement rates and control post-settlement survivorship by affecting growth and predation rates. In this study, newly settled white grunts, Haemulon plumieri, are shown to select natural habitats composed of small Acropora cervicomis coral heads in a shallow seagrass bed rather that either artificial reefs in the same seagrass bed or natural substrates available in the surrounding areas. These preferred microhabitats should be identified for other fishery species and included within MFR boundaries to preserve these habitats and to hasten the rate of increase in the spawning stock biomass within the reserve.

PDF Preview