National Coral Reef Monitoring Program: Benthic Complexity and Urchin Abundance at Climate Stations of the Mariana Archipelago since 2014

The benthic complexity and urchin abundance monitoring effort provides baselines for tracking these variables at NCRMP climate stations. Climate stations are 3-4 sites per island that were selected in a stratified random fashion to be roughly equally spaced around the island, along the 15 m contour, on hard bottom, and at least 1 km away from a river mouth or embayment. Once selected we assess multiple features of the coral reef environment including in-situ temperature (STR), seawater carbonate, net carbonate accretion (CAU), bioerosion (BMU), and cryptobiota diversity (ARMS).

Structural complexity is known to be an important component in coral reef ecosystems. Ecosystem relationships that correlate with structural complexity include reef fish density and biomass, live and branching coral cover, urchin abundance and algal cover (Graham and Nash 2013). In many cases, the benthic complexity is an important indicator of benthic and fish communities.

The data were collected around the Mariana archipelago as part of the NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (PIFSC), Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) led missions since 2014. These data can be accessed online via the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) Ocean Archive.

The NOAA National Coral Reef Monitoring Program (NCRMP) details a long term approach to provide an ecosystem perspective via monitoring climate, fish, benthic, and socioeconomic variables in a consistent and integrated manner. The NCRMP is intended to coordinate various NOAA Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP) biological, physical, and human dimensions activities into a cohesive NOAA-wide effort. Through the implementation of the NCRMP, NOAA will be able to clearly and concisely communicate results of national-scale monitoring to national, state, and territorial policy makers, resource managers, and the public on a periodic basis.

New record. AMD 2015-06-05

The National Coral Reef Monitoring Program (NCRMP) is a framework for conducting sustained observations of biological, climate, and socioeconomic indicators at 10 priority coral reefs across the U.S. and its territories. This integrated approach will consolidate monitoring of coral reefs under a uniform method in the Pacific, Atlantic, Caribbean, and the Gulf of Mexico for the first time. NCRMP is funded by the CRCP and supported by NOAA Fisheries, NOAA National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS), and many other partners. The Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) at NOAA Fisheries is leading biological monitoring in the U.S. Pacific Islands Region.

The biological component of NCRMP in the Pacific provides a triennial ecological characterization at a broad spatial scale of general reef condition for reef fishes, corals and benthic habitat (i.e., fish species composition/density/size, benthic cover, and coral density/size/condition). Each year, CREP scientists work closely with CRCP and local partners to collect biological data on fish populations and coral reef communities from strategically selected sites during Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (RAMP) missions. Innovative analysis techniques are then used to develop products that give fellow scientists, managers, decision makers and the public a better understanding of a region’s resources and how they are changing over time.

Raw survey data includes metadata for each survey (where, when, who, area); topographic complexity; and a measure of urchin abundance.

While every effort has been made to ensure that these data are accurate and reliable within the limits of the current state of the art, NOAA cannot assume liability for any damages caused by errors or omissions in the data, nor as a result of the failure of the data to function on a particular system. NOAA makes no warranty, expressed or implied, nor does the fact of distribution constitute such a warranty.

Mariana Archipelago (Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, including Rota, Tinian, Saipan, Pagan, Asuncion, and Maug).

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NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) Data Sharing Recommendations, version 9.0 updated August 12, 2015:

CREP welcomes the opportunity to collaborate on research issues contributing to the scientific basis for better management of marine ecosystems. CREP has a very diverse set of field activities that generates large volumes of data using an array of data collection protocols.

The following recommendations are for your consideration as you use this data:

1) Data analyses should take all field exigencies into account. The most effective way to do this would be active collaboration with CREP principal investigators.

2) In all presentations, product releases, or publications using data generated by CREP, proper acknowledgement of both CREP and the individuals responsible for data collection is expected. Citing the DOI (if available) is preferred, a non-DOI example is listed below.

3) If you collect or generate data for the same study areas, CREP requests that you share relevant information on complimentary data collections.

4) Those receiving data are strongly urged to inform the CREP Data Management Team of any errors and discrepancies that are discovered during the course of using these data. They are further urged to bring to the attention of the Team all problems and difficulties encountered in using these data. This information is necessary in order to improve the collections and to facilitate more efficient and economical data processing and retrieval. The users are asked to supply copies of any missing data that may be located, and to provide information as to significant subsets and special aggregations of data that are developed in using the material provided.

Example citation:

"This publication makes use of data products provided by the Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP), Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (PIFSC), National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), with funding support from the NOAA Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP). The analysis and interpretations presented here are solely that of the current authors.”

Data can be accessed online via the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) Ocean Archive.

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Please cite NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) when using the data.

Suggested citation:

Coral Reef Ecosystem Program; Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (2016). National Coral Reef Monitoring Program: Benthic Complexity at Climate Stations of the Mariana Archipelago in 2014. NOAA's National Center for Environmental Information, https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/inport/item/25251.

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PIFSC Oracle database view: V0_TOPOGRAPHIC_COMPLEXITY

Observations at each site were made by divers who have been trained in the benthic complexity and urchin abundance estimate protocols. Between years there may be some variance in the location of the transect tape due to oceanographic conditions. Visual estimates of abundance are useful as a broad indication of the urchin assemblages present at each survey site, but there is scope for error in diver estimates of this type.

The benthic complexity surface relief measurements are binned within 1 of 5 classification categories. NOAA PIFSC CREP’s use of the 5-category method is the same category delineation employed by CREP’s fish team for substrate height and was adapted from the University on North Carolina at Wilmington’s Protocol for Measuring Topographic Complexity.

Complexity categories and the measurements are as follows:

Category 1: < 0.2 m

Category 2: 0.2 – 0.5 m

Category 3: 0.5 – 1.0 m

Category 4: 1.0 – 1.5 m

Category 5: > 1.5 m

DACOR (dominant, abundant, common, occasional, rare) abundance codes are used to quantify urchins in the NCRMP plot. The number of “free” urchins and boring urchins within the NCRMP plot is visually estimated. The same category delineation is employed by CREP’s fish team for urchin abundance estimates.

DACOR categories are quantified as follows:

D - Free Urchins: 101-999; Boring Urchins: 501-999

A - Free Urchins: 51-100; Boring Urchins: 251-500

C - Free Urchins: 21-50; Boring Urchins: 101-250

O - Free Urchins: 6-20; Boring Urchins: 26-100

R - Free Urchins: 0-5; Boring Urchins: 0-25

The data are complete as entered. Any null values recorded are due to an incomplete field survey and not by omission.

The benthic complexity and urchin abundance data are collected at the 15m NCRMP stations.

The same methods of data collection are used at each surveyed site.

The data is entered in an MS Excel spreadsheet, then quality controlled against the physical data sheets prior to the data considered final. Upon completion of the cruise, the data is migrated to Oracle databases during which any errors are flagged based on pre-defined criteria.

The data is captured in several locations: physical data sheets, MS Excel spreadsheets, and PIFSC Oracle database. The physical data sheets are housed at PIFSC. The MS Excel spreadsheets area regularly backed up by the cruise data manager while at sea. The PIFSC Oracle database is regularly backed up by PIFSC ITS.

Benthic complexity and urchin abundance survey employed by the NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) since 2013.