Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program: Calcification Rates of Crustose Coralline Algae Derived from Calcification Accretion Units (CAUs) Deployed across American Samoa...

Calcification accretion units, or CAUs, are used to assess the current effects of changes in seawater carbonate chemistry on calcification and accretion rates of calcareous and fleshy algae in the Hawaiian and Mariana Archipelagos, American Samoa, and the Pacific Remote Island Areas as part of the Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (RAMP).

Laboratory experiments reveal calcification rates of crustose coralline algae (CCA) are strongly correlated to seawater aragonite saturation state. Predictions of reduced coral calcification rates, due to ocean acidification, suggest that coral reef communities will undergo ecological phase shifts as calcifying organisms are negatively impacted by changing seawater chemistry.

Deployed on the seafloor for a period of time, CAUs allow for recruitment and colonization of CCA and hard corals. By measuring the change in weight of the CAUs, the reef carbonate accretion rate can be calculated for that time period. Monitoring net accretion over successive deployments allows for the detection of changes in calcification rates over time.

The calcification rate data described here are from CAUs that have been deployed and retrieved at existing, long-term monitoring sites during NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (PIFSC), Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) led RAMP missions around American Samoa and the Pacific Remote Island Areas in 2010 and 2012, in accordance with protocols developed by Price et al. 2012. There are typically (but not always) five CAU sites established at each location CREP visits with five units deployed at each site.

CAUs are composed of two 10 x 10 cm flat, square, gray PVC plates, stacked 1 cm apart, and are attached to the benthos using stainless steel threaded rods. Calcareous organisms, primarily crustose coralline algae and encrusting corals, recruit to these plates and accrete/calcify carbonate skeletons over 2-3 year deployments. Due to the simple, low-cost design and analysis, statistically robust numbers of calcification plates can easily be deployed, recovered, and processed to provide estimates of net calcification.

This study provides information about Pacific-wide spatial patterns of algal calcification and accretion rates and serves as a basis for detecting changes associated with changing seawater chemistry due to ocean acidification. In conjunction with benthic community composition data (separate dataset), the calcification rates will aid in determining the magnitude of how ocean acidification affects coral reefs in the natural environment. The data can be accessed online via the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) Ocean Archive.

Analysis of these data will expand scientists’ capacity for assessing coral reef resilience regarding the effects of ocean acidification outside of controlled laboratory experiments. These data can also be used in comparative analyses across natural gradients, thereby assisting efforts to determine whether key reef-building taxa can acclimatize to changing oceanographic environments. These data will have immediate, direct impacts on predictions of reef resilience in a higher carbon dioxide (CO2) world and on the design of reef management strategies.

This effort is a partnership between CREP and Drs. Nichole Price of Bigelow Marine Laboratory and Jen Smith of Scripps Institution of Oceanography, who have extensive knowledge of marine benthic algal community ecology.

The Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (Pacific RAMP), established by the NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) and supported by NOAA's Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP), is tasked with documenting and understanding the status and trends of coral reef ecosystems in the U.S. Pacific. Pacific RAMP involves interdisciplinary monitoring of oceanographic conditions and biological surveys of organisms associated with hard-bottomed habitats in the 0 - 30 m depth range. Regions are surveyed on a biennial cycle and aims to support integrated, consistent and comparable monitoring of coral reefs across all U.S.-affiliated regions.

The data described is collected as part of the Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (RAMP) which pre-dates the establishment of the National Coral Reef Monitoring Program (NCRMP) in 2013, which 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 ocean and climate change monitoring in the U.S. Pacific Islands Region.

The climate component of NCRMP in the Pacific provides a comprehensive view of climate change impacts on coral reef ecosystems and helps identify areas of resilience and vulnerability. The key indicators used to identify and monitor climate-driven trends include 1) thermal stress caused by changes in sea temperature, 2) ocean acidification resulting from changes in carbonate chemistry, and 3) ecological impacts by collecting data on coral growth rates, erosion, and community structure to understand the impacts of thermal stress and ocean acidification on the ecosystem. Each year, CREP scientists work closely with CRCP and partners during Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (RAMP) missions to collect data using moored oceanographic (subsurface temperature recorders) and ecological (calcification accretion units [CAUs] and autonomous reef monitoring structures [ARMS]) instruments stationed at fixed sites in the Pacific Ocean, and water samples collected by divers. The in-situ data and satellite-based observations are also used in modeling efforts. Innovative analysis techniques are 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.

A data dictionary describing each column provided in the data set is included in the NCEI archive package as a comma-separated file. The columns provided in the dataset include the location where the CAUs were deployed (REGION_NAME, ISLAND, SITE, LATITUDE, and LONGITUDE), when they were deployed and recovered and the duration in water (DEPLOYMENT_MISSION, RECOVERY_MISSION, DEPLOYMENT_DATE, RECOVERY_DATE, RECOVERY_YEAR, DAYS_IN_WATER, and YEARS_IN_WATER), information about the CAUs (SERIALNUMBER, CAU_UNIT), and the calculated rate of calcification (CALCIFICATION_RATE_BY_UNIT).

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.

American Samoa including Tutuila, Manu'a (Ofo, Olosega, and Ta'u), Rose Atoll, and Swains.

Pacific Remote Island Areas (PRIA) including Baker, Howland, Jarvis, Kingman Reef, and Johnston and Palmyra atolls.

Not applicable

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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) and the NOAA Ocean Acidification Program. 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.

None

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

Suggested Citation:

Coral Reef Ecosystem Program; Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (2016). Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program: Calcification Rates of Crustose Coralline Algae Derived from Calcification Accretion Units (CAUs) Deployed across American Samoa and the Pacific Remote Island Areas in 2010. NOAA's National Center for Environmental Information, https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/inport/item/26945.

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PIFSC Oracle database view: V_CALCIFICATION_RATE_BY_UNIT

Prior to processing the calcification accretion unit (CAU) samples, laboratory analysts are trained to properly use relevant lab equipment (analytical balance, vacuum filtration pump, etc.) and are familiarized with the data entry tool/spreadsheet. Laboratory analysts are also required to go through the CAU Processing Standard Operating Procedure and other training materials.

Calcification Accretion Units (CAUs) that have been deployed may not have been recovered due to logistical constraints of the following mission or could not be found when divers returned to the site. This can be quantified by comparing the number of recovered units to the number of units originally deployed (typically, 5 units per site).

The calcification rate and ratio of calcified materials to fleshy materials are determined for each Calcification Accretion Unit (CAU) recovered by the NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP). Scripps Institution of Oceanography (Scripps) staff may conduct additional analyses of specific units to determine functional group coverage and to determine species recruitment rates based on the results of analyzed photos collected during the unit recovery and disassembly process.

Additionally, data from the CAUs processed in 2012 that do not meet the processing criteria set in 2012—that is, if the difference between the final two subsequent dry weights exceeds 0.2 grams, then those data have been omitted from the final dataset described herein.

The sampling procedure is based on the protocols developed by Price et al. 2012. While this project followed the same overall protocols, slight modifications were made after the first set of recovered Calcification Accretion Units (CAUs) were processed in 2012. Specifically, the following changes were implemented in 2013: 1) camera settings (adjusted to fit laboratory light conditions), and 2) use of freshwater in lieu of seawater during plate photo-documentation (seawater was not readily available in the new facility). Further, the processing procedures were also modified in 2013 such that the acceptable criteria for samples to be considered completely dry was set to 0.1 grams instead of 0.2 grams—that is, if two subsequent dry weights do not fall within the identified acceptable range (0.1 grams), the drying process will continue until this criteria is met.

Prior to processing a batch from each region/jurisdiction, laboratory analysts inventory the recovered Calcification Accretion Units (CAUs) to ensure all units are accounted for and all serial numbers assigned to each unit match field data records. The Data Manager additionally performs quality control checks on the site deployment data and the recovery data for further accuracy. Once all CAUs from the jurisdiction have been processed, the dataset is checked by the analysts to ensure: 1) all CAU plates have been processed, 2) there are no missing cell values, and 3) calculations for net weight of calcified materials are correct. The dataset is then turned over to the Data Manager for further quality control procedures and data ingestion into the NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program's master database.

NOAA IRC and NOAA Fisheries ITS resources and assets.

Assembled calcification accretion units (CAUs) are attached to the benthos using stainless steel threaded rods. There are typically five CAU sites established at each location (island) the NOAA Coral Reef Ecosystem Program (CREP) visits with five CAUs deployed at each site (n=25 per location). Calcareous organisms, primarily crustose coralline algae and encrusting corals, recruit to these CAUs and accrete/calcify carbonate skeletons over 2-3 year deployments. Once recovered from the seafloor, the CAUs are processed to provide estimates of net calcification, percent cover, and vertical accretion rates. CAUs have been deployed and replaced at existing, long-term monitoring sites during Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (RAMP) cruises, in accordance with protocols developed by Price et al. 2012.