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RESEARCH community structure Motivation
Critical to the ecological understanding and protection of these communities is our ability to distinguish their natural dynamics from changes caused by local or global human influences. However, our ability to predict how these communities will change in the face of natural or human-caused environmental variation is poor. To rectify this shortfall in our understanding of these ecological systems, PISCO has implemented a large-scale, long-term study of the patterns of community structure in rocky intertidal and shallow subtidal habitats and of the physical and ecological processes responsible for structuring these communities. Ultimately, our goal is to understand and predict how environmental change (including human impacts) influences these physical and ecological processes and how communities respond to such changes. Research Questions
General Approach
We are describing and monitoring the structure (i.e., species composition and relative abundance) of representative rocky intertidal and subtidal communities across an unprecedented range extending from northern Washington to southern California. The distribution of sampling sites across oceanographic regimes, in conjunction with measures of oceanographic conditions (e.g., nutrients, chlorophyll, temperature, and currents) at core sites, will allow us to examine the relationships between conditions in the nearshore ocean and community structure, and how those relationships vary over time. In addition, this design allows us to examine whether oceanographic conditions influence communities in different habitats similarly or differently. We also examine the linkages between oceanographic events, recruitment of key species, and community structure by relating rates of larval supply and recruitment to changes in community structure. Annual surveys of community structure at sites within and outside marine reserves provide an opportunity to determine how community dynamics vary with and without the protection offered by marine reserve designation (see Marine Reserves page). For detailed methodologies and results see Subtidal page and Intertidal page. |
The great diversity and productivity of algae, invertebrates, and fishes that inhabit rocky intertidal and shallow subtidal reefs have fascinated ecologists since the time of Darwin. Research on species interactions (i.e., competition and predation) and physical and ecological processes that determine the abundance of species in these communities has spawned many of the leading theories of how ecological communities are organized and how they persist through time. But rapid growth of coastal populations, and increasing number of human activities focused on these rich natural habitats frequently exposes them to various threats.
Sampling of each of these sites includes quantitative description of habitat features (e.g., substratum type and relief) that allows us to examine relationships between community structure and habitat across an immense geographic range.