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Accelerating Tropicalization and the Transformation of Temperate Seagrass Meadows
Glenn A Hyndes1, Kenneth L Heck1, Adriana Vergés1
1Glenn Hyndes (g.hyndes@ecu.edu.au) is an associate professor, Paul Lavery is a professor, and Kathryn MacMahon is a senior lecturer at the Centre for Marine Ecosystems Research of the School of Natural Sciences at Edith Cowan University, in Western Australia. Kenneth L. Heck Jr. is a professor at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab and at the University of South Alabama. Euan Harvey is a professor in the Department of Environment and Agriculture at Curtin University, in Western Australia. Gary Kendrick is a professor and Thomas Wernberg is an associate professor at the Oceans Institute and School of Plant Biology at the University of Western Australia. Robert Orth is a professor in the Virginia Institute of Marine Science at the College of William & Mary, in Gloucester Point, Virginia. The late Alan Pearce was a principal research scientist at the Western Australian Department of Fisheries. Mathew Vanderklift is a research scientist at CSIRO Wealth Oceans Flagship, in Western Australia. Adriana Vergés is a senior lecturer at the School of Biological, Earth, and Environmental Sciences and the Evolution and Ecology Research Centre at the University of New South Wales, in Australia. Scott Whiting and Shaun Wilson are principal research scientists at the Department of Parks and Wildlife, in Western Australia. We dedicate this article to Alan Pearce, who passed away in the late stages of this article's development.
Abstract:
Climate-driven changes are altering production and functioning of biotic assemblages in terrestrial and aquatic environments. In temperate coastal waters, rising sea temperatures, warm water anomalies and poleward shifts in the distribution of tropical herbivores have had a detrimental effect on algal forests. We develop generalized scenarios of this form of tropicalization and its potential effects on the structure and functioning of globally significant and threatened seagrass ecosystems, through poleward shifts in tropical seagrasses and herbivores. Initially, we expect tropical herbivorous fishes to establish in temperate seagrass meadows, followed later by megafauna. Tropical seagrasses are likely to establish later, delayed by more limited dispersal abilities. Ultimately, food webs are likely to shift from primarily seagrass-detritus to more direct-consumption-based systems, thereby affecting a range of important ecosystem services that seagrasses provide, including their nursery habitat role for fishery species, carbon sequestration, and the provision of organic matter to other ecosystems in temperate regions.
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