Data from: Temperature drives seagrass recovery across the Western North Atlantic
- Smulders, Fee O. H.1
- Campbell, Justin2
- Altieri, Andrew3
- Armitage, Anna4
- Bakker, Elisabeth5
- Barry, Savanna3
- Becker, Tatiana1
- Bethel, Enrique6
- Douglass, James7
- van Duinhoven, Hannah1
- de Fouw, Jimmy8
- Frazer, Thomas9
- Glazner, Rachael6
- Goeke, Janelle6
- Gort, Gerrit1
- Heck, Kenneth10
- Kramer, Olivier1
- van de Leemput, Ingrid1
- Manuel, Sarah11
- Martin, Charles3
- Martinez Lopez, Isis6
- McDonald, Ashley6
- Munson, Calvin2
- O'Shea, Owen12
- Paul, Valerie6
- Reynolds, Laura3
- Rhoades, Olivia6
- Rodriguez Bravo, Lucia13
- Sang, Amanda2
- Sawall, Yvonne14
- Smith, Khalil6
- Thompson, Jamie6
- van Tussenbroek, Brigitta15
- Wied, William6
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Christianen, Marjolijn1
- 1. Wageningen University & Research
- 2. Florida International University
- 3. University of Florida
- 4. Texas A&M University
- 5. Netherlands Institute of Ecology
- 6. Smithsonian Marine Station
- 7. Florida Gulf Coast University
- 8. Radboud University Nijmegen
- 9. University of South Florida
- 10. Dauphin Island Sea Lab
- 11. Government of Bermuda*
- 12. MSc Foundation*
- 13. King Abdullah University of Science and Technology
- 14. Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences
- 15. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Description
Climate-driven shifts in herbivores, temperature and nutrient runoff threaten coastal ecosystem resilience. However, our understanding of ecological resilience, particularly for foundation species, remains limited due to a rarity of field experiments that are conducted across appropriate spatial and temporal scales and that investigate multiple stressors. This study aimed to evaluate the resilience of a tropical marine plant (turtlegrass) to disturbances across its geographic range and how this is impacted by environmental gradients in abiotic and biotic factors. We assessed the resilience (i.e. recovery) of turtlegrass to a simulated disturbance (complete above- and belowground biomass removal) over a year. Contrary to temperate studies, higher temperature generally enhanced seagrass recovery. While nutrients and light availability had minimal impact, combined high levels of nutrients and herbivore grazing (meso and megaherbivore) reduced aboveground recovery. Our results suggest that the resilience of some tropical species, especially in cooler subtropical waters, may initially increase with warming.
Notes
Funding provided by: Dutch Research Council
ROR ID: https://ror.org/04jsz6e67
Award Number: 181-002
Funding provided by: Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
ROR ID: https://ror.org/043c0p156
Award Number:
Funding provided by: National Science Foundation
ROR ID: https://ror.org/021nxhr62
Award Number: OCE-1737116
Funding provided by: National Science Foundation
ROR ID: https://ror.org/021nxhr62
Award Number: OCE-1737247
Funding provided by: National Science Foundation
ROR ID: https://ror.org/021nxhr62
Award Number: OCE-2019022
Funding provided by: National Science Foundation
ROR ID: https://ror.org/021nxhr62
Award Number: OCE-1737144
Methods
This dataset contains the data collected from field experiments studying the impact of fertilization treatments and environmental drivers on the recovery rate of the (sub)tropical seagrass species Thalassia testudinum. In this study, we experimentally disturbed plots of seagrass by removing all above and below ground biomass within a 15 cm diameter circle. The experiment was conducted at 10 sites across the Western North Atlantic (spanning 20 degrees of latitude) with natural variation in environmental drivers. In addition, we applied fertilization treatments to test the effect of experimental nutrient addition on seagrass recovery rates (N = 5). During one year post-disturbance, we measured the recovery of T. testudinum shoots as well as several environmental drivers (temperature, light, nutrient availability, fish and turtle grazing pressure), and after one year we quantified the recovery of the number of shoots and the amount of above- and below ground biomass within the disturbed patch. We used a generalised mixed model approach to assess what factors are driving above- and below ground recovery rates.
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Additional details
Related works
- Is source of
- 10.5061/dryad.2280gb602 (DOI)