[Coral-List] New paper on an under-recognized role for coral-eating fishes on reefs

[Adrienne Simoes Correa]

 <>Dear Coral Listers,

I’m emailing to share our new paper in Animal Microbiome, led by Carsten Grupstra, which provides support for an under-recognized role that coral-eating fishes play on reefs, as dispersers of coral symbionts. Our paper demonstrates that the feces of obligate corallivorous fishes are environmental hotspots of Symbiodiniaceae cells: live Symbiodiniaceae concentrations in such feces are 5–7 orders of magnitude higher than in reef-associated sediments and water. We also show that Symbiodiniaceae community compositions in the feces of obligate corallivores are similar to those in locally abundant coral genera, but differ from Symbiodiniaceae communities in the feces of facultative corallivores and grazer/detritivores, as well as in other environmental reservoirs. We estimate that per day, some obligate corallivorous fish species release >100 million Symbiodiniaceae cells per 100 sq. m of reef – an area about the size of 6 car parking spaces! Released corallivore feces came in direct contact with coral colonies on the forereef following >90% of observed egestion events, providing a potential mechanism for the transfer of live Symbiodiniaceae cells among coral colonies. The paper is open access: https://animalmicrobiome.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s42523-021-00086-4 <https://animalmicrobiome.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s42523-021-00086-4>. If you have questions, please let me know.

All the best,
Adrienne

Adrienne M.S. Correa (she/her)
Assistant Professor
BioSciences at Rice University

http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~ac53/
Instagram & Twitter: @CorreaLab