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Shifting dominance among Scarid species on reefs representing a gradient of fishing pressure

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 July 2008

Eric Clua  and
Pierre Legendre
Eric Clua
Affiliation:
Secrétariat de la Communauté du Pacifique (CPS), BP D5, 98848 Nouméa Cedex, Nouvelle-Calédonie École Pratique des Hautes Études, UMR 5244 EPHE-CNRS-UPVD, Université de Perpignan, 54 bis avenue Paul Alduy, 66860 Perpignan, France
Pierre Legendre
Affiliation:
Département de sciences biologiques, Université de Montréal, CP 6128, Montréal, Québec H3C 3J7, Canada
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Abstract

The present paper analyzes data collected between 2001 and 2002 on 81 reef fish species targeted by fishers at 5 sites in the Kingdom of Tonga (South Pacific). We first ranked the sites with respect to fishing pressure using two independent methods: (i) Tongan demography and reef surfaces available for fishing, and (ii) the differential effects of fishing on the whole set of 81 species grouped by their life history traits (LHT). We then focused on Parrotfish (Scaridae), which are heavily targeted in coral reef fisheries. We used the identified gradient of fishing pressure to study the effect of fishing on the community structure and test the hypothesis of “shifting dominance” amongst the 20 Scarid species present in the surveys. In addition to the classical effect of decreasing fish size in a family strongly targeted by fishers, the shifting dominance phenomenon includes a decrease in the abundance of the large-bodied and highly targeted species, favouring their replacement by smaller-bodied species from the same family, which are less impacted by fishing. In a context of interspecific competition amongst Scarids, the stress of fishing appears as a factor favouring the replacement of species with large maximum size, and LHT promoting low resilience, by smaller species with the opposite attributes. The discussion focuses on the various processes that can explain the shifting dominance phenomenon. The total density of resilient species, which increased along the gradient of increasing fishing pressure, can be used as an indicator of the over-exploitation of fish communities for reef fisheries management.

Keywords

Fishing pressureCoral reef fish assemblagesReef fisheries indicatorShifting dominanceScarid fishPacific Ocean.
Type
Research Article
Information
Aquatic Living Resources , Volume 21 , Issue 3: Special Issue (Advances in Fisheries Analysis and Modelling – Reversible and Irreversible Changes in Fish Resources and their usage) , July 2008 , pp. 339 - 348
Copyright
© EDP Sciences, IFREMER, IRD, 2008

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