2018 Tubbataha benthic resurvey

College

College of Science

Department/Unit

Br. Alfred Shields FSC Ocean Research Center

Document Type

Report

First Page

1

Last Page

27

Publication Date

2018

Abstract

The annual monitoring resurvey of Tubbataha Reefs Natural Park was done on May 3 to 8, 2018 to update the status of the coral reefs in the location. Ten regular monitoring stations (i.e., Stations 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B, 3A, 3B, 4A, 4B, Jessie Beazley A, and Jessie Beazley B), two grounding sites (i.e., that of the USS Guardian and Min Ping Yu), and one new station (i.e., Southwest Wall of the South Atoll) were visited this year. Hard coral cover (HCC) and benthic composition were obtained using photo-transect method in the ten regular monitoring stations. HCC of five out of the ten stations reveals statistically significant changes through time based on linear regression analysis, but these changes may not be ecologically significant overall. The quadrat method was also used in the grounding sites to determine the changes in within different zones in the sites. The ‘ground zero’ quadrat in USS Guardian showed a statistically significant increase of 1.4% (p-value 0.001) in HCC and a decrease in algal assemblage cover by 2.7% (p-value

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Disciplines

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Keywords

Tubbataha Reefs Natural Park (Philippines); Marine parks and reserves—Monitoring—Philippines

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