Repeated bleaching events driven by heat stress have caused extensive coral mortality and declines in survivors’ reproductive output, undermining reef recovery. On the Great Barrier Reef, heat stress events currently coincide with early oogenesis in many abundant taxa; with climate change, earlier onsets are expected to increasingly overlap later gametogenic stages. How coral reproduction responds as gametes mature in warmer w...

Healthy coral reefs hold significant value to society, not just from industries such as tourism or fishing, but by their very existence. These so-called ‘non-use benefits’ are increasingly endangered as the health of coral reefs faces escalating threats from climate change. Yet, current observation and modelling tools that help guide reef intervention efforts typically do not provide guidance on how the impact of management ac...

Demographic rates of juvenile corals are critical to reef recovery, yet their variation across environmental gradients remains understudied. Over three years, we assessed juvenile coral vital rates across the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) and Torres Strait (TS), spanning 14° latitude and diverse inshore to offshore environments. Environmental conditions varied, with annual temperatures ranging 24–28 °C, high turbidity in the southe...

Erosion is a key process in shaping the physical structure of coral reefs, yet due to erosion being semi‐cryptic and difficult to quantify, information remains limited. Here, we investigate erosional processes along Ningaloo Reef, an extensive fringing coral reef in Western Australia. We employed both direct and indirect methods to measure erosion in wave‐exposed reef slopes and protected lagoonal habitats. Direct measurements...

Coral reefs are model systems for studies of ecological resilience, with communities generally exhibiting multiple stable states and more resilient regions trending towards a single, coral-dominated, regime. We expand the theory of ecological resilience beyond the concepts of distinct stable states to integrate emerging ideas from transient dynamics as long-term intermediate states with no pronounced trend towards equilibria....

Indo-Pacific corals predominantly reproduce using synchronous mass spawning events to maximise fertilisation. However, as disturbances continue to thin population densities, the quantities of gametes released declines and colonies become more isolated, reducing the likelihood of cross-fertilisation. Local hydrodynamic conditions can promote or inhibit gamete contact; thus, the interaction between the abiotic environment and sp...

With rubble predicted to increase on coral reefs worldwide, we review the physical, biological, and ecological dynamics of rubble beds, with a focus on how rubble generation, mobilization, binding, and coral recruitment is expected to change on future reefs. Major disturbances, including storms and coral bleaching, are predicted to increase in intensity and frequency, and—like localized impacts including blast fishing and ship...

Bolbometopon muricatum (bumphead parrotfish, Valenciennes, 1839) is a conspicuous, iconic and ecologically important coral reef fish species. B. muricatum plays an important role in the bioerosion of the reef framework and as a result has been described as both an ecosystem engineer and keystone species. Despite the complete absence of B. muricatum from 32 years of scientific surveys across the Ningaloo Reef World Heritage Are...

Herbivory and nutrient availability are fundamental drivers of benthic community succession in shallow marine systems, including coral reefs. Despite the importance of early community succession for coral recruitment and recovery, studies characterizing the impact of top‐down and bottom‐up drivers on micro‐ and macrobenthic communities at scales relevant to coral recruitment are lacking. Here, a combination of tank and field e...

Aim The aim was to quantify latitudinal patterns in seagrass–herbivore interactions in the context of a warming climate. Location: We carried out a global meta‐analysis combined with a field experiment across 1,700 km and 12° of latitude in Western Australia. Time period: 1984–2014. Major taxa studied: Seagrasses. Methods We first synthesized the global literature on herbivore exclusion experiments in seagrasses to test whethe...

Community succession following disturbance depends on positive and negative interactions, the strength of which change along environmental gradients. To investigate how early succession affects coral reef recovery, we conducted an 18‐month experiment in Palau, using recruitment tiles and herbivore exclusion cages. One set of reefs has higher wave exposure and had previously undergone a phase shift to macroalgae following a maj...