Biofouling communities are usually managed as pests in aquaculture, yet their natural proliferation in fish farms makes them also promising IMTA extractive components. The growth and biomass production of four dominant macrofoulers, Mytilus galloprovincialis (mussels), Sabella spallanzanii (polychaete worms), Phallusia mammillata and Styela plicata (ascidians), were evaluated under a novel IMTA system in the Ionian Sea (southe...

Editorial Marine Animal Forests: Bridging Science, Policy, and Local Knowledge

The net effect of stress induced by climate change on forest functional dynamics remains uncertain. We monitored the dynamics of wood formation and cambial phenology for 11 consecutive years in two co‐occurring tree species with different drought tolerance, Pinus sylvestris and Quercus pyrenaica , providing a unique long‐term xylogenesis dataset (2012–2022). To assess the influence of climate on cambial and xylem developmental...

Temporal trends of the main Mediterranean benthic coastal marine habitats point to an overall decline of their extent and health status. We assessed recreational scuba divers’ perceptions of the temporal change abundance of two key Mediterranean ecosystem engineering species in the Cap de Creus Marine Protected Area: the red coral Corallium rubrum (an octocoral, component of coralligenous assemblages) and Posidonia oceanica (a...

Some marine benthic invertebrates increase the structural complexity of the seabed, thereby providing suitable habitats to several associated species, resulting in biodiversity hotspots. Marine Animal Forests (MAFs) encompass a set of the most important marine benthic habitats into which diversified sessile suspension feeders like sponges, corals, sea pens, tube worms, bivalves, bryozoans and ascidians occur. Such a mix of ses...

The structural and functional change of shallow-water coral reefs is a reality that is still not fully understood. In many areas of the world, such as the Caribbean shallow waters, it has been shown that macroalgae, sponges, and octocorals occupy the seascape left by stress-sensitive scleractinians, which did not resist human impacts. In this paper, we analyze different drivers for the current- day resilience of one of the “wi...

Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) has been demonstrated to be a very useful tool to minimize the waste product production of fish monocultures whilst promoting biomass that can be used for different purposes. The stable isotope analysis (δ13C, δ15N, and C:N ratio) of bioremediating organisms present in an IMTA facility is critical to understanding the nutrient flow between farm food waste and filter-feeding organisms...