ERDDAP > info > bcodmo_dataset_789145

Grid DAP Data	Sub- set	Table DAP Data	Make A Graph	W M S	Source Data Files	Acces- sible	Title	Sum- mary	FGDC, ISO, Metadata	Back- ground Info	RSS	E mail	Institution	Dataset ID
		data	graph		files	public	[Edmunds and Lasker MEPS 2019 Fig 2a: Density by taxon and year] - Octocoral colony density by pooled taxa, life stage, and year from surveys conducted in St. John, US Virgin Islands from 2014 to 2017 (Collaborative Research: Pattern and process in the abundance and recruitment of Caribbean octocorals)		I   M	background			BCO-DMO	bcodmo_dataset_789145

The Dataset's Variables and Attributes

Row Type	Variable Name	Attribute Name	Data Type	Value
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	access_formats	String	.htmlTable,.csv,.json,.mat,.nc,.tsv
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	acquisition_description	String	The following methodology applies to this dataset in addition to other datasets published in Edmunds and Lasker (2019). Sampling and analytical procedures: Surveys were completed at six sites on shallow (7\u20139-m depth) fringing reefs on the south shore of St. John, between Cabritte Horn and White Point. In 1992, these sites were randomly selected on hard substrata along 4.5 km of shore between these headlands, and they have been censused annually to present. Each site consists of a permanently marked transect that has been 40-m long since 2000. The present project began in 2014 with the objective of augmenting a long-standing analysis of benthic community structure (which emphasized scleractinians with new analyses focused on octocorals. As part of this effort, arborescent octocorals were surveyed in situ with genus resolution, using 40 quadrats (0.5 \u00d7 0.5 m) placed at random, non- overlapping positions along the same transect (and re-randomized annually) located at each of the six sites. Surveys were completed over four weeks beginning on ~ 20th July of each of 2014\u20132017, and were conducted by counting and measuring the height of octocorals attached by holdfasts within each quadrat. Height was determined (\u00b1 1 cm) using a flexible tape measure stretched from the holdfast to the colony apex. Abundances were analyzed separately for adults (> 5-cm tall), and recruits (\u2264 5-cm tall), with this size cut-off based on the maximal height to which the recruits of most octocoral species are likely to grow in one year. While the benthos was inspected for all small octocorals, sampling efficiency probably was low for recruits consisting of only a few polyps (i.e., < 1-cm tall). Analyses testing for the effects of density dependence (DD) and self-thinning (ST) were first, completed for octocorals pooled among taxa, and second, for the three most common genera of octocorals. Evidence of DD recruitment also was sought from analyses of per capita recruitment by site, with these values obtained by dividing the density of recruits by mean density of adults. For more information about statistical analyses performed using these data see Edmunds and Lasker (2019).
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_award_nid	String	752507
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_award_number	String	OCE-1756678
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_data_url	String	http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=1756678
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_funder_name	String	NSF Division of Ocean Sciences
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_funding_acronym	String	NSF OCE
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_funding_source_nid	String	355
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_program_manager	String	David L. Garrison
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	awards_0_program_manager_nid	String	50534
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	cdm_data_type	String	Other
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	comment	String	Edmunds and Lasker MEPS 2019 Fig 2a: Density by taxon and year PI: Peter J. Edmunds Data Version 1: 2020-02-04
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	Conventions	String	COARDS, CF-1.6, ACDD-1.3
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	creator_email	String	info at bco-dmo.org
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	creator_name	String	BCO-DMO
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	creator_type	String	institution
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	creator_url	String	https://www.bco-dmo.org/
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	data_source	String	extract_data_as_tsv version 2.3 19 Dec 2019
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	date_created	String	2020-02-04T18:31:40Z
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	date_modified	String	2020-02-14T21:22:58Z
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	defaultDataQuery	String	&amp;time&lt;now
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	doi	String	10.1575/1912/bco-dmo.789145.1
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	infoUrl	String	https://www.bco-dmo.org/dataset/789145
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	institution	String	BCO-DMO
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	instruments_0_dataset_instrument_nid	String	789148
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	instruments_0_description	String	A tape measure or measuring tape is a flexible ruler. It consists of a ribbon of cloth, plastic, fibre glass, or metal strip with linear-measurement markings. It is a common measuring tool.
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	instruments_0_instrument_name	String	Measuring Tape
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	instruments_0_instrument_nid	String	645010
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	keywords	String	bco, bco-dmo, biological, chemical, data, dataset, density, dmo, erddap, life, Life_stage, management, oceanography, office, preliminary, site, stage, taxon, year
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	license	String	https://www.bco-dmo.org/dataset/789145/license
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	metadata_source	String	https://www.bco-dmo.org/api/dataset/789145
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	param_mapping	String	{'789145': {}}
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	parameter_source	String	https://www.bco-dmo.org/mapserver/dataset/789145/parameters
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_0_affiliation	String	California State University Northridge
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_0_affiliation_acronym	String	CSU-Northridge
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_0_person_name	String	Peter J. Edmunds
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_0_person_nid	String	51536
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_0_role	String	Principal Investigator
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_0_role_type	String	originator
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_1_affiliation	String	State University of New York at Buffalo
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_1_affiliation_acronym	String	SUNY Buffalo
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_1_person_name	String	Howard Lasker
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_1_person_nid	String	562092
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_1_role	String	Co-Principal Investigator
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_1_role_type	String	originator
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_2_affiliation	String	Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_2_affiliation_acronym	String	WHOI BCO-DMO
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_2_person_name	String	Amber York
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_2_person_nid	String	643627
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_2_role	String	BCO-DMO Data Manager
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	people_2_role_type	String	related
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	project	String	Octocoral Community Dynamics
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_acronym	String	Octocoral Community Dynamics
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_description	String	NSF abstract: Coral reefs are exposed to a diversity of natural and anthropogenic disturbances, and the consequences for ecosystem degradation have been widely publicized. However, the reported changes have been biased towards fishes and stony corals, and for Caribbean reefs, the most notable example of this bias are octocorals ("soft corals"). Although they are abundant and dominate many Caribbean reefs, they are rarely included in studies due to the difficulty of both identifying them and in quantifying their abundances. In some places there is compelling evidence that soft corals have increased in abundance, even while stony corals have become less common. This suggests that soft corals are more resilient than stony corals to the wide diversity of disturbances that have been impacting coral corals. The best coral reefs on which to study these changes are those that have been studied for decades and can provide a decadal context to more recent events, and in this regard the reefs of St. John, US Virgin Islands are unique. Stony corals on the reefs have been studied since 1987, and the soft corals from 2014. This provides unrivalled platform to evaluate patterns of octocoral abundance and recruitment; identify the patterns of change that are occurring on these reefs, and identify the processes responsible for the resilience of octocoral populations. The project will extend soft coral monitoring from 4 years to 8 years, and within this framework will examine the roles of baby corals, and their response to seafloor roughness, seawater flow, and seaweed, in determining the success of soft corals. The work will also assess whether the destructive effects of Hurricanes Irma and Maria have modified the pattern of change. In concert with these efforts the project will be closely integrated with local high schools at which the investigators will host marine biology clubs and provide independent study opportunities for their students and teachers. Unique training opportunities will be provided to undergraduate and graduate students, as well as a postdoctoral researcher, all of whom will study and work in St. John, and the investigators will train coral reef researchers to identify the species of soft corals through a hands-on workshop to be conducted in the Florida Keys. Understanding how changing environmental conditions will affect the community structure of major biomes is the ecological objective defining the 21st century. The holistic effects of these conditions on coral reefs will be studied on shallow reefs within the Virgin Islands National Park in St. John, US Virgin Islands, which is the site of one of the longest-running, long-term studies of coral reef community dynamics in the region. With NSF-LTREB support, the investigators have been studying long-term changes in stony coral communities in this location since 1987, and in 2014 NSF-OCE support was used to build an octocoral "overlay" to this decadal perspective. The present project extends from this unique history, which has been punctuated by the effects of Hurricanes Irma and Maria, to place octocoral synecology in a decadal context, and the investigators exploit a rich suite of legacy data to better understand the present and immediate future of Caribbean coral reefs. This four-year project will advance on two concurrent fronts: first, to extend time-series analyses of octocoral communities from four to eight years to characterize the pattern and pace of change in community structure, and second, to conduct a program of hypothesis-driven experiments focused on octocoral settlement that will uncover the mechanisms allowing octocorals to more effectively colonize substrata than scleractinian corals on present day reefs. Specifically, the investigators will conduct mensurative and manipulative experiments addressing four hypotheses focusing on the roles of: (1) habitat complexity in distinguishing between octocoral and scleractinian recruitment niches, (2) the recruitment niche in mediating post-settlement success, (3) competition in algal turf and macroalgae in determining the success of octocoral and scleractian recruits, and (4) role of octocoral canopies in modulating the flux of particles and larvae to the seafloor beneath. The results of this study will be integrated to evaluate the factors driving higher ecological resilience of octocorals versus scleractinians on present-day Caribbean reefs. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_end_date	String	2022-03
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_geolocation	String	St. John, US Virgin Islands
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_name	String	Collaborative Research: Pattern and process in the abundance and recruitment of Caribbean octocorals
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_project_nid	String	752508
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	projects_0_start_date	String	2018-04
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	publisher_name	String	Biological and Chemical Oceanographic Data Management Office (BCO-DMO)
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	publisher_type	String	institution
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	sourceUrl	String	(local files)
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	standard_name_vocabulary	String	CF Standard Name Table v55
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	summary	String	Octocoral colony density pooled by taxon and year from surveys conducted in St. John, US Virgin Islands from 2014 to 2017. These data were used in Edmunds and Lasker (2019) Figure 2.
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	title	String	[Edmunds and Lasker MEPS 2019 Fig 2a: Density by taxon and year] - Octocoral colony density by pooled taxa, life stage, and year from surveys conducted in St. John, US Virgin Islands from 2014 to 2017 (Collaborative Research: Pattern and process in the abundance and recruitment of Caribbean octocorals)
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	version	String	1
attribute	NC_GLOBAL	xml_source	String	osprey2erddap.update_xml() v1.3
variable	Year		short
attribute	Year	_FillValue	short	32767
attribute	Year	actual_range	short	2014, 2017
attribute	Year	bcodmo_name	String	site
attribute	Year	description	String	Year (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017)
attribute	Year	long_name	String	Year
attribute	Year	units	String	unitless
variable	Taxon		String
attribute	Taxon	bcodmo_name	String	site_descrip
attribute	Taxon	description	String	Taxon (All Taxa, Eunicea, Gorgonia, Antillogorgia)
attribute	Taxon	long_name	String	Taxon
attribute	Taxon	units	String	unitless
variable	Site		String
attribute	Site	bcodmo_name	String	stage
attribute	Site	description	String	Site (Cabritte Horn, Europa Bay, West Tektite, East Tektite, White Point, West Little Lameshur)
attribute	Site	long_name	String	Site
attribute	Site	units	String	unitless
variable	Life_stage		String
attribute	Life_stage	bcodmo_name	String	taxon
attribute	Life_stage	description	String	Life stage (adult or Juvenile)
attribute	Life_stage	long_name	String	Life Stage
attribute	Life_stage	units	String	unitless
variable	Density		byte
attribute	Density	_FillValue	byte	127
attribute	Density	actual_range	byte	0, 8
attribute	Density	bcodmo_name	String	density
attribute	Density	description	String	Colony density, number of colonies in 0.5 x 0.5 m quadrat
attribute	Density	long_name	String	Density
attribute	Density	units	String	number per quadrat

The information in the table above is also available in other file formats (.csv, .htmlTable, .itx, .json, .jsonlCSV1, .jsonlCSV, .jsonlKVP, .mat, .nc, .nccsv, .tsv, .xhtml) via a RESTful web service.