Meta-analysis of ecosystem services associated with oyster restoration on the Eastern and Gulf coasts of the US

We conducted a meta-analysis to systematically quantify the success and uncertainty of oyster reef restoration for a suite of biological, biogeochemical, and physical ecosystem services relative to both degraded and natural reference habitats. We focused on the eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica . To evaluate whether restored eastern oyster reefs enhance ecosystem services relative to unaltered, degraded habitats and whether restored reefs provide ecosystem services equivalent to reference reefs, we synthesized data and calculated log response ratios for 245 restored-degraded reef pairs and 136 restored-reference reef pairs from 106 publications collected along 3500 km of U.S. Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic coastlines.

本研究开展了一项荟萃分析（meta-analysis），系统量化了牡蛎礁修复在一系列生物、生物地球化学及物理生态系统服务方面的成效与不确定性，对比基准为退化栖息地与自然参照生境。本研究聚焦于东部牡蛎（Crassostrea virginica）。为验证修复后的东部牡蛎礁相较于未受扰动的退化栖息地是否可提升生态系统服务，以及修复礁能否提供与参照礁等效的生态系统服务，本研究整合了106篇已发表文献中的数据，并计算了对数响应比（log response ratios）；所涉数据集覆盖沿美国墨西哥湾及大西洋海岸线3500公里范围内的245组修复-退化礁对与136组修复-参照礁对。