Graba-Landry PhD thesis: The effect of increasing temperature to algae-fish interactions on coral reefs

This thesis investigated the role of temperature in influencing algae-fish interactions on coral reefs. Specifically the aims of the thesis were to determine: (1) the relative influence of natural variations in water temperature on the feeding rates of herbivorous fishes; (2) how rates of turf algae growth and feeding rates of herbivorous fishes change with seasonal variation in temperature; (3) how predicted increases in temperature are likely to affect the growth and survival of common coral reef macroalgae; (4) how individual metabolism, feeding rates, growth and body condition of a common herbivorous fish changes with temperature.  These aims were addressed in the following five chapters.Chapter 2 investigates the influence of natural variation in temperature versus resource availability in influencing herbivore feeding rates by quantifying feeding of three functionally distinct herbivores among three latitudes and two seasons on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), and among reefs with distinct algal communities.Chapter 3 builds on the findings of Chapter 2, and investigates how seasonal variation in temperature influences the relative rates of herbivore feeding and turf algal growth in the northern GBR.Chapter 4 uses experimental manipulation of temperature to investigate the influence of increasing temperature on the growth, survival, tissue quality and susceptibility to herbivory of adult and juvenile life stages of the common coral reef macroalgae Sargassum.Chapter 5 uses juvenile Siganus doliatus, a common herbivorous reef fish, to investigate the effect of rearing temperature on physiological processes (i.e., oxygen uptake, feeding rate, growth and body condition).This dataset consists of 27 files in comma-separated values (.csv) format:Benthic_Latitude_sub_1.csv - Chapter 2: Benthic Count data from point intercept transects across three latitudesCross_Shelf_Benthos_MDS.csv - Chapter 2: Benthic Count data from point intercept transects across the continental shelf in the northern GBRCross_Shelf_Feeding_nonorthpoint.csv - Benthic Count data from point intercept transects across the continental shelf in the northern GBR, no north point siteLatitude_with_resource.csv - Chapter 2: Herbivore feeding data across the three latitudes along the GBRCrossShelf_with_Resource.csv - Chapter 2: Herbivore feeding data across the continental shelf in the northern GBRRESOURCE_Seasonal_Comparison.csv - Chapter 2: Herbivore feeding data between two seasons in the northern GBRCommunity_Subreps_Total_R.csv - Chapter 3: Feeding rate data of herbivore assemblages from video analysis on 1m^2 quadratsDry_Wt_n10.csv - Chapter 3: Algal growth data from tiles across four seasons at Lizard IslandLizard_Temp_8.8.csv - Chapter 3: Temperature data from AIMS loggers at 8.8 m at Lizard IslandSeasonal_Benthic.csv - Chapter 3: Benthic Count data from point intercept transects over four seasons at Lizard IslandSeasonal_Feeding_Contrasts .csv - Chapter 3: Seasonal Feeding Contrasts for catapillar plotsSeasonal_with_Resouce.csv - Chapter 3: Herbivore Feeding rates of 8 species over four seasons at Lizard IslandFish_Abundance_Counts.csv - Chapter 3: Herbivore Count data from 50x5m transects over four seasons at Lizard IslandCarbon_New.csv - Chapter 4: Carbon data for three species of Sargassum grown in different temperaturesNitrogen_New.csv - Chapter 4: Nitrogen data for three species of Sargassum grown in different temperaturesglm_mass_consumed.csv - Chapter 4: Data for mass consumed by the wild herbivore assemblage on Sargassum grown in three different temperature treatments.Penetrometer_nocris2016.csv - Chapter 4: Physical toughness data for three species of Sargassum grown in three different temperature treatmentsRGRNew.csv - Chapter4: Relative Growth Rate of Sargassum propagules grown in three different temperature treatmentsSurvival.csv - Chapter 4: Survival data for Sargassum propagules grown in three different temperature treatmentsRGR_NEW.csv - Chapter 4: Relative Growth Rate of three different species of Sargassum grown in different temperature treatmentsMass_Std_glm.csv - Chapter 4: Mass standardized bites from the wild herbivorous fish assemblage on three species of Sargassum grown in different temperature treatments. From video analysisFeeding_Assay_Total_Bites.csv - Chapter 5: Feeding assay: bites from fishes grown in different temperature treatments on different seaweedsHepatosomatic_Index.csv - Chapter 5: Hepatosomatic index of juvenile S. doliatus grown in different temperature treatmentsMARFU Temperature Data.csv - Chapter 5: Tank temperature data for experimental durationMO2_metadata_bottom_10.csv - Chapter 5: MO2 Rest data for fishes grown in different temperature treatmentsRGR_LENGTH_ALL_R.csv - Chapter 5: Relative growth rate data for fish grown in different temperature treatments, by total length (cm)RGR_WEIGHT_ALL_R.csv - Chapter 5: Relative growth rate data for fishes grown in different temperature treatments by wet weight (g)