Database of facilitative interactions between pairs of coastal marine habitats

Large-scale restoration of habitats is urgently needed to meet international calls for restoration and to reinstate the ecosystem services derived from these habitats. Coastal marine seascapes are comprised of interconnected habitats where their density, diversity and spatial distributions are shaped by the biophysical and ecological processes occurring among them. Cross-habitat facilitation, where processes generated in one habitat benefit another (e.g., wave attenuation, sediment stabilisation), naturally underpins coastal ecosystem development, resilience and expansion but restoration of coastal marine habitats has traditionally focused on single- rather than multi-habitat approaches. We identified over 2100 studies on coastal restoration, yet only 6 (0.002%) addressed restoration of multiple habitats concurrently, and just 3 explicitly aimed to harness cross-habitat facilitation. Using a systematic literature review, we then identified over 200 facilitative interactions between pairs of coastal marine habitats, but 85% of them were described on scales <1m. This database describes the spatial scale and type of facilitative processes documented between pairs of coastal marine habitat types. In order to scale-up coastal marine restoration, we need to address a key knowledge gap in understanding how processes underpinning cross-habitat facilitation operate at the spatial scales of those used in restoration.