Herbivorous fish communities of the Great Barrier Reef - LTMP

The purpose of this study is to examine the GBR-wide spatial distributions of large mobile herbivorous fishes. Target taxa include species within three familes (Acanthuridae, Scaridae and Siganidae) that can be aggregated into four feeding functional groups (grazers/detritivores, algal browsers, excavators and scrapers). Abundances of herbivorous fish species are recorded annually using visual census along permanently marked transects as part of the Long Term Monitoring Program (refer to ‘fish communities of the GBR’ for details of the sampling design). To address the current objective, data from two survey years that occurred within the 2006-2009 time period are included for each of 92 reefs. Mean abundance and species richness were calculated across the two survey years for each reef. Spatial distribution maps have been created showing spatial variation in abundance and richness of the three herbivorous fish families and the four functional groups. Maps of total abundance and total species richness of the pooled herbivorous fish species data are presented last.