Reef fish community mean body size decreases in warmer waters and varies
with trophic composition
Abstract
Aquatic ectotherms often reach smaller body sizes at higher
temperatures. By analysing ~15,000 coastal-reef fish
surveys across a 15oC spatial sea surface temperature gradient, we show
mean community-level fish length decreased by ~5% for
each 1oC warming, equating to a decrease in mean community-level
body-length by 50%, or mean weight by 90% from 14-29oC. We further
show dominant trophic guild composition shifts from invertivores and
piscivores, to herbivores and planktivores, as water temperature
increases. By investigating the contribution of trophic-composition to
overall community-mean-length, we show ~25% of
temperature-related changes could be attributed to trophic-composition
at the warmest sites, but close to zero at colder temperatures. Our
findings suggest that small changes in temperature will lead to large
changes in fish community body sizes, driven both by changes in
community trophic composition in warm waters, and by changes to the
average body sizes of fish within trophic guilds across all
temperatures.