The Structure of Coral Communities at Hurghada in the Northern Red Sea

Authors

Bernhard Riegl, Universität Wien - AustriaFollow
Branko Velimirov, Universität Wien - Austria

ORCID

0000-0002-6003-9324

ResearcherID

F-8807-2011

Document Type

Article

Publication Title

Marine Ecology

ISSN

0173-9565

Publication Date

12-1994

Keywords

Coral community structure, Red Sea, Scleractinia, Coral reef, Diversity

Abstract

The community structure of hard and soft corals, with an emphasis on hard corals, was determined by means of line-transects on 9 on-and off-shore reefs of different type and different wave exposure in the Northern Red Sea near Hurghada in Egypt. Coral communities were found to differentiate along a horizontal wind- and wave-exposure gradient. Exposed communities were dominated by Acropora species, sheltered communities by Porites species, and semi-exposed communities by Millepora species. Also, vertical within-reef zonations following a depth gradient were observed; these were unique for each exposure-determined community type. Average transect diversity was highest on semi-exposed reefs, lowest on sheltered reefs. Reef slopes were more diverse than other reef zones. The observed community structure was compared with data from the literature, and widely distributed, roughly comparable hard and soft coral communities were identified.

DOI

10.1111/j.1439-0485.1994.tb00054.x

Volume

15

Issue

3-4

First Page

213

Last Page

231

Comments

©1994 Blackwell Verlag GmbH

NSUWorks Citation

Bernhard Riegl and Branko Velimirov. 1994. The Structure of Coral Communities at Hurghada in the Northern Red Sea .Marine Ecology , (3-4) : 213 -231. https://nsuworks.nova.edu/occ_facarticles/233.