Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
Reef types include fringing reefs, barrier reefs, and atolls. A fringing reef is a reef that is attached to an island. Whereas, a barrier reef forms a calcareous barrier around an island, resulting in a lagoon between the shore and the reef. Conversely, an atoll is a ring reef with no land present.
A reef is a ridge or shoal of rock, coral or similar relatively stable material, lying beneath the surface of a natural body of water. [55] Many reefs result from natural, abiotic processes but there are also reefs such as the coral reefs of tropical waters formed by biotic processes dominated by corals and coralline algae.
Canton Island typifies the isolated coral atolls dotting the Pacific Ocean. The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs, Being the first part of the geology of the voyage of the Beagle, under the command of Capt. Fitzroy, R.N. during the years 1832 to 1836, was published in 1842 as Charles Darwin's first monograph, and set out his theory of the formation of coral reefs and atolls.
Coral reef systems can dramatically shift from pristine coral-dominated systems to degraded algae-dominated systems when populations grazing on algae decline. The 1983 crash of sea urchin populations in Caribbean reef systems released algae from top-down control, allowing them to overgrow corals and resulting in a shift to a degraded state ...
Ecosystem classifications are specific kinds of ecological classifications that consider all four elements of the definition of ecosystems: a biotic component, an abiotic complex, the interactions between and within them, and the physical space they occupy. Biotic factors of the ecosystem are living things; such as plants, animals, and bacteria ...
The reef drop-off is, for its first 50 m, habitat for reef fish who find shelter on the cliff face and plankton in the water nearby. The drop-off zone applies mainly to the reefs surrounding oceanic islands and atolls. The reef face is the zone above the reef floor or the reef drop-off. This zone is often the reef's most diverse area.
An ecosystem is composed of biotic communities that are structured by biological interactions and abiotic environmental factors. Some of the important abiotic environmental factors of aquatic ecosystems include substrate type, water depth, nutrient levels, temperature, salinity, and flow.
Abiotic components include physical conditions and non-living resources that affect living organisms in terms of growth, maintenance, and reproduction. Resources are distinguished as substances or objects in the environment required by one organism and consumed or otherwise made unavailable for use by other organisms.