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NRLD - 329924 | Psammocora stellata

Assessment ID
329924
Taxon name
Psammocora stellata
Verrill, 1868
Uploaded by
National Red List Database
Taxonomic information
Scientific name
Psammocora stellata
Verrill, 1868
Assessed taxon level
Species
Higher level taxonomic groupings
Invertebrates
Corals
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
cnidaria
Class
anthozoa
Order
scleractinia
Family
siderastreidae
Genus
Psammocora
Species
stellata
Species authority
Verrill, 1868
Location and scope
Specific locality or subnational name or regional name
United Arab Emirates (the)
Scope (of the Assessment)
National
Countries included within the scope of the assessment
United Arab Emirates (the)
Country ISO code(s)
ARE
Does the assessment cover a marine EEZ area(s)?
Not_assigned
Conservation Status
Assessed as
Vulnerable
Abbreviated status
VU
Qualifying criteria (if given)
A2bc
Criteria system used
IUCN

(see Assessment details)

Assessment rationale/justification
This coral occurs along both coasts of the UAE, where it is generally rare. The most important known threat for this species is extensive reduction of coral reef habitat due to a combination of threats. However, species in the genus Psammocora seem to be relatively resistant and resilient to anthropogenic stressors. Species-specific information is limited; it is generally rare but present in UAE waters. In Abu Dhabi, it was recorded at few sites and at lower abundance after the 2017 mass bleaching; given its rarity, estimates of population decline are based on the total coral mortality. The 2017 bleaching event caused substantial declines of even resilient coral taxa (e.g., Favia and Favites) and overall, coral mortality exceeded 70% in shallow-water habitats of Abu Dhabi. As Abu Dhabi represents approximately half of this species' distribution in the UAE, it is suspected that population declines have exceeded 30% over the past three generation lengths (30 years). Therefore, this species is listed as Vulnerable A2bc. No regional adjustment is made to the Vulnerable listing.
Assessment details
Year assessed
2019
Assessors/contributors/reviewers listed
UAE National Red List Workshop
Criteria system used
IUCN
Reference for methods given
IUCN. 2012. IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria: Version 3.1, Second edition. IUCN, Gland, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK. iv + 32pp pp. And IUCN. 2012. Guidelines for Application of IUCN Red List Criteria at Regional and National Levels: Version 4.0. Gland, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK: IUCN. iii + 41pp.
Further information
Endemism (according to assessment)
Endemic to region
Not assigned
Taxon distribution as listed in assessment
This species is reported from UAE waters in the Gulf (Riegl et al. 2012) and may also occur along the Sea of Oman coast. However, individuals identified as P. stellata from Kuwait were determined to be hybrids of P. stellata and P. contigua (Stefani et al. 2008); the status of individuals from elsewhere in the Gulf is unknown. Elsewhere, it is widely distributed in the Indo-Pacific.
Is there a map available in assessment?
Yes
Habitat and systems
Ecological system type
Terrestrial
Not_assigned
Freshwater
Not_assigned
Marine
Yes
Habitat
Habitat details as listed in assessment
This species occurs on shallow wave washed rock, or at depths of 15-20 m depth on coarse sand bottoms (Hickman 2005). In general, species of Psammocora are very slow growing corals; with a calculated growth rate of 0.6cm/year for P. superficialis in Costa Rica (Guzmán and Cortés 1989, 1993). Sexual reproduction is important, but asexual reproduction and fragmentation are more effective strategies for colonizing free areas within the reef (Cortés and Guzmán 1998); as such, these species are considered to be among the most opportunistic because of the capacity to rapidly recolonize open areas after disturbances (Guzmán and Cortés 2001).The age of first maturity of most reef building corals is typically three to eight years (Wallace 1999) and therefore we assume that average age of mature individuals is greater than eight years. Furthermore, based on average sizes and growth rates, we assume that average generation length is 10 years, unless otherwise stated. Total longevity is not known, but likely to be more than ten years. Therefore, any population decline rates for the Red List assessment are measured over at least 30 years.
Threats and conservation measures listed
Threats listed in assessment
In the Gulf, the major threats to corals include extreme and increasing temperature variability due to climate change, as well as direct destruction and increased turbidity caused by coastal construction (Riegl et al. 2012). Although bleaching thresholds in the Gulf are the highest recorded in the world (Riegl et al. 2012), bleaching events in the UAE have resulted in significant mortality (such as in 1996-1998, 2002, 2010 and 2017) and slow recovery (Burt et al. 2008). In Abu Dhabi, the most recent coral bleaching event resulted in nearly 95% of corals bleaching, and by April 2018, mortality reached 73% (Burt et al. 2019). This event resulted in mass mortality of even the more stress-tolerant corals such as poritids and merulinids (Burt et al. 2019). Coastal development, particularly large-scale offshore real estate developments and sedimentation associated with reclamation, has directly buried coral reefs in the Gulf (Burt et al. 2008, 2013; Burt 2014; Burt and Bartholomew 2019). In the Sea of Oman, UAE reefs have experienced major hurricanes and harmful algal blooms that caused high coral mortality and shifted community structure (Bauman et al. 2010, Foster et al. 2011).Globally, the major threat to corals is global climate change, in particular, temperature extremes leading to bleaching and increased susceptibility to disease, increased severity of ENSO events and storms, and ocean acidification. This species experienced localized population declines after El Niño events (for example, Española Island, Galapagos: Glynn 1997 and Manuel Antonio and Punta Cambial, Costa Rica: Jiménez and Cortés 2001, 2003). However, it is more resistant to bleaching than shallow-water corals such as Pocillopora (Feingold 1996). In some localities, species of Psammocora were overgrown by algae after a bleaching event. For example, large aggregations of this species were overgrown by thick mats of Caulerpa after the 1982-1983 El Niño event in Panama (Glynn 1997); similar overgrowth of Psammocora-dominated reefs occurred at La Penca, Costa Rica (Bernadette et al. 2006). At Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica, species of Psammocora were completely overgrown by a brown algae (Jimenez and Cortés 2001). Species of Psammocora are also negatively impacted by predation by the crown-of-thorns starfish, Acanthaster planci, and pufferfish, Arothron meleagris (Cortés and Guzmán 1998, Reyes-Bonilla et al. 1998). These voracious predators of reef-building corals are found throughout the Pacific and Indian Oceans, and the Red Sea. Populations of the crown-of-thorns starfish have greatly increased since the 1970s and have been known to wipe out large areas of coral reef habitat. Increased breakouts have become a major threat to some species, and have contributed to the overall decline and reef destruction in the Indo-Pacific region. The effects of such an outbreak include the reduction of abundance and surface cover of living coral, reduction of species diversity and composition, and overall reduction in habitat area. The pufferfish, Arothron meleagris, is capable of reducing populations of Psammocora species if other preferred coral species such as Porites lobata are absent (Cortés and Guzmán 1998).Coral disease has emerged as a serious threat to coral reefs worldwide and is a major cause of reef deterioration (Weil 2006). The numbers of diseases and coral species affected, as well as the distribution of diseases have all increased dramatically within the last decade (Porter et al. 2001, Green and Bruckner 2000, Sutherland et al. 2004, Weil 2004). Coral disease epizootics have resulted in significant losses of coral cover and were implicated in the dramatic decline of acroporids in the Florida Keys (Aronson and Precht 2001, Porter et al. 2001, Patterson et al. 2002). In the Indo-Pacific, disease is also on the rise with disease outbreaks recently reported from the Great Barrier Reef (Willis et al. 2004), Marshall Islands (Jacobson 2006) and the northwestern Hawaiian Islands (Aeby et al. 2006). Increased coral disease levels on the Great Barrier Reef were correlated with increased ocean temperatures (Willis et al. 2004) supporting the prediction that disease levels will be increasing with higher sea surface temperatures. Escalating anthropogenic stressors combined with the threats associated with global climate change of increases in coral disease, frequency and duration of coral bleaching and ocean acidification place coral reefs in the Indo-Pacific at high risk of collapse.Localized threats to corals include fisheries, human development (industry, settlement, tourism, and transportation), changes in native species dynamics (competitors, predators, pathogens and parasites), invasive species (competitors, predators, pathogens and parasites), dynamite fishing, chemical fishing, pollution from agriculture and industry, domestic pollution, sedimentation, and human recreation and tourism activities. The severity of these combined threats to the global population of each individual species is not known.
Publication
Ralph, G.M., Stump, E., Linardich, C., Bullock, R.W., Carpenter, K.E., Allen D.J., Hilton-Taylor, C., Al Mheiri, R., and Alshamsi, O. 2021. UAE National Red List of Marine Species: Reef-building corals, cartilaginous fishes and select bony fishes. 2021. Ministry of Climate Change and Environment, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.