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NRLD - 329957 | Acropora valida

Assessment ID
329957
Taxon name
Acropora valida
(Dana, 1846)
Uploaded by
National Red List Database
Taxonomic information
Scientific name
Acropora valida
(Dana, 1846)
Assessed taxon level
Species
Higher level taxonomic groupings
Invertebrates
Corals
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
cnidaria
Class
anthozoa
Order
scleractinia
Family
acroporidae
Genus
Acropora
Species
valida
Species authority
(Dana, 1846)
Taxonomic notes and synonyms listed
Acropora parapharaonis and Acropora variabilis are now synonyms of this species.
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
Data Deficient
Abbreviated status
DD
Criteria system used
IUCN

(see Assessment details)

Assessment rationale/justification
This species is known from at least two localities in the UAE (Dubai and Fujairah emirates), suggesting that it may have occurred along both coasts of the UAE, but there are conflicting opinions regarding the validity of these records and its current presence and distribution in UAE waters. It may have been locally extirpated from the Gulf coast of the UAE as a result of the 1996-1998 mass bleaching and/or the land reclamation required for the Palm Island developments. In general, acroporids were dominant coral species historically, but have largely been extirpated from reefs within UAE waters since the 1970s. The most important known threat for this species is extensive reduction of coral reef habitat due to a combination of threats. As the distribution of this species in UAE waters is highly uncertain, it is listed as Data Deficient; given the extensive threats to acroporid corals in UAE, and their resultant decline, further research on the distribution of this species is necessary. No regional adjustment is made to the Data Deficient 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 has been reported from both coasts of the UAE, specifically from Dubai (Riegl 1999) and Fujairah (Bento 2009). It has been suggested that this species possibly occurred in the southeastern Gulf prior to the 1996-1998 mass bleaching and has since been locally extirpated (Burt et al. 2008, Riegl et al. 2012) or that the records from the Gulf refer to A. arabensis (Riegl et al. 2012). Additional research is needed to determine the complete distribution of this species within the UAE. 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 in shallow, tropical reef environments. It is found in a wide range of reef environments and rocky foreshores. It is found intertidally on the outer reef flat and subtidally on the reef edge and tops of submerged reefs (Wallace 1999). At Gorgona Island, Acropora valida was found in a rocky wall habitat (diabasic type) at approximately 10 m (Prahl and Mejia 1985). This species is found from 1-15 m. 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. Total longevity is not known, but likely to be more than ten years. Furthermore, based on average sizes and growth rates, we assume that average generation length is 10 years, unless otherwise stated. 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. Other threats include the crown-of-thorns starfish (Acanthaster planci), which has been observed preferentially preying upon corals of the genus Acropora (Colgan 1987). 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. Coral disease has emerged as a serious threat to coral reefs worldwide and 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 since the 1990s (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.
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.