NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS-PIFSC-43 doi:10.7289/V5B27S76 November 2014 Design and Parameterization of a Coral Reef Ecosystem Model for Guam Mariska Weijerman, Isaac Kaplan, Elizabeth Fulton, Bec Gordon, Shanna Grafeld, and Rusty Brainard Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center National Marine Fisheries Service National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration U.S. Department of Commerce About this document The mission of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is to understand and predict changes in the Earth’s environment and to conserve and manage coastal and oceanic marine resources and habitats to help meet our Nation’s economic, social, and environmental needs. As a branch of NOAA, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) conducts or sponsors research and monitoring programs to improve the scientific basis for conservation and management decisions. NMFS strives to make information about the purpose, methods, and results of its scientific studies widely available. NMFS’ Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (PIFSC) uses the NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS series to achieve timely dissemination of scientific and technical information that is of high quality but inappropriate for publication in the formal peer- reviewed literature. The contents are of broad scope, including technical workshop proceedings, large data compilations, status reports and reviews, lengthy scientific or statistical monographs, and more. NOAA Technical Memoranda published by the PIFSC, although informal, are subjected to extensive review and editing and reflect sound professional work. Accordingly, they may be referenced in the formal scientific and technical literature. A NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS issued by the PIFSC may be cited using the following format: Weijerman, M., I. Kaplan, E. Fulton, B. Gordon, S. Grafeld, and R. Brainard. 2014. Design and parameterization of a coral reef ecosystem model for Guam. U.S. Dep. Commer., NOAA Tech. Memo., NOAA-TM-NMFS- PIFSC-43, 113 p. + Appendices. doi:10.7289/V5B27S76 __________________________ For further information direct inquiries to Chief, Scientific Information Services Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center National Marine Fisheries Service National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration U.S. Department of Commerce 1845 Wasp Boulevard Honolulu, Hawaii 96818-5007 Phone: 808-725-5386 Fax: 808-725-5532 ___________________________________________________________ Cover: Photograph courtesy of Pacific Islands Regional Observer Program, National Marine Fisheries Service. Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center National Marine Fisheries Service National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration U.S. Department of Commerce Design and Parameterization of a Coral Reef Ecosystem Model for Guam Mariska Weijerman1,2, Isaac Kaplan3, Elizabeth Fulton4, Bec Gorton4, Shanna Grafeld1, and Rusty Brainard5 1Joint Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research University of Hawaii, 1000 Pope Road Honolulu, Hawaii 96822 2Environmental System Analysis Group Wageningen University, P. O. Box 47 6700 AA Wageningen 3Conservation Biology Division Northwest Fisheries Science Center 2725 Montlake Boulevard East Seattle, Washington 98112 4Marine and Atmospheric Research Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization GPO Box 1538 Hobart Tasmania 7001, Australia 5Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center National Marine Fisheries Service 1845 Wasp Boulevard, Bldg 176 Honolulu, Hawaii 96818 NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS-PIFSC-43 November 2014 doi:10.7289/V5B27S76 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Declines in the fish stocks and degradation of habitats around Guam have serious implications for the residents of Guam who depend on the ecosystem goods and services provided by coral reefs. The planned large relocation of military personnel, their dependents and contractors will have additional impacts on these marine resources. Management on an ecosystem scale has proven to be a useful strategy to conserve, manage, and restore marine systems. Implementing ecosystem-based management requires an understanding of the complex and often synergistic dynamics of coral reefs, including the role of humans in the ecosystem. The Atlantis modeling framework integrates physical, chemical, ecological, and anthropogenic processes in a three- dimensional, spatially explicit domain and can serve as an useful decision-support tool for ecosystem-based coral reef management. The Atlantis ecosystem model has successfully been applied to investigate ecosystem-based fisheries management scenario evaluations and ecological questions in Australia and North America. In this report we describe the construction of the Guam Atlantis Coral Reef Ecosystem Model. Atlantis incorporates various submodels that each have their own set of parameters and variables. Here we describe the details of each model component and present the parameterizations of the spatial and ecological submodels. The ultimate goal of the fully developed model is to provide a tool to evaluate management strategy scenarios against a backdrop of climate and ocean change. The Guam Atlantis model is focused on the shallow (< 30 m) coral reefs fringing Guam and is predominantly based on biological data collected by the NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center Coral Reef Ecosystem Division (CRED), fisheries data collected by Guam Division of Aquatic and Wildlife Resources, and water quality data collected by Guam Environmental Protection Agency and CRED. The physical model will be based on model output of a Delft3D model developed by the U.S. Geological Survey and Deltares and will be incorporated in 2015. The Atlantis model uses polygons as its ‘grids’ which were drawn to represent areas of similar ecological and oceanographic characteristics while also taking into account the spatial strata of fisheries catch data and existing spatial management areas. The physical model forces temperature and water fluxes, and the loading of sediments and nutrients into the shallow waters. We simulate food web dynamics of 42 functional groups: 3 detritus, 2 bacteria, 5 plankton, 3 algae, 2 corals, 7 invertebrate, and 20 vertebrate groups. iii We gathered and analyzed environmental, habitat, biological, and fishery data from diverse sources. These data helped us identify information gaps, such as, near-shore habitat data, biomass and abundance data of invertebrate species, chlorophyll-a data at different depths and certain life history parameters for invertebrates and fish. We reconstructed biomass estimates of fish groups based on stock size in marine protected areas to guide the calibration of Guam Atlantis and to evaluate the model’s ability to respond to a constant fishing pressure. After calibration and testing we believe that the model produces an adequate representation of Guam’s coral reef ecosystems. However, there still is a need for the incorporation of coral-reef-specific dynamics and improved physical oceanography to better simulate coral reef processes around Guam. These aspects are still under development and will be incorporated in the near future. After additional calibration with the fully developed Atlantis model, we will be able to evaluate alternative management scenarios. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This report was made possible with funding support from NOAA's Coral Reef Conservation Program and NOAA’s office of Habitat Conservation in support of NOAA’s Habitat Blueprint Initiative. Numerous people helped at various stages of the development of this ecosystem model. Gerry Davis, Jennifer Koss and Valerie Brown helped to get the initial funding. Data and feedback were provided by Ivor Williams, Terry Donaldson, Brett Taylor, Brent Tibbatts, Ed DeMartini, Laurie Raymundo, Dave Burdick, Valerie Brown, Roxanne Miller, Jesse Cruz, Annie Leon Guerrero, Jay Gutierrez, Joseph Cameron, Evangeline Lujan, Alex Kerr, Amanda Desvillers, Jade Delaveaux, Chuck Birkeland, Marc Nadon, Jon Brodziak, Carl Meyer, Adel Heenan, Oliver Vetter, Jamie Gove, Chip Young, Bernardo Vargas-Angel, Molly Timmers, Tomoko Acoba, Amanda Toperoff, Amanda Dillon, Darwina Griffin, Gerry Davis, Penglong Tao, Kimberly Lowe, Peter Houk, Tracey McDole, among others. v ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS AFDW ash-free dry weight ARMS Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structure BGM Box Geometry CCA crustose coralline algae CNMI Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands COTS crown-of-thorns seastar CPUE catch per unit effort CRED Coral Reef Ecosystem Division CSIRO Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation DAWR Guam Department of Aquatic and Wildlife Resources EPA Guam Environmental Protection Agency gh gear hours HYCOM Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Model IBM Individual-Based Model IUCN International Union for Conservation of Nature JIMAR Joint Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research MPA Marine Protected Areas NMFS National Marine Fisheries Service NOAA National Oceanic and Atmpspheric Administration PAR Photosynthetically Available Radiation PIFSC Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center REA Rapid Ecological Assessment SPC Stationary Point-Count SST Sea Surface Temperature WPacFIN Western Pacific Fisheries Information Network USGS U.S. Geological Survey vi CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................................1 GUAM .............................................................................................................................................4 CORAL REEF ECOSYSTEM MODELS .......................................................................................8