“Climate-driven regime shift of a temperate marine ecosystem” (2016), by Thomas Wernberg et al. Earth and Planetary Sciences research paper. Original abstract below, unchanged. No free PDF was found.

Climate-driven regime shift of a temperate marine ecosystem

Thomas Wernberg, Scott Bennett, Russell C. Babcock et al. · July 7, 2016 · Earth and Planetary Sciences

Abstract

Ecosystem reconfigurations arising from climate-driven changes in species distributions are expected to have profound ecological, social, and economic implications. Here we reveal a rapid climate-driven regime shift of Australian temperate reef communities, which lost their defining kelp forests and became dominated by persistent seaweed turfs. After decades of ocean warming, extreme marine heat waves forced a 100-kilometer range contraction of extensive kelp forests and saw temperate species replaced by seaweeds, invertebrates, corals, and fishes characteristic of subtropical and tropical waters. This community-wide tropicalization fundamentally altered key ecological processes, suppressing the recovery of kelp forests.

Source page DOI: 10.1126/science.aad8745