The red coral colonies that were transplanted a decade ago on the seabed of the Medes Islands have survived successfully. They are very similar to the original communities and have contributed to the recovery of the functioning of the coral reef, a habitat where species usually grow very slowly. Thus, these colonies, seized years ago from illegal fishing, have found a second chance to survive, thanks to the restoration actions of the University of Barcelona teams, in collaboration with the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM - CSIC), to transplant seized corals and mitigate the impact of poaching.
These results are now presented in an article in the journal Science Advances. Its main authors are the experts Cristina Linares and Yanis Zentner, from the UB's Faculty of Biology and the Biodiversity Research Institute (IRBio), and Joaquim Garrabou, from the ICM (of the Spanish National Research Centre, CSIC).
The findings indicate that actions to replant corals seized by the rural corps from poachers are effective not only in the short term - the first results were published after four years - but also in the long term, i.e. ten years after they have been initiated. Under the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021-2030) and the European Union's Nature Restoration Act, the paper stands out as one of the few research studies that has evaluated the success of long-term restoration in the marine ecosystem.
Transplanted colonies surviving and helping to structure the coralligenous habitat
Red coral (Corallim rubrum) poaching has been a threat even in marine protected areas and, in addition, due to the slow growth of this species, populations are still far from pristine conditions. The team's restoration work was carried out in the Montgrí, Medes Islands and Baix Ter Natural Park, "at a depth of around 18 metres, in a little-visited area where no poaching has been observed in recent years and which, for the moment, does not seem to be affected by climate change", explains Cristina Linares, professor at the UB's Department of Evolutionary Biology, Ecology and Environmental Sciences.
The results of this research study, which has received funding from both the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities and the European Union's Next Generation funds, reveal the high survival of the transplanted red coral colonies after so many years. "The restored community - i.e. the set of organisms in the environment where the transplanted coral is found - has been completely transformed in just ten years", says Linares.
