Marine benthic communities using ARMS
Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures (ARMS) are structures that make it possible to monitor benthic plant and animal communities in a systematic and standardised way. Recent ARMS studies carried out in European seas, including the Bay of Biscay, have shown that environmental variables, including ocean temperature, play a key role in the distribution of benthic communities. The composition of species in the marine benthos, monitored by ARMS, is an indicator that will help determine the response of the ecosystem to ocean warming.
- Rising ocean temperatures are causing changes in the structure and composition of benthic communities.
- Ocean warming in the Bay of Biscay over the last three decades may have had an impact on the redistribution of the benthic community along the Basque coast, benefiting warm-water species rather than cold-water species.
Relationship of the indicator to climate change
Recent ARMS studies using traditional and genetic taxonomy techniques carried out in European seas, including the Bay of Biscay, have shown that environmental variables, including ocean temperature, play a key role in the distribution of benthic communities (David et al., 2019; Pearman et al., 2020). Ocean warming in the Bay of Biscay over the last three decades seems to have had an impact on the redistribution of the benthic community along the Basque coast, benefiting warm-water species rather than cold-water species (Chust et al., 2022).
A time series of annual monitoring of the benthos using ARMS was launched as part of the Urban Klima 2050 project, starting in 2021, allowing the series that began in 2013 to be resumed. Monitoring ARMS every year will allow us to determine the extent to which changes in benthic community composition are related to increases in ocean temperature.
Installation of the ARMS in Lekeitio in 2021 and the subsequent colonisation of the marine benthos.
Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures (ARMS) are structures that make it possible to monitor benthic plant and animal communities in a systematic and standardised way. Their design is made up of a number of plates layered on top of each other in order to mimic the structural complexity of the hard substrate and to make it possible for a variety of benthic organisms to colonise. ARMS were developed by the Coral Reef Division of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in 2004 and have been implemented in all of the world's oceans (Zimmerman & Martin, 2004).
Each ARMS unit consists of nine 22.5 cm × 22.5 cm PVC plates and spacers stacked in an alternating series of open and closed formats, attached to a 35 cm × 45 cm base plate (Fig. 1). ARMS units are installed by divers and submerged for 12 months. The ARMS are then recovered and returned to the laboratory, where they are analysed and processed.
In the Bay of Biscay, ARMS were installed in 2013, 2021 and 2022 off Lekeitio.
Chust, G., M. González, A. Fontán, M. Revilla, P. Alvarez, M. Santos, U. Cotano, M. Chifflet, A. Borja, I. Muxika, Y. Sagarminaga, A. Caballero, I. de Santiago, I. Epelde, P. Liria, L. Ibaibarriaga, R. Garnier, J. Franco, E. Villarino, X. Irigoien, J. A. Fernandes-Salvador, A. Uriarte, X. Esteban, D. Orue-Echevarria, T. Figueira, and A. Uriarte. 2022. Climate regime shifts and biodiversity redistribution in the Bay of Biscay. Science of the Total Environment 803:149622.
David, R., Uyarra, M. C., Carvalho, S., Anlauf, H., Borja, A., Cahill, A. E., Carugati, L., Danovaro, R., De Jode, A., Feral, J. P., Guillemain, D., Martire, M. Lo, D’Avray, L. T. D. V., Pearman, J. K., & Chenuil, A. (2019). Lessons from photo analyses of Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures as tools to detect (bio-)geographical, spatial, and environmental effects. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 141(October 2018), 420–429. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2019.02.066
Pearman, J. K., Chust, G., Aylagas, E., Villarino, E., Watson, J. R., Chenuil, A., Borja, A., Cahill, A. E., Carugati, L., Danovaro, R., David, R., Irigoien, X., Mendibil, I., Moncheva, S., Rodríguez‐Ezpeleta, N., Uyarra, M. C., & Carvalho, S. (2020). Pan‐regional marine benthic cryptobiome biodiversity patterns revealed by metabarcoding Autonomous Reef Monitoring Structures. Molecular Ecology, 29(24), 4882–4897. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.15692
Zimmerman, T. L., & Martin, J. W. (2004). Artificial Reef Matrix Structures (Arms): An Inexpensive and Effective Method for Collecting Coral Reef-Associated Invertebrates. Gulf and Caribbean Research, 16(1), 59–64. https://doi.org/10.18785/gcr.1601.08.
