Charles Sheppard

The University of Warwick · School of Life Sciences

Some of the most interesting geological features of the Chagos and other Indian Ocean atolls are the `reef flats', which are emerged conglomerate platforms extending up to 100 m or more to seawards. To determine their ages and rate of horizontal growth we dated fossil corals from various islands using U/Th mass-spectrometry. Seven out of eleven cor...

There are major concerns about the ecological impact of extreme weather events. In the oceans, marine heatwaves (MHWs) are an increasing threat causing, for example, recent devastation to coral reefs around the world. We show that these impacts extend to adjacent terrestrial systems and could negatively affect the breeding of endangered species. We...

Supplemental Information for " Impacts of marine heatwaves for sea turtle incubation conditions".

Given the recent trend towards establishing very large marine protected areas (MPAs) and the high potential of these to contribute to global conservation targets, we review outcomes of the last decade of marine conservation research in the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), one of the largest MPAs in the world. The BIOT MPA consists of the atol...

The global decline of reef corals has been driven largely by several marine heatwaves. This has greatly reduced coral cover but has reduced coral diversity also. While there is a lack of data in most locations to detect coral species losses, reefs of the Chagos Archipelago, central Indian Ocean, have long term monitoring data extending back to the...

The ocean crisis is urgent and central to human wellbeing and life on Earth; past and current activities are damaging the planet's main life support system for future generations. We are witnessing an increase in ocean heat, disturbance, acidification, bio‐invasions and nutrients, and reducing oxygen levels. Several of these act like ratchets: once...

Here we present coral Sr/Ca data of biweekly resolution from three modern coral cores drilled from living Porites corals from two different reef settings at Chagos (tropical Indian Ocean). Chagos lies at the eastern margin of the Seychelles-Chagos thermocline ridge and features open ocean upwelling. In situ temperatures have been recorded by temper...

Briefly describes the physical environmental condition of the western Arabian Gulf.

As in the tropical Atlantic, Acropora populations in the southern Persian/Arabian Gulf plummeted within two decades after having been ecosystem engineers on most wave-exposed reefs since the Pleistocene. Since 1996/8 live coral cover in the Gulf declined by over 90% in many areas, primarily due to bleaching and diseases caused by rising temperature...

Aim Large‐scale variation in species richness results from multiple environmental controls. We proposed to identify the main factors that influence species richness of reef corals to provide insight into natural forces and their implications for future climate impacts. Location Indian Ocean. Methods We applied quantile regression (QR) to predict...

Although focused on aiding managers, these Guidelines are for anyone involved in supporting Large scale MPAs (LSMPAs) or the communities that hold an interest in them. It is hoped these Guidelines will also assist new LSMPAs from the earliest design phase, and enhance the management of existing LSMPAs from planning and implementation through ongoin...

The atolls and coral banks of the Chagos Archipelago (British Indian Ocean Territory) in the central Indian Ocean were badly affected by the warm water event that started in 2015 and lasted for nearly two years. On these reefs, coral mortality was very severe, reducing coral cover to <10% cover and usually about 5%, almost eliminating soft corals a...

The Chagos Archipelago (British Indian Ocean Territory, or BIOT) has 55 islands totalling approximately 5,000 ha spread over approximately 50,000 km 2 of the central Indian Ocean. From the first human settlements, which occurred in the late 1700s, and for the following century, all of the larger islands were converted into coconut plantations. Duri...

Being low and flat, atoll islands are often used as case studies against which to gauge the likely impacts of future sea-level rise on coastline stability. Furnished with lengthy temporal datasets, Pacific atolls form the majority of studies with scant information published for sites in the Indian Ocean. To address this imbalance, this study consid...

This article discusses two key issues: firstly, the demise of reefs in the Gulf which is happening probably more rapidly than elsewhere; and secondly, the reasons why this remains such an intractable problem. Most reasons for this decline are scientifically well understood, though clearly not by the region's managers. Several factors may cause peop...

Outbreaks of the crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS), Acanthaster planci, have occurred at many locations throughout the Indo-Pacific and are a major contributor to widespread coral loss and reef degradation. The causes of outbreaks remain controversial, but are commonly attributed to anthropogenically elevated nutrients and/or over-fishing. If so, it...

This study provides a preliminary review of the economic value of the ecosystem goods and services of the Chagos Islands, central Indian Ocean, in the period immediately prior to the designation of the Chagos marine reserve in April 2010. The goods and services valued include inshore and offshore fisheries, shoreline protection, scientific value, t...

The Aichi Biodiversity Targets were designed to promote and implement the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) by providing a framework for action to save biodiversity and enhance its benefits for people. Specifically, Target 11 aims to protect 10% of all seas by 2020. The percentage of the world's oceans that are protected has increased steadi...

The size structure and taxonomic composition of coral communities in the inner (Granitic) Seychelles were studied 10 years after a thermal stress‐induced mass mortality event. A survey of the abundance, population size structure and community composition of hard corals across 21 sites from three different geomorphological reef types on the Seychell...

In his In Depth News story “Warming may not swamp islands” (1 August, p. [496][1]), C. Pala argues that “coral reefs supporting sandy atoll islands will grow and rise in tandem with the sea,” based largely on studies that showed stable Pacific-island area over recent decades ([ 1 ][2]–[ 4

Over 1.3 billion people live on tropical coasts, primarily in developing countries. Many depend on adjacent coastal seas for food, and livelihoods. We show how trends in demography and in several local and global anthropogenic stressors are progressively degrading capacity of coastal waters to sustain these people. Far more effective approaches to...

I welcome the contribution by Harris to the ongoing debates around the Chagos Islands. He presents the complex tangle of issues with some clarity and relative balance that is often absent from many contributions on this subject. However, marrying scientific and political issues as Harris sets out to do is less helpful in this instance than distingu...

Hamylton and East [1] reported a remarkably substantial expansion and accretion of land since the 1960s at numerous sites along the island of Diego Garcia atoll. This atoll has a near continuous rim encircling its lagoon, and they reported that the width of the island rim has expanded by several tens of metres in many places. Those results contrast...

Commercial fishery catches in Brunei Darussalam between 2000 and 2009 were used to examine changes in community structure of Brunei's marine ecosystem – a relatively lightly harvested system within a region chronically overexploited by fisheries. We found that Mean Trophic Level (MTL) has declined at a rate of 0.08 trophic levels (TL) per decade, s...

Stylophora pistillata is a widely used coral "lab-rat" species with highly variable morphology and a broad biogeographic range (Red Sea to western central Pacific). Here we show, by analysing Cytochorme Oxidase I sequences, from 241 samples across this range, that this taxon in fact comprises four deeply divergent clades corresponding to the Pacifi...

Supplementary information

Over the period of BIOT’s existence, there have been a dozen scientific visits to its atolls by more than 50 scientists, and double this number have become engaged in work on materi- als sent back. It is clear, during this period when coral reefs in most of the Indian Ocean have become seriously degraded, that the reefs of Chagos persist in an exce...

The British Indian Ocean Territory consists of the Chagos archipelago, almost all of which was designated a no-take MPA in 2010. It covers 650,000 km2, with >60,000 km2 shallow limestone platform and reefs. This has doubled the global cover of such MPAs. It has strong biological affinities with the western Indian Ocean, and larval travel time to re...

This study quantified background rates of mortality for Acropora cytherea in the Chagos Archipelago. Despite low levels of anthropogenic disturbance, 27.5% (149/541) of A. cytherea colonies exhibited some level of partial mortality, and 9.0% (49/541) of colonies had recent injuries. A total of 15.3% of the overall surface area of physically intact...

A broad range of chemical contaminants and pollutants have been measured within the Chagos Archipelago. Contamination is amongst the lowest in the world. Whilst much data is in the open literature, the chapter also includes details of extensive pollution monitoring for the atoll Diego Garcia which hosts a military facility. Hydrocarbons present are...

The islands of the Chagos have never been connected to a continental land mass, are geologically young, low in relief, and are as remote as possible in the central Indian Ocean. The area permanently above water comprises <0.1 % of the Archipelago. These factors have led to an impoverished terrestrial flora and fauna with only a single endemic speci...

Understanding the limits and population dynamics of closely related sibling species in the marine realm is particularly relevant in organisms that require management. The crown-of-thorns starfish Acanthaster planci, recently shown to be a species complex of at least four closely related species, is a coral predator infamous for its outbreaks that h...

NeighborNet analyses of the (a) Northern and (b) Southern Indian Ocean sister-species. The two main clades within each species are highlighted, and the central Cocos Keeling Island haplotypes in the ESIO clade are surrounded by a grey box. (PDF)

Run conditions for the Migrate analyses (Control Region dataset) for the Northern (NIO) and Southern Indian Ocean (SIO) sister-species. (PDF)

Current direction and velocity during the peak of (a) the Southwest Monsoon (January mean from 1993 to 2009) and (b) the Northeast Monsoon (July mean from 1993 to 2009). Arrow colour indicates direction of flow (westward: blue, eastward: red), arrow length and plot background colour indicate current velocity in meters per second. Data obtained from...

Areas of primary productivity higher than 130 gC/m−2. In grey; modified from Reid et al., 2006, data for 1998–99 [not an El Niño year] after NASA SeaWiFS. (PDF)

Bayesian skyline plots for the (a) Northern and (b) Southern Indian Ocean sister-species. Black lines are an estimate of effective population size as a function of time, grey lines indicate the 95% upper and lower highest posterior probability interval. (PDF)

Genetic distance ΦST/(1−ΦST) as a function of the natural logarithm of geographic distance (in km) for the (a) Northern and (b) Southern Indian Ocean sister-species. (PDF)

Run conditions for the BEAST Bayesian Skyline analysis for both the Northern and the Southern Indian Ocean sister-species. (PDF)

Sampling locations of crown-of-thorns starfish individuals. With coordinates (decimal degrees), collector or reference, number of Control Region (CR) sequences (nCR) and of Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI) sequences (nCOI) per clade and location, and EMBL accession numbers (in grey are EMBL accession numbers from Vogler et al. (2008)). Locations preceded...

Pairwise ΦST values for the (a) Northern and (b) Southern Indian Ocean sister-species. (PDF)

We explore impacts on pristine atolls subjected to anthropogenic near-field (human habitation) and far-field (climate and environmental change) pressure. Using literature data of human impacts on reefs, we parameterize forecast models to evaluate trajectories in coral cover under impact scenarios that primarily act via recruitment and increased mor...

Results of the hind-casting model 2 - massive corals; presented for each environment; Data colums 1–5 show modeled frequencies in coral size classes, columns 6–13 show estimated number of spat in each model year. First and second line shows maxima and minima, third, italicized line is the mode (used for forecast models). Accuracy of model predictio...

Forecast solutions linking 2006 size-class data and population projections to the 2009 cover data. The increases in column 7 are comparable to those observed in the field [10]. Values in columns 2, 3, and 4 are those recruitment values from a large number of trials that led to the best-fitting increase assumption. In two cases, several equally acce...

Results of the hindcasting model 1- Branching/encrusting and arborescent corals, presented for each environment; Data colums 1–5 show modeled frequencies in coral size classes, columns 6–13 show estimated number of spat in each model year. First and second line shows maxima and minima, third, italicized line is the mode (used for forecast models)....

RFLP (28S and 18S) pattern of Symbiodinium clades in corals from Chagos Archipelago. RFLP banding profiles shown for 28S rDNA (a) include: type A (lane 2), type A+C (lanes 3 and 4), type C+Csh (Csh; lane 5), type C+Cs (Cs; lanes 6 and 7) and type C (lanes 8–11), with the 100 bp DNA marker in lane 1. RFLP patterns of 18S rDNA (b) include: type A (la...

Phylogenetic analysis of 28S-rDNA sequences. Maximum likelihood tree of all the samples from this study combined (a) and Neighbour-joining trees showing details of Clade C group (b) and clade A group (c). Samples from this study are represented by colored letters. (EPS)

The biogeographic and host information for the Genbank Accession numbers of Symbiodinium used for phylogenetic analysis. (DOC)

The Chagos Archipelago designated as a no-take marine protected area in 2010, lying about 500 km south of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean, has a high conservation priority, particularly because of its fast recovery from the ocean-wide massive coral mortality following the 1998 coral bleaching event. The aims of this study were to examine Symbiodin...

The harsh climate of the Gulf puts severe constraints on coral survival and, therewith, on biodiversity by restricting the number of coral species that can survive in the harsh conditions. Despite this and despite being at the western high-latitude edge of Indo-Pacific reef coral distribution, the Gulf’s coral fauna is surprisingly rich. Within the...

The Gulf is located in a subtropical, hyper-arid region. It is shallow, and bordered by several wealthy states (Fig. 16.1) undergoing rapid economic growth involving substantial construction along shores and offshore regions, underpinned by its oil and gas industry, and by wealth derived from financial centres. Thriving economic activity has, over...

1. The Chagos Archipelago was designated a no-take marine protected area (MPA) in 2010; it covers 550 000 km2, with more than 60 000 km2 shallow limestone platform and reefs. This has doubled the global cover of such MPAs. 2. It contains 25–50% of the Indian Ocean reef area remaining in excellent condition, as well as the world’s largest contiguous...

The Chagos Archipelago was designated a no‐take marine protected area (MPA) in 2010; it covers 550 000 km ² , with more than 60 000 km ² shallow limestone platform and reefs. This has doubled the global cover of such MPAs. It contains 25–50% of the Indian Ocean reef area remaining in excellent condition, as well as the world's largest contiguous un...

The effects of Hurricane Emily (July 2005, Category 4) on nine different benthic substrates in the reef-associated landscape along the west coast of Cozumel (Mexico) were evaluated by comparing the cover of nine types of substrate on ground-truthed sites before (ten months) and after (two months) the hurricane. Four substrates showed significant di...

The effects of Hurricane Emily (July 2005, Category 4) on nine different benthic substrates in the reef–associated landscape along the west coast of Cozumel (Mexico) were evaluated by comparing the cover of nine types of substrate on ground–truthed sites before (ten months) and after (two months) the hurricane. Four substrates showed significant di...

1. The Chagos archipelago was designated a no-take MPA in 2010; it covers 550,000 km2, with >60,000 km2 shallow limestone platform and reefs. This has doubled the global cover of such MPAs. 2. It contains 25-50% of the Indian Ocean reef area remaining in excellent condition, as well as the world’s largest contiguous undamaged reef area. It has suf...

1. The Chagos Archipelago was designated a no-take marine protected area (MPA) in 2010; it covers 550 000 km 2 , with more than 60 000 km 2 shallow limestone platform and reefs. This has doubled the global cover of such MPAs. 2. It contains 25–50% of the Indian Ocean reef area remaining in excellent condition, as well as the world's largest contigu...

The Gulf is considered to be a young sea in decline, with poor prognosis for continuing production of abundant natural resources. We compare and contrast ‘monetary’ and ‘environmental’ compensation as mechanisms for addressing ecosystem damage in the Gulf. The 1992 International Oil Pollution Compensation Conventions settle claims financially, but...

Long-term changes in coral cover for the Caribbean and the Pacific/Southeast Asia regions (PSEA) have proven extremely useful in assessing the main drivers, magnitude and timescales of change. The one major coral reef region where such assessments have not been made is the Indian Ocean (IO). Here, we compiled coral cover survey data from across the...

Associations between branching corals and infaunal crabs are well known, mostly due to the beneficial effects of Trapezia and Tetralia crabs in protecting host corals from crown-of-thorns starfish (e.g., Pratchett et al. 2000) and/or sedimentation (Stewart et al. 2006). These crabs are obligate associates of live corals and highly prevalent across...

The decline of large‐bodied predatory species in the oceans is a concern both from a sustainability perspective and because such species can have important ecological roles. Sharks are particularly vulnerable to fishing as their life histories are characterized by late age at maturity, large body size, and low fecundity. Substantial shark populatio...