ANALYSIS OF SCLERACTINIAN DISTRIBUTION IN TAIWAN INDICATING A PATTERN CONGRUENT WITH SEA SURFACE TEMPERATURES AND CURRENTS : EXAMPLES FROM ACROPORA AN D FAVIIDAE CORALS

Abstract

Chaolun Allen Chen (1999) Analysis of scleractinian distribution in Taiwan indicating a pattern congruent with sea surface temperatures and currents: examples from Acropora and Faviidae corals. Zoological Studies 38(2): 119-129. Taiwan, a continental island with several offshore islets, is located on the center or junction of the Philippine-Japan island arc. Approximately 300 species of scleractinian corals occur around Taiwan and its neighboring islets except on the west coast with its sandy or muddy habitats. I analyzed the distribution patterns of 104 species of 2 major groups of scleractinian corals, the genus Acropora and family Faviidae, from 8 regional databases using distance and parsimony methods. Distance analyses (neighbor-joining) indicate that southern Taiwan and Green Island possess similar scleractinian distributions for both Acropora and Faviidae corals, whereas northeastern Taiwan groups with other locations of Penghu. Parsimony analysis (exhaustive search) of Acropora shows a similar pattern of distance analysis, whereas parsimonious tree of Faviidae united northeast- ern Taiwan with Green Island and South Taiwan leaving Penghu as a single group. Combining both Acropora and Faviidae, parsimony analysis suggests 2 distinct provinces of scleractinian distributions which show a congru- ence with sea surface temperatures and currents around Taiwan. Reef-building corals, the scleractinians, are distributed throughout tropical and subtropical re- gions of the world. Distribution patterns of sclerac- tinians are usually characterized in terms of numbers of families, genera, or species present in different regions. Veron (1995) summarized the global distri- bution and species diversity of scleractinians, sug- gesting that there is no Indo-Pacific center of diver- sity at the family level, with the Caribbean being almost as diverse as the Indo-Pacific. At the generic level, configuration of diversity is dominated by the Indo-Pacific center of diversity, with a relatively low diversity in the western Atlantic. Species diversity is also overwhelmingly high in the Indo-Pacific region with uniformity from the Red Sea to Fiji (Veron 1993 1995). Regional (or latitudinal) distribution of sclerac- tinians is presumably influenced by local physical- environmental constraints. Three major regions of the Indo-Pacific locations, including Philippines-